Solving Yourself

by Wu Hsin

  In seeing the false as false, you are seeing the truth.

  10

  All phenomena come and go.

  What one is is the aware space in which these phenomena materialize, in which the self-conscious mirage appears.

  Or it could be stated with this conceptual distinction: awareness is simply that triad of "I"-awareness, "I am"-ness as formlessness, and "I am"-ness with form.

  The last two always resolve back into "I"-awareness.

  11

  We are already looking from that which we are looking for. In that sense, we really need not go anywhere.

  The ability to observe change means that you stand outside of it.

  The Changeless, residing in the background, observes the change. It is a pre-existing condition.

  This I-am is the consciousness in which the world appears through the senses of the instrument in which I-am dwells, this body.

  This is the This that I am and not that which I appear to be.

  12

  Personhood provides continuity; the events of life flow from the future into the present to the past.

  However, in accepting being a person, we sacrifice the splendor of the infinite for the security of the particular.

  13

  Non-discriminating or non-differentiating consciousness is what is prior to thought.

  Whatever thought arrives ultimately departs.

  Attending to thought makes attending to That which permanently transcends all comings and goings virtually impossible.

  14

  The totality of thought we call mind. The waves rise and fall, come and go.

  Energy moving through space creates wind. It is the same energy moving through water that creates waves. Likewise, that energy moving through the brain creates wave-states called thought.

  What is the mind other than the assistant of the "I" thought?

  It strategizes, it reacts, it serves and protects. It edits memory, sometimes re-writing, other times imagining alternative outcomes.

  The numerous arguments about the mind are produced by the mind itself, for its own protection and continuation. Wu Hsin refuses to provide it with authentication.

  15

  When every inch of the canvas is covered with paint, the background, the canvas, is lost.

  This world is one such painting and it is the mind which both impedes and distorts one’s perception of the canvas.

  16

  So many are looking for a way, a means to see more clearly.

  When Wu Hsin tells them that the way leads through yourself to before yourself; they shake their heads.

  They want to add something to themselves, as if a lack needs to be filled.

  But, adding tin to gold doesn't make better gold.

  What you seek is so near you, that there really is no room for a way. Most insist that isn't enough.

  So Wu Hsin says that if there is any way, if there is anything that needs to be done, it may very well be simply to listen to his words.

  What else is there to do? It is like eating. All you can do is to place the food in your mouth, chew and swallow. Everything that ensues is spontaneous, unconscious and automatic.

  17

  In most, there is an inherent dissatisfaction. Something is not right. Yet, one consistently fails in righting the not-right because one looks in the wrong place.

  The problem is not the world; the problem is one’s view of the world.

  You have created a collection of personal knowledge, beliefs and opinions based on second hand information. You never questioned whether it is flawed or not. For your entire life, you have been led around by a perspective that simply isn't true.

  The process to correction begins with being empty...........empty of all comparisons, empty of all beliefs.

  Empty of notions of the lush landscape of Heaven, empty of the notions of the harsh terrain of Hell. Empty of what we believe lies in between the two.

  Empty.

  That's what Wu Hsin leads you to.

  18

  Memory is the entirety of the field of the known. There is no memory of the unknown.

  It is the capture of details, correlations and patterns in what is perceived and adapting the mind and behavior accordingly in order to insure survival.

  It is a four step process: cognize, which is to see for the first time, recognize, which is seeing for the second time, storage, and access or recall, which is bringing it into the present.

  In that sense, one's past only appears in this present moment.

  Worldly knowledge is only memory. One knows something because one remembers it.

  However, to know one’s real self, one need not remember it.

  One knows it by being it.

  19

  All there is, is life or functioning and the perception of that life or functioning.

  Humans have the tendency to create entities where none are needed or truly exist. It is all a construction project which started with the arrival of "me".

  Wu Hsin instructs you that all talk of persons and individualities is nothing more than the mind's diversion, to try to impose order on what seems like disorder.

  To be, no past or future is required.

  These are only needed to be something in particular.

  20

  There is a singular step in understanding; it is in giving up the false concept of I/me as a separate entity.

  Then there is no need for merging with the Totality because the notional boundary has been eliminated.

  It then becomes clear that it is foolish to talk about being "one with" that which you've truly never been separate from. The idea of oneness collapses in the absence of two-ness.

  Apperception of this is not a gradual affair. Apperception is like lightning, spontaneous and instantaneous.

  21

  Do not speak to Wu Hsin about your ideas of yourself.

  Whose idea was it to limit yourself to time and space, to squeeze yourself into a body, and into the duration of a lifetime?

  All self-descriptions are only ideas. You are not an idea.

  This delusion is almost universal. Clarity is rare.

  Yet there is hope, because the moment one perceives delusion, one is on the way toward clarity.

  22

  Wu Hsin’s words are directed toward That in you which was present before the superimposition of "you" arrived.

  Any attempt to process his words via this "you" can, at best, bring limited results.

  Trust him when he tells you that this enlightenment you are seeking wants to happen. It is seeking you as much, if not more, than you are seeking it.

  The only thing that needs to be done is to get out of your own way. Then, knowing arises.

  At its simplest, this knowing is conscious of a “who,” but there certainly isn’t a “who” that is conscious of the knowing.

  Superimpositions always need to be supported, with stories, dramas, ideas, philosophy, etc. because they cannot stand on their own. The knowingness which you are, doesn’t need any support.

  One strategy, when confronted with these words, is to change the subject. But within the context of Wu Hsin’s instruction, the Subject never changes.

  23

  The play has already been written.

  Absent your directly and persuasively communicating with the playwright, the idea of altering the script is another ego-based illusion.

  Understand that you are sitting in the audience, laughing or crying.

  To clarify further, the difference between life and "your life" is involvement. Personality is a tool; you use it when you need it.

  But at no time do you become it.

  24

  Elimination is a key to life. In the absence of the processes of elimination, the poisons accumulate and ultimately the body dies.

  What-Is is realized also by the processes of elimination.

  Eliminate all that you think you know, all your beliefs, and you will find yourself face to face wi
th Truth.

  Within the context of anyone doing anything, that is what needs to be done.

  25

  Your personal narrative is merely a representation. It allows for anchoring to something, in essence, to locate yourself.

  The mind does not create facts; it either describes them or distorts them.

  When the biases and distortions inherent in one's story are seen through, the story loses its power.

  You are here at this moment in time because of everything you have done before. You are here at this moment in time in spite of everything you have done before.

  You are here; that's all that matters.

  Can you simply stop and be here without concerning yourself with the question "What's next?"

  26

  When one asks "Who am I" and receives no answer, one fails to realize that no answer is the answer.

  If you are no thing in particular, what answer can you expect?

  To have a mind, you must be someone. See that both self and mind are not things; they are processes.

  Then ask "Who experiences them?"

  By steady and continuous investigation into the nature of these, they are resolved back into That to which they point back.

  27

  The person is like the music produced by the instrument.

  A name is merely an address. What occupies the address is what is important.

  It is there, like your shadow is there in daylight. Give it the same attention that you give to your shadow.

  When you are alive and conscious, but no longer self-conscious, your days of personhood will have ended.

  28

  Like the tartness in a lime or the sweetness of honey, the person is merely the quality or expression of the organism.

  The individual is really a series of interconnected processes working together that give the appearance of being a single, separated whole.

  Wu Hsin instructs you here today that there are no activities of any individual.

  There is only the activity of the unmanifest as manifestation.

  March (Zhēng Yuè)

  1

  One believes that he knows what he is. Wu Hsin challenges that.

  What is believed is mere hearsay, told to you over and over by your parents, peers, teachers and by society.

  You have never taken the time to look and see for yourselves.

  That’s what you will do here…………… and you will do that by removing what you aren’t and seeing what remains. It is the same method as the sculptor uses.

  Many believe that the sculptor adds shape and texture to the raw material to create the sculpture.

  Wu Hsin prefers to see the sculptor as simply removing from the raw material everything that isn’t the sculpture. What remains is the sculpture

  2

  There is no self-consciousness in deep sleep, only in waking. Yet, "you are" in both. This "you are" is what you are.

  At its core, this what you are moves you to discern what you are not. Seeing what is false as false is sufficient.

  All problems are ultimately reducible to two components: you and the world. All me's and you's exist only as one another's objects.

  The world is another set of objects. As such, all problems are between objects. How can the subjective be affected unless there is identification?

  The use of objects to define yourself needs to end. Do you need a mirror to know that you are? Can a mirror even tell you what you are, when what you are is formless?

  "This" and "that" are then seen not to be separate from That, but only aspects of That.

  3

  Beliefs are the unquestioned acceptance of an idea in the absence of verification and reason.

  Beliefs are not facts; beliefs are the escape from facts. Beliefs are the food of a make-believe world.

  Permanent clarity is available to you, but not if you want to cling to your beliefs.

  If you insist on believing, believe this:

  I am Conscious Life Energy. Because I am, all is. I am vibrant intelligence, by which flowers

  grow and wounds heal. In my absence, existence as it is known, ceases. The world is my manifest

  expression and this body is its instrument of perception and action. In this regard, I am the Knowing of every sensation, feeling and thought. I am the Author of every action.

  4

  One is alive, one is conscious and one is conscious of being conscious.

  This is the proof of the presence of the Conscious Life Energy.

  Can a shirt be independent of its thread?

  The fixation on the gross object by necessity masks its underlying support.

  But it can never negate it.

  5

  One can only know what occurs within the mind, which is the instrument or tool of conscious experience.

  There is no such thing as "out there".

  There is only our perception as inbound data. Everything is registered, just as it is. It is only via the mind that a selective representation of the data is created.

  Thoughts are objects in the mind as things are objects in the world. The mind and the world are two separate dimensions, overlapping during the waking state.

  When you can so readily create a world when you dream, why do you believe the impossibility of your creating another world when you are awake?

  6

  The mind is the process through which expression comes. The thought "I am" is the expression of being conscious.

  It is the bridge from the relative to the Absolute. It is the aperture through which the Absolute perceives its expressions.

  But you are neither the field nor its contents.

  You are That Light by which light is perceived.

  You are That which provides the blank canvas onto which the paint is applied. You provide the space which supports all objects while itself being ignored.

  You are the seeing, the hearing, the perceiving, the knowing, and the doing of all that is seen, heard, perceived, known and done.

  Like the wind, That that you are is known only by its effects.

  7

  Hearsay is information gathered by one person from another person concerning some event, condition, or thing of which the first person had no direct experience.

  What is "the known, from direct experience"?

  You are and this world is. These can be further reduced to perceiving and the objects of perception.

  Let this be the point of departure for this investigation.

  You are in deep, dreamless sleep. You are dreaming, you are awake.

  The "I" is present in all three. Without calling on hearsay, what is this "I"?

  8

  For those who are pursuing the discovery of the essential nature, it is vital to distinguish between thinking and watching the mind.

  Witnessing the mechanism of the mind is vastly different from being fixated by thought.

  When in thought, you are absent to what is present, but when you watch the mind, without getting involved, you can discern your very own beingness.

  Over time, you discern that you can exist without thoughts, but thoughts cannot exist without the energy you provide them.

  When you are no longer chained by your beliefs and your mechanical responses, you are autonomous, free.

  9

  Dreaming, waking and sleep appear on the substratum of subjectivity, that which is present throughout as a singular constant.

  This subjectivity is the common factor at the root of all experience, the base onto which everything happens.