Mental distinctions and concepts create everything that appears,
Including the notions of singularity, permanence, and independence.
Through habit one's mental map is formed and invisibly sustained,
The map is one's experience, but it is not the territory it represents.
Ignoring the existence of the map,
Is to live in delusion and ignorance.
Without awareness, the map becomes a mental prison without an exit,
With walls that can't be seen.
Just as recognizing the lack of mindfulness is mindfulness itself,
So recognizing the presence of the map is freedom from its subtle bondage.
The map is all that appears, and is the root of all appearances.
Freedom from the map is therefore freedom from all appearances.
The formation of the map is mindless habit and lack of wisdom.
Wisdom and insight, the fruits of meditation, illuminate the map with awareness.
Under the light of awareness and focused attention, the map gradually dissolves.
Dissolution of the map is the end of delusion.
Each moment lived without a map is a moment lived in Wisdom.
Living in Wisdom means to be truly alive, to touch reality directly.
To be truly alive is to penetrate the barrier between self and other,
True life begins when all experience dissolves into one taste.
The sutras say, "Those who free themselves from all appearances are called buddhas."
Life with multiple tastes is bondage to unconscious discrimination and self-created delusion.
Life with only one taste is freedom and enlightenment.
The key is to recognize the existence of the map.
Not seeing the map perpetuates samsara without end.
Seeing the map is the cessation of samsara.
Seeing the map transcends karma.
To see the map is to see emptiness.
Emptiness is the lack of mistaken distinction.
As everything depends on everything - nothing is inherently distinct, in spite of all appearances.
What appears as separateness, is merely mental imputation by way of unconscious distinction.
Without distinction, there is no appearance of separateness - no objects, and even no entities.
As everything is dependent,
Nothing is completely independent.
If nothing is independent, there is no duality.
Dependently arisen, everything is empty of inherent separateness.
Making distinctions where no distinctions truly exist,
Is false imagination.
Mistaking the map for the territory,
Is living in a world of endless dreams.
Mistaking dream worlds for true reality,
Even though they have little or nothing to do with true reality.
Actions are forever misguided and mistaken, based on confusion and distortion.
In this way, we perpetuate the suffering of samsara.
Distinction must always include that which is distinguished and that which is distinguished from.
Conceptual objects can only appear against the non-appearance of their opposite.
In this way, opposites are both singular and mutually dependent.
Without distinction, there is only equality.
Something can only be known in relation to and in dependence upon its opposite.
