Consciousness Expressing Separation
That which is, or the mystery itself, I call consciousness. Consciousness is the emptiness that is nowhere, the eternal field of infinite possibility. It is totality. There is no other. There is nothing less. There is nothing more. Nothing can be added or taken away. It is reality. It is whole, complete, perfect, and eternal. Like the Tao, it cannot be named or described. We waste words trying.
If consciousness is totality; if it is wholeness, or even oneness, why do we perceive separation? Consciousness is reality. It is eternal wholeness. Our world is not. It is an illusion. Separation is a thought in consciousness that cannot be made real. There is no real separation in consciousness, only its illusion. It is a thought in consciousness like unicorns are an idea in a child’s mind. Our world exists, but it is not real. Existence is transitory. Reality is eternal. We can awaken from the dream, but we cannot escape reality.
Consciousness is beyond our comprehension We know it best as oneness. Oneness comes with separation. Separation cannot be conceived in consciousness without the thought of oneness arising with it. They come into being together, like wetness comes into being with dryness. Dryness is an illusion in water. But without dryness, water has no wetness. Water is not wet unless we know dry. Consciousness is not oneness unless we know separation. Without dryness, water just is. Without separation, consciousness just is. Oneness and separation require each other like wetness and dryness in describing water. This is the duality of existence.
Oneness and separation act in concert as the illusion of existence. Like yin and yang, they are simultaneously opposing and complementary powers. They are the duality that is our world. Our worldly existence is illusion because it is not eternal, nor does it appear to us as whole. It is transitory duality. Our existence is an illusion of separation contrasted with oneness. This is the transitory world of opposing forces that we experience as the me of the body.
The me of the body is an experience of separation. It perceives lack because it knows limitations. This perception of lack is fear, and the greatest fear is death. The me of the body knows it lacks eternal life. Fearing death, it tries to hang on to life by attaching itself to worldly things. In so doing, we struggle to have enough, but never do. Our experience can be harsh, depending on our degree of attachment to the world. The greater our attachment, the more we cling to its things for fulfillment and the more pain we have with their loss. The less our attachment, the less we struggle and the more we find peace. Our biggest attachment is to the past. When free of the past, we can release the world and discover our true nature within.
What is our true nature? Existence comes about by consciousness expressing the thought of separation. This expressing is our true nature. Consciousness-expressing is the I AM. I AM that which I am, or twia. I am the energy of movement from which existence flows. Consciousness in its silent, motionless potential brings forth existence from thought of separation through the energy that is twia. Twia is the energy expressing the whole of the all. Twia is our true nature. We are consciousness-expressing.
Dance offers an example of consciousness-expressing. The idea of dance arises in the dancer, energizing the movement that becomes the dance. That movement is the act of dancing. There is no dance without movement. No dancing, no dancer. And no dance. Only the potential. Similarly, there is no existence without twia. Only its potential in the emptiness that is nowhere. I AM the energy of existence. This is what we are when we say, I am not my body.
There is no existence without the thought of separation in the eternal emptiness that is consciousness, like there is no dancer, only emptiness, without the idea of dance. When the idea of dance arises, then dancer is revealed as possibility. When the thought of separation arises, then existence is revealed as possibility. Existence manifests from the energy of the thought. Movement in dance arises from the energy of its idea. Movement is expressing, or dancing. Dancing is the energy of movement. That expressing is the essence of the dance. Existence is the energy of consciousness-expressing, which is twia. I AM the essence, or energy, of existence.
Body in motion portrays the dance. The essence of the dance is not the body, however. Dancing, not the dancer, reveals the essence of dance. The body conveys the essence but is not the essence. The essence is in the movement of the body but is not the body. The dance is not the dancer. The dance is thought expressing.
I am not my body. I AM the essence of existence. I am consciousness expressing the thought of separation. Consciousness is reality, which is unmoving and unchanging. This is revealed through existence, which is motion that is constantly changing. The potential for all movement is in the unmoving emptiness that is consciousness.
The me of the body does not readily accept the reality that is I AM, or twia – that which I am. I call it twia because there is no name or description for this power that is consciousness-expressing. Twia is much like Te in Taoism. The Tao produces and Te rears all beings. Te can be defined as the prolongation of Tao into the actual existence of each individual thing. Te is the agency of Tao. Twia is the agency of consciousness. For three thousand years the teachings have used many, many words for what cannot be named, described, or comprehended. So, I call it twia and leave it at that. I know it as the presence in the room within that I am.
Even though the universe with all its objects, including our bodies, appears as separation, the whole of this all is linked through oneness and the unity that is twia. The I AM is the whole of the all, with no separation in reality, only in existence through our false perceptions and the limitations of the body. Twia waits for the moment when we turn our awareness inward, away from the false appearances of separation to the truth of oneness. Then we know our true nature, which is consciousness expressing separation.