buddha nature contains all

Buddha nature contains all

People have odd ideas about enlightenment, about the nature of self realisation, awakening, our buddha nature. Mostly when we start seeking enlightenment, we're trying to escape from some sorrows of life, and we're trying to find something in ourself that is good, virtuous, holy. And it's not really like that. This journey of self discovery takes us deeper and deeper into ourself, into more and more refined parts of our being. And eventually we end up at our essence, at the very core of our being. We have come home to our buddha nature.

This buddha nature is formless. It's not really appropriate to stick any adjectives on it. I use words like stillness, silence, spaciousness, but such words should not be interpreted in a relative way as we normally would. When we finally land back in our buddha nature, there is something absolute about it. Comparison – the relative world – has dropped away. That is why we say it's beyond duality.

And sitting in that space within ourself, residing in our buddha nature, we can understand that it contains everything. It contains all those aspects of ourself that are so human: the good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly. It contains all the emotional space, from happiness to sadness, joy to depression, anger – everything is there, contained within it.

You could say that our essential nature, the essential part of our being, is a container, a container in which the human side of our life gets played out. But the container itself has no judgment about these things. It does not reject some emotions as unacceptable. It does not favour other aspects of our being. It does not say its better to be kind than unkind. It has no moral commandments. It has no judgment. It's simply a container, a space within which we can play out our life. And if we forget that we are that container, if we identify ourself with all the bits and pieces that come into being within that space – today I am angry, yesterday I was calm – if we associate ourself, identify with these transient feelings, then we are missing the fact that we are ultimately this space within which it is all being played out. That is why I say our buddha nature contains all. And it contains it all without judgment, without preference. All is sacred, everything.