Being

In your moment of complete selflessness, when all things flow through and leave no trace

Scripture

Mud-waves churn the jar; stillness is what clarifies.

Bubbles rise and die; dregs sink into the dark.

The water’s bones gradually crystalize; being is in mixing, is in stopping.

Being is in stirring, is in settling; being is in murk, is in clarity.

Clarity is not wiping—it is the waves calming themselves.

The dust settles; the pool-mirror has no grain.

Wenzi · On Being

Your heart is like a jar of muddy water shaken violently. Mud and sand churn, turbid waves roll (mud-waves churn the jar); the debris of thoughts, emotions, and memories stirs crazily within. You cannot see anything clearly, only a chaos of restlessness. You try to think, analyze, sort it out—but that is like stirring the muddy water with your hand; it only makes it murkier.

At some point, you are thoroughly tired. You lay down every effort of “sorting out.” You simply place this jar of muddy water, gently, steadily, on an absolutely level surface. Then you step back one pace, and just watch. You allow it to “settle” (stillness is what clarifies).

“Bubbles rise and die; dregs sink into the dark.” The process begins: those restless “bubbles” (the inflated thoughts and emotions) rise to the surface, and die one by one (rise and die). Those heavy “dregs” (the fixed cognitions and wounds) slowly, firmly, sink toward the bottom of the jar, returning to the dark (sink into the dark). You are not doing anything—you are allowing the “settling” to happen of itself.

Good. Keep this posture. Do not intervene, do not judge. Your whole task is to be an absolutely steady, absolutely level “surface,” letting that jar called “the heart” rest on your thus-abiding awareness. “The water’s bones gradually crystalize; being is in mixing, is in stopping.” Gradually, between the chaos and the stopping (being is in mixing, is in stopping), in the middle layer of the muddy water, the “bones of the water” begin to show a “crystal” texture (the water’s bones gradually crystalize). Murk above, sediment below, and in between, clearer and clearer water.

“Being is in stirring, is in settling; being is in murk, is in clarity.” You review the whole process: it contains “stirring” and “settling,” “murk” and “clarity” (being is in stirring, is in settling; being is in murk, is in clarity). But the key is not at either end—it is in that containing space which “allows everything to complete itself.”

“Clarity is not wiping—it is the waves calming themselves.” At last you understand: true “clarity” (clarity) is not “wiping” the dirt with effort (is not wiping). It is the natural result of the waves “calming themselves” after every stirring force has rested (it is the waves calming themselves). Clarity is not created—it is revealed.

“The dust settles; the pool-mirror has no grain.” At last, all dust settles (the dust settles). That jar of muddy water has turned into a deep “mirror,” its surface smooth as glass, without one line of grain (the pool-mirror has no grain). All things may be reflected in it, but nothing can leave a trace on its surface.

You still think, still feel, still live.

But you know the heart has become that grain-less pool-mirror.

You are not the muddy jar that needs cleaning—

you are that mirror which reflects all that is yet is moved by none—

that naturally clear, traceless mirror-pool.

Being-Clarity: you are not the purifier—you are that clarity itself, the mirror-still water naturally revealed after ten thousand streams have passed.