Q. What is the truth when everything is an illusion?
A. Every illusion is the truth itself. To take the sea for example, there are countless waves in the sea, each of which has its own unique form. There are no two waves that are exactly the same as each other. However, the essence of the waves is just part of the sea, whatever shape and size they may have.
All things we can see, hear, and feel are to the truth as waves are to the sea. We classify and label all things individually or in groups according to their size and shape. In fact, the essence of all the things, however, is the truth, whatever labels are put on them.
Everything is an illusion when we don’t know that everything is the truth.
However, when we have realised that everything is the truth, there is nothing, whatever label it may have, that doesn’t belong to the truth, just as there is no wave that doesn’t belong to the sea. Therefore, it is said that every illusion is the truth when you can see things as they are.
Student: “What is the truth?”
Master: “What is not?”
©Boo Ahm
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