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- #1
The word nirvāṇa means extinction. Nirvāṇa is not a place you can go.
Nirvāṇa is not in the future. Nirvāṇa is the nature of reality as it is. Nirvāṇa is
available in the here and the now. You are already in nirvāṇa. Imagine the
wave rising on the surface of the ocean. The wave is made of water, but
sometimes it forgets. A wave has a beginning and an end, it goes up and it
goes down. It can be higher or lower than other waves, and more or less
beautiful than other waves. If the wave is caught by these notions—beginning,
ending; coming up, going down; more or less beautiful—it will suffer.
But if the wave realizes it is water, it enjoys going up and going down. It
enjoys being this wave, and it sees that at the same time it is all the other
waves. There’s no discrimination, no fear at all. The wave doesn’t have to go
anywhere to look for water in the present moment, the wave is already water.
So we don’t have to go and look for nirvāṇa, because nirvāṇa is our true
nature—the nature of no beginning and no end, no birth and no death. And
like the wave, if we are able to touch our true nature, then we transcend all
fear, all anger, all despair, because our suffering is born from these notions:
birth and death, being and nonbeing, coming and going, same and different.
Nirvāṇa is not the object of our searching, and we do not need to enter
nirvāṇa because everything is in nirvāṇa already. Our reality is the reality of
no birth and no death. Our reality is the reality of no coming and no going.
We are perfectly in nirvāṇa. We have been nirvanized from the non-
beginning.
Nirvāṇa is not in the future. Nirvāṇa is the nature of reality as it is. Nirvāṇa is
available in the here and the now. You are already in nirvāṇa. Imagine the
wave rising on the surface of the ocean. The wave is made of water, but
sometimes it forgets. A wave has a beginning and an end, it goes up and it
goes down. It can be higher or lower than other waves, and more or less
beautiful than other waves. If the wave is caught by these notions—beginning,
ending; coming up, going down; more or less beautiful—it will suffer.
But if the wave realizes it is water, it enjoys going up and going down. It
enjoys being this wave, and it sees that at the same time it is all the other
waves. There’s no discrimination, no fear at all. The wave doesn’t have to go
anywhere to look for water in the present moment, the wave is already water.
So we don’t have to go and look for nirvāṇa, because nirvāṇa is our true
nature—the nature of no beginning and no end, no birth and no death. And
like the wave, if we are able to touch our true nature, then we transcend all
fear, all anger, all despair, because our suffering is born from these notions:
birth and death, being and nonbeing, coming and going, same and different.
Nirvāṇa is not the object of our searching, and we do not need to enter
nirvāṇa because everything is in nirvāṇa already. Our reality is the reality of
no birth and no death. Our reality is the reality of no coming and no going.
We are perfectly in nirvāṇa. We have been nirvanized from the non-
beginning.
