NEW & SELECTED TEACHINGS

By genuinely loving truth, one becomes more at ease with not knowing. Although not knowing can be uncomfortable in the realm of thought, it is more than familiar in the realm of being. In fact, the spiritual truth of our very existence is often referred to as the “unknown.”

This true nature of existence is also referred to as “awake,” “still,” and “undying.” And yet, in the realm of spirit, awakeness is not the absence of sleep; stillness is not the absence of movement; and death is not the absence of life. How do we come to know these things, and how do we come to know the unknown? Is it possible?

I once followed a similar line of inquiry when I was captured by the notion of coming to know stillness. I thought, “Is stillness possible? Is there ever absence of movement?” I saw that my own attempts to locate and confirm stillness were movements of mind. Clearly, the stillness pointed to in spiritual writings was not referring to the mind’s idea of no motion. Similarly, “not knowing,” in this spiritual context, is also beyond the thinking mind, beyond assumptions.

The essence of existence is beyond words. Words by their nature are dualistic, and existence is not bound by duality. We regularly experience knowledge outside the realm of thought. We have knowledge of the air we breathe and the sun that shines upon us, but we do not need to reference a thought for this knowledge to be present. This knowledge is direct; it is knowledge of being (not thinking).

How exactly might we experience the unknown? The body breathes; the sun shines. How does the unknown express? It expresses in a thinking mind that ceases its insistence upon knowing. It expresses as mystery in the quiet depths of our body and being. When the spotlight of the mind turns away from locating answers in thought, it is free to rest in the center of the body, such as in the heart center or in the hara (just below the navel). Consciousness can then be freely offered to the quiet essence in the depths of being.

The formless responds to that offered consciousness, harnessing it for formless awareness to perceive itself in form. So too, formless awareness harnesses the senses of body-mind to experience itself as form—not through the identity of a centralized “I,” but as unidentified existence knowing and experiencing itself.

In the spirit of truth and your love of truth, I encourage you to abide in the mystery of being, the direct sense of it. Feel your way beyond the thinking mind into intimate experience of that which has no need to know and yet very much is. Dwell in the sense of I AM or the sense of mystery—whichever presents in your experience. Look beyond the mind’s projections and ideas of “not knowing” and feel what it is to let yourself be. As you become more intimate with being, invite it to make itself known through and through. Just as you welcome the warmth of the sun or the gift of your breath, invite this intimacy of being to be resident in your body and alive in your knowing.

This is how the mystery awakens to itself. It needs our attention, our consciousness, and it needs our invitation. The formless needs our form to know itself, both in our human body and in the big body of life all around us. The more at home we become with not knowing and with the mystery of our being, the more that same mystery knows the miracle of existence in all its forms, the more the unknown knows itself.

© 2026 by Mukti Gray. All rights reserved.