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the past cannot face the present. The present is totally different, it has a quality of being here and now. The past is always dead, the present is life, the very source of all aliveness. The past cannot face the present so it moves into the future -- but both are dead, both are nonexistential. The present is life; the future cannot encounter the present, nor can the past encounter the present. And your ego, your somebodiness, is your past. Unless you are empty you cannot be here, and unless you are here you cannot be alive.
How can you know the bliss of life? Every moment it is showering on you and you are bypassing it.
Says Chuang Tzu:
SUCH IS THE PERFECT MAN --
HIS BOAT IS EMPTY.
Empty of what? Empty of the I, empty of the ego, empty of somebody there inside.
HE WHO RULES MEN, LIVES IN CONFUSION;
HE WHO IS RULED BY MEN LIVES IN SORROW.
HE WHO RULES MEN, LIVES IN CONFUSION. Why? The desire to rule comes from the ego; the desire to possess, to be powerful, the desire to dominate, comes from the ego. The greater the kingdom you can dominate, the greater the ego you can achieve. With your possessions your inner somebody goes on becoming bigger and bigger and bigger. Sometimes the boat becomes very small because the ego becomes so big....
This is what is happening to politicians, to people obsessed with wealth, prestige, power. Their egos become so big that their boats cannot contain them. Every moment they are on the point of drowning, on the verge, afraid, scared to death. And the more afraid you are the more possessive you become, because you think that through possessions somehow security is achieved. The more afraid you are, the more you think that if your kingdom could be a little greater, you would be more secure.
HE WHO RULES MEN, LIVES IN CONFUSION....
Really, the desire to rule comes out of your confusion; the desire to be leaders of men comes out of your confusion. When you start leading others you forget your confusion -- this is a sort of escape, a trick. You are ill, but if somebody is ill and you become interested in curing that man, you forget your illness.
I have heard
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