Fast Company
Ma has also been described as "an emptiness full of
possibilities, like a promise yet to be fulfilled", and as "the
silence between the notes which make the music"[6] (cf. Isaac
Stern's comment below).
Other illustrations appear in this old poem:
Thirty spokes meet in the hub, though the space between them
is the essence of the wheel;
Pots are formed from clay, though the space inside them
is the essence of the pot;
Walls with windows and doors form the house, though the
space within them is the essence of the house[7].
Mu is no thing
To
me the Ma and Mu have similar yet subtle nuances. The gaps between branches,
the notes between music, the space in the room, they all convey to me the
essence of life, the sub atomic field full of possibilities and probabilities
and this is pure potential, full consciousness and yet devoid of thought. It is distilled awareness.
I
have used the idea that the space in the room is the empty mind and the
contents of the room the furniture are the mind of thoughts, programmes and
agendas which are the familiarities of life and as such are or can lead to an
assumed reality and a way of life often led without variance which culture,
religion and world fashion and media sculpture many and rob one of free
original inspirational creation.
The
room being full of the cluttered mind fixed content to a point of safety and security
until some event ‘upsets the apple cart’ or one becomes bored and swaps the
furniture around or new content usually based on someone else’s design or
concept and perhaps after a while boredom sets in and one goes from one
religion, philosophy, guru, politic, TV, video vainly searching the channels to
take one away from the boredom or some unresolved crisis, anxiety or
dissatisfaction, the urge to break out and breakout from a series of mind set patterns which are
deeply embedded in habitual ritual and anything is better, perhaps, new drugs,
distractions, anything other than silence, stillness and MA / MU.
Of
course endeavouring to define Mu / Ma is merely getting out of Ma / Mu and is
the furniture, the form in the room describing the space can be said in a few
words as void, emptiness and so on, yet the experiencing the absence of thought
and content in the mind other than sleep or dreaming has to be experienced and
on reaching Mu / Ma or if you want psychological or awareness consciousness
without content is indescribable at the experience moment and such phrases as
‘timelessness yet aware’ ‘looking with out opinion’ ‘joy’ ‘peace’.
Like
the space between the notes and the space between the spokes as above, the pot,
the room, it would suggest that this space, this emptiness is the creator’s
intelligence at rest as it were which is potential and ready for some intention
to bring forth some form of creation if so desired, this can either be by
inspiration and spontaneity as one comes from the space to the content and
awareness of the dream one has chosen as reality and yet in essence illusionary.
Here
frustration and despair for the mind that has restlessness and has had glimpses
of Mu / Ma in meditation or a synchronistic spontaneity so called coincidence
and may wish to be in this peace of emptiness and yet cannot shed the cling
film, the stickiness, gooey glue of the habits of conditioning and no amount of
effort and energy, disciplines, rituals and prayers seem to relieve this
seemingly battle.
However
sitting in awareness, going past itching, watching with patience, looking
without bias with alert gazing in a non focussed way, perhaps noting the
breathing and then being aware of thoughts, emotions and distraction, there may
come a time when one questions where do these thoughts and so on arise from and go
to, like clouds in the sky, and one comes to perhaps, they seem to have no form
or substance, they arise from nowhere and disappear to nowhere and then a
subtle letting go and realising I am a bunch of pre-programmed thoughts that I
probably was not aware of the choice, they were foisted on me and I could have
been programmed with other choices, so I have choice now. But
what choice, perhaps one realises any programmes, ways of life and so on are
only programmes, software stuff, interchangeable, juxtaposed, contiguous and
have a fleeting temporal illusionary dream like fantasy quality and full of
holes and queries, insecurities and one realises that change at some time is
inevitable and death is the one thing that is certain.
Maybe
death is but an idea and is not in its essence real. Perhaps the programmes die
or peter out in intensity and just those to keep one alive and well in this
temporary cocoon of flesh and realising this is temporal and transitory and
that this body changes over time, however when that sinks to relaxed peace and
there is absence of thought without sleep one may realise that having no
thought is the essence of life and one is experiencing death as it were whilst
alive. So in the end of life in a body one is already where death is and the
realisation there is no death. Death is only the habit of the programmed self not
able to live on in a body no longer able to sustain it. I am my programmes my thoughts and feelings so
I thought and yet when they are no longer there in the silence of emptiness,
the gap, the Ma / Mu, who am I then?
I
am death or am I, or is death another trap to bring fear which is the super glue
that holds all the programmes in tact and produces the illusion that whatever
set of conditions, programmes and agendas I think is reality, safety, security
and assurance one might thinks it brings, there is the nagging biting thought I
will die and leave all this, or maybe I want to die because I hate this life
and so on, however the experience of true Ma /Mu on a continual enterprise of
meditation, contemplation, rumination and free non judgemental thinking may
lead one to the conclusion that there is no conclusion and surrender to the
empty mind, the surrender is not that difficult once one realises the true
nature of thought, then one comes to the thought that maybe my programmes give
me an identity which I have to uphold, my status and dignity, my power and
success, failures and successes and on the acceptance of the essence of
oneself, I can either fake an identity because all identities are fake, they
are all ‘man made’ and that being in the essence which is itself without
identity, the identity of space, the identity of no identity becomes a real
choice and that is not so much a choice as a melting away of the illusionary
programmes that formerly we thought we were.
SHACK
MA AND MU ARE QUANTUM(SHACK)
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