Chapter 27 Chapter 3 Everything is Empty -1

Siddhartha conquered Mara and his army and realized the emptiness of existence.He understands that all that exists that we see, hear, feel, think, and know is purely emptiness, and we attach or label a certain "reality" to it.People label or understand the world as real out of strong individual and collective tendencies—all of us do.The habit is so strong, and the concept of emptiness is so uninteresting to us, that almost no one wants to pursue Siddhartha's realization.On the contrary, we are like a traveler lost in the desert who sees in the distance an oasis of life, which is only a reflection of the heat on the sand, but which, out of desperation, hunger, and anticipation, sees it as It is water.He exhausted his strength and got there, only to realize that it was a mirage, so he was extremely disappointed.

Although we don't see ourselves as hopeless, and believe we are educated, normal, and sane, when we see and feel that everything is real, we act like the lost man in the desert.We are desperate to find real companionship, security, praise, success, or just peace and quiet.We can even catch something similar to desire.But like the lost one, when we rely on external physicality, we will eventually be disappointed.Things are not as they appear -- they are impermanent and not entirely within our control. If we analyze with certainty like Siddhartha, we will find that additional labels such as shape, time, space, direction, size, etc., can be easily deconstructed.Siddhartha realized that even the ego exists only on a relative level, like a mirage.His realization ended the cycle of expectation, disappointment, and pain.At the moment of enlightenment, he thought to himself, it is said that the heavenly kings Indra and Brahma, who had heard of Siddhartha's plan, appeared and begged him not to retire to the forest, but to speak for the people.they said,

Siddhartha honored their request and set off for Varanasi.At that time, in Sarnath near Varanasi on the banks of the Ganges, he met his companions who left him because he broke his vow and drank the goat milk offered by Sujada.When they saw Siddhartha approaching from a distance, they jointly decided to ignore him, not to greet him, let alone stand up and salute him.They jeered and said, Here comes the liar.However, to a person who realizes emptiness like Siddhartha, concepts such as praise and criticism, respect and contempt, good and bad, are all unimportant.These are weak annotations, so there is no need to react as if they were real.So Siddhartha approached them without conceit, hesitation, or arrogance.Because of his lack of self-awareness, his steps were so majestic that the five meditators involuntarily rose to their feet.Siddhartha gave the first teaching at that time and place, and these past fellow practitioners became his first disciples.