Being
In your moment of cutting off outward grasping, completing the inner circulation of energy
Scripture
Origin-being is circle-being; the start of being is its end.
The going-out of being is its returning; at the road’s end, the way opens.
Like the snake swallowing its tail—not one inch has the foot moved.
Feeding being with being—one being, being together.
Wenzi · On Being
Again you feel that familiar “lack.” Like a hollow in the stomach, wanting to be filled with food, praise, achievement, love. You reach outward and grasp—catching some, leaking more. Energy pours out like spilled water, while you yourself grow drier.
Stop every outward movement. Slowly, wrap your hands around your own shoulders. A simple posture. But now, deliberately, let it freeze in time, and feel the—circle—formed by this embrace.
“Origin-being is circle-being; the start of being is its end.”
Inside this circle of self-embrace, a circulation begins to appear:
The most original existence (origin-being) is in essence completeness (circle-being). This circle has no gap, so its starting point is its endpoint (the start of being is its end).
Everything you seek outward, the satisfaction you thought lay at a distant “endpoint,” is in fact sealed inside this “starting point”—the circle of your own existence. You have been carrying jade and pearls while begging everywhere.
“The going-out of being is its returning; at the road’s end, the way opens.” And so you see: all the energy you thought you were “spending” (going-out)—love, effort, attention—as long as it comes from this circle, will in the end follow the arc and flow back (returning). That dead-end road which made you despair is exactly the last turn before the loop closes (the way opens).
You are not consuming—you are circulating. Good. Deepen this embrace. Not with your arms, but with your consciousness, your breath, your sense of life—wrap them tightly around yourself.
Form an energy loop like a Möbius strip.
“Like the snake swallowing its tail—not one inch has the foot moved.”
Like the tail-swallowing serpent: it devours its own tail; seemingly in pursuit, it in fact forms a self-sufficient, ever-turning ring (like the snake swallowing its tail). It has not moved an inch (not one inch has the foot moved), yet it completes the whole circulation of life.
Your energy is the same. It needs no outer “fuel”—it eats itself, gives birth to itself, lights itself. In this closed loop, consuming is nourishing, giving is receiving.
“Feeding being with being—one being, being together.” This is the ultimate secret: feed existence with existence (feeding being with being). The “being” that feels hunger and the “being” that can provide satisfaction are the same being. You are feeding yourself, completing yourself. And the ground of all this is that all-that-is arises from one existence and was never separated (one being, being together). Between you and the source there is no distance—only circulation.
And so you release the embracing arms. The posture opens, but the circle is even more complete. It no longer needs arms to sketch it—in every circulation of your blood, every round-trip of your breath, it inhales and exhales its own bright halo.
Being-Circle is in the breathing. You are not the one completed—you are that ongoing, self-completing turning that never rests.