Emptiness has become my good friend. When I feel empty, I watch life move through me, guiding me, operating me, doing what needs to happen in the moment. I experience being there with the emptiness but I am not in charge and that is a kind of freedom like no other.
Our minds associate emptiness with something bad or lonely or powerless or dead. In fact, the opposite is the case. Life arises and brings with it a sense of completeness and naturalness.
To invite emptiness, become still. Meditate, even for a few minutes. Sit quietly with a cup of tea and breathe. Allow all of the content to settle until nothing is left but emptiness.
Favorite Quotes About Emptiness...
"The wide open expanse of spiritual realization, the true condition of mind, is like the sky, like space, without center, without edge, without goal. Dissolving into the expanse of emptiness, it has no limits and no boundary. Everything I see, everything I hear, my own mind, and the sky all merge. When you see a lofty mountain, be reminded of the inner view. The view is the teacher's mind inseparable from the nature of your own." ~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
"When emptiness is still, that is eternity. When it moves, that is love." ~ Adyashanti, My Secret is Silence
"When your realization of emptiness becomes as vast as the sky, you will gain an even greater conviction about the law of cause and effect, and you will see just how important your conduct really is. Relative truth functions inexorably within absolute truth." ~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
"Empty yourself of everything. Let the mind become still. The ten thousand things rise and fall while the Self watches their return. They grow and flourish and then return to the Source. Returning to the Source is stillness, which is the way of Nature." ~ Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, Verse 16