The Buddha's Secret

During my recent Esalen Institute seminar, I was lounging in the hot baths one morning, overlooking the vast Pacific Ocean. Then I looked up at a statue of the Buddha in the hillside garden just above the baths. As I contemplated his partially open eyes, and his mystical, half-smile, I suddenly realized his ancient yet timeless message to humanity—his “secret,” as it were: “I exist here, now, one with the ease, harmony, and flow of life—and I invite you into the same realization.” In terms of tangible knowledge, the only thing we can “know” for certain is that we exist here, now. In this moment now, we exist as the aware, conscious beings—the men and women—we are. This was and is the Buddha’s secret. This feeling of existing here, now, when you really settle into it, is characterized by a quality of infinite, spacious awareness which has no center, other than the feeling of “you” experiencing your existence, and no border. It truly is infinite, unbounded, and universal. This awareness that you most essentially are is aware of everything happening in your inner and outer environment: thoughts, sensations, sounds, feelings, emotions, events, and circumstances. Notice how everything you observe happening within and around you is also is also characterized by a single quality: it comes and goes, arises and disappears within the spacious awareness of your existing here, now. The realization that the only thing we can “know” for certain is that we exist here, now, is the essence of awakening, self-realization, or enlightenment. Every person who is awake and free has come to the realization that they are not their thoughts or stories—not even their “I” and “me” thoughts—all of which come and go, but the ever-present, aware, conscious being or person who is existing here, now. This is why those who are awake and free talk about living in the present, in your experience here, now, so much. This is why I talk about it. When you are awake to your true nature, to the fact of your existence here, now, you realize that this moment right now is actually all there ever is. Even when you imagine, think about, an event that will happen later, it too is only real when “later” becomes the now.