A guide to nothing?
Nothing is complicated, it might appear simple, the absence of anything does not seem to be much, and that is true, that is until you realise that everything comes from nothing. Before the big bang there was just the great pause, nothing at all, no time, gravity, matter, there was pure absence, it could not have come from anything, that was theoretical and practically impossible, it could have only have come from nothing, and the release of that nothingness created everything, the potential of nothing is the whole of existence, it produced all the energy that has ever been. What we are currently witnessing, the passage of time and our reality is the the unwinding of a clock that has been slowing down since the first moment of the universe's creation and we are riding on that motion like a surfer on a wave, it is not a coincidence that that the arrow of time and the amount of potential energy available both have a single definite direction back to nothing.
Each human life has the same flow of potential consciousness that also comes out of nothingness, whilst a mother's labours required a huge amount of effort, awareness itself arrives from nowhere, it burst into the world with no pre-destiny or plan, if we did we would not waste years learning to walk, talk and think. That pure consciousness has to point out into the world, it has a firm outwards facing direction it has to know the world before it can know itself, it falls into the world from nothing, it was nothing and then it falls outwards toward the ground of experience, the gravity of which pulls us towards knowing the world and environment around us. There is without doubt elements of nature and nurture in all the outcomes in our lives, what job, the level of our education, our character and preferences, both of which did not appear from the air, they emerge from pre-existing conditions, we get our genes from our parents and normally their nurture, we inherit the society that they live in, however the consciousness itself is the random element that is unaccountable for, and that changes everything, it is indeed the engine of our progress as a community and human beings.
Nothingness is the crucial element that changes everything else, it is where randomness emerges from but more than that it loads the dice in favour of good outcomes, you can even sit with nothingness and feel that goodness, you can witness it, it is what is left when you strip away everything else, and it is magical, there is no other sensible word for it. That is why you see those enlightened individual going around with smiles on their faces like they know the cosmic joke, as when you sit with an empty consciousness and just listen to nothingness, it turns out that joy is just sitting there like a dog waiting for it's owner to return, it been there forever and it is happy to see you, it always knew you would return and you being there proves it was right, what joy! That is why it is well worth searching for nothingness in your life, we seek peace, calm, tranquillity, what a lack of ambition, go for the joy as early and often as possible, if you choose it, it will come.
There is always a choice, it might not be conscious, so little is until you seek it, which is the basic unit of freewill, choosing to pay attention. You have to decide to become aware of joy and then focus your attention on it, and if you are not paying attention to the joy in your life, that is a choice, even if you are not aware of making it and there might be a thousand subconscious decisions being made that are getting in the way of making that choice. That is the nature of consciousness so much of it is subconscious running in the background without you realising that it is drain so much of your energy, attention and awareness, that is the gift of returning nothingness, it strips away distraction allows you to see what programs are running and then you have the option to stop them.
The reason for this is that you started them before you knew what you were doing, you were a young learning machine and anything in your life circumstances could start a program that will run until you become aware of it. However we all have the option to decide on our intentions, that is the intentionally stating what you want to do, say it out loud or clearly in your thoughts, and when you get distracted restate them, though this is not a shopping list, have one intention at a time, whether that is to be open hearted, to listen or be aware, by setting your intention you are speaking clearly to your subconscious (they do not always listen the first time!). This is the way that we get to talk to our subconscious, our conscious mind is the input that matter to them and our intentions instruct them.
Though our intentions can run into some very stubborn programs and stopping them can be uncomfortable, especially as one of the favourite reactions to pain is to contain that pain in a box so that you can deal with it later in safe mode. However that safe mode never seems to come, more stuff just keeps on happening and put in more boxes, so when you finally start to deal with all those old boxes of programs you have got a full attic that need opening, and that is a lot of painful energy.
The only way to deal with it is to let it pass through you, a bit at a time, not in a metaphor sense but by letting the feelings and energy run through your physical body which you will feel physically (I stress this as people ignore that I mean this literally, it is as real as burning your hand on a kettle) concentrate on the physical sensations that occur and do not judge them or comment, “let them come, let them be and let them go” there is no other way. We let them return to nothingness, and it is by being at ease with nothingness that we are able to do so, we need to become like a mirror to these sensations that we feel whilst we watch it.
It is by being a mirror that contains nothing that we are able to give up our reaction to the pain that life contains both in the moment and all that pain we have put into boxes until we can deal with them. It is only by stopping the drama of taking everything personally, that we stop thinking about the pain as it is happening to us, and let them just happen as information. The simplest form of this surrendering to what is, is minimalism, when we declutter we are moving back towards nothing, we are giving up most of the things that we have taken so much trouble, time and money to acquire, the surprising thing is that by removing that which we do not need, we actually gain something better. We sacrificed our stuff to gain a better position of having space, the physical representation of nothing, and it feels great, light, freeing and luxurious, it is the easiest and most accessible form of spiritual progress, the training wheels before we start riding the bike, that is why if we stop at just minimalism it is so easy to slide back to having too much stuff because we have not declutter our mind.
When we move back towards nothingness it is so we can view the world and ourselves in a clearer, purer light, without all the shadows of our past, and we can restart the learning process of human being, that is the moving towards the best self-actualised version of ourselves. It is by allowing nothingness to exist in our live that we are able to be something, it is the only true plumb line against which we can measure ourselves, as it is completely honest. When we decide nothing matters in the long run, everything becomes important in the moment as whatever could be important, how we act, our judgement, how present we are, are all vital to the quality and depth of our experience, we get to see clearly how these action impact us, how good it feels to be of service as opposed to being greedy and self-serving. By seeking nothing, you get the present instead and every emotion, all beauty, all goodness only ever exist in this moment, so find your nothing as it contains everything.
