My Dear Friend: This is a very important question. In truth, until one really wrestles with this, or a question with similar terminology, one cannot delve deeply into the projections and pretenses of ego mind; and thus, no real piercing of the veil of illusion can occur. That being said, in virtually all spiritual traditions there exist many vehicles to transport one's consciousness into creative proximity with a veil-rending state of awareness. While at first blush, these practices, techniques and moments of grace may seem quite different, in the final analysis all are intimately connected and derived from the various proclivities of mind to grapple with the Unknown (yet not unknowable).

In the first place, one must be aware that the experiential realm is a realm of appearances, not a realm of ultimate "Reality." Things often (perhaps always) appear to be one way, when they are, in fact, another way all together. For example: let's say you are driving your car on an interstate highway, when you look in the rear-view mirror and see that another car is coming upon you very fast. You notice that this car is darting in an out of lanes, passing as many people as possible. Perhaps you even estimate the speed of the vehicle to be in excess of 90 miles per hour, and you may even experience a moment of fear. As the car passes you, you look at the driver of the other vehicle and see that his/her face is furrowed in a frown, and that s/he looks angry and seems to be in his/her own world, giving little or no concern to other drivers on the highway.

You might write off the situation to yet another case of "road rage," and simply be glad when the other driver passes you. Perhaps your heart speeds up a bit, and if the darting in and out produces one or more "close calls," you might even find yourself breaking into a sweat. Perhaps you even comment to yourself (or a passenger in your car) that road rage is abundant these days, and that it creates very dangerous situations for innocent passers-by who are simply minding their own business along the road of life. Indeed, your mind projects the scenario based on what you have experienced in the past. The mind has given you the whole story (or so it seems), and in the moment you do not question it. You simply feel relief that this "angry person" got out of your direct line of experiencing.

You may have noticed by now that minds are very good at "filling in the blanks" of any experience that arises in your immediate field. Often, minds fill in the blanks for experiences that you did not even have, as in the case, perhaps, of someone describing to you one of their experiences. The very best information the mind has is merely that of what appears to be happening. In truth, maybe the person in the speeding car cited above just learned that a child of theirs was in a bad accident at his/her school, and in a state of abject fear, is rushing to the child's side. In truth, no matter how creative the mind can be at dreaming up details, the very best it has is simply what appears (to your mind) to be happening. Likewise, in the old example of six people witnessing a car accident and each one giving a different version of what happened, one can see quite easily that what may have appeared to be true to one person is not necessarily what appeared to be true to another person witnessing the same event.

Ultimately, one must ask how it is that person to person, what appears to be going on can be reported so differently. In witnessing the car accident and then giving a synopsis of the event, each person did "really experience" the flow of events as s/he reported them. Yet sometimes those "reports" differ radically; and, hearing all the reports, one ends up asking, "Did anyone here really see what was going on?" The mind is quick to provide details - details which, although "really experienced," could not later be substantiated at all. Such is an example of the difference between what is "really experienced," and what is "Real."

Another example might be observed in simply how people experience the relative solidness of things they encounter in life. It does seem, after all, that those walls that support the roof of a building are solid. Yet upon inspection of the actual substance of the walls at the subatomic level, one discovers that there is millions times more space than there is actual substance. If we consider a rather simple atom, and increase its size proportionately to where the nucleus is about the size of a cherry, you would find that the little electrons zooming around it in orbital paths would scarcely be big enough to see. Since the little electrons are merely electrical charges flying around this nucleus, you might conclude that the substance is found in the nucleus, since you also discover that the field needed to contain the orbital paths for those little electric charges is perhaps the size of the Vatican! "So much space," you think, "so little substance!" Yet if you delve even more deeply into that nucleus, you will discover that virtually the same ratio between substance and space exists at the subatomic level as is found at the atomic level. You are thus confronted with the great question of how all this apparent substance you find on the Earth actually hangs together. After all, those walls do appear to be solid; but with profound and deep investigation, you discover there is really nothing existing that can be truly defined as substantive. Rather, everything that exists (or that you perceive to exist) is merely different combinations of space and energy; and that at the ultimate level of existence, there really is no substance - even though certain thing do appear to be heavier and denser than other things.

Clearly, this is another example of the difference between what is "really experienced" and what is "Real. You are very fortunate to be living in a time wherein your scientists confirm that there is, actually, no substance. Such helps you grasp this difference between the "Real" and the "really experienced" in ways that previous generations could not know. Thus, it becomes obvious to note that one cannot really trust that which one "really experiences" as having any ultimate "Reality" at all. This is not to say that there is no reality in experiencing, but rather there is no inherent reality in what one experiences.

If this seems confusing, simply be aware that there is a kind of "functional reality" in what one experiences, which does have merit and which can give meaning to experiences. For example, if everyone experienced the ultimate emptiness of a form, say, such as a table, the table would lose its ability to function as it appears to function to most everyone in the conventional reality.

Let's say you live on a planet where people intake water by drinking it from a glass. Then, let's pretend you visit a planet where people (or the form of life you meet there) intake water quite nicely by placing a finger in a pool of water and simply drawing it in through the process of osmosis. On that particular planet, the glass would lose its meaning/function. In fact, individuals living in that "reality" might not even be able to see a glass should you hold one up for their inspection. Since the glass would have neither meaning nor function, it could not be a part of that "reality." Based on that experience, one would then have to ask oneself, "Which 'reality' is the 'Real' reality?" Well, perhaps neither would actually qualify.

While this line of discussion may seem a bit "far out" for some of you, it should at least provide for the possibility that things are simply not as they seem. This is where those who require some kind of proof for the spiritual plane, or the presence of spiritual beings on a physical plane, run amok. When we talk about proof, we must first qualify the level at which we seek to demonstrate proof. If one hits a brick wall with his/her fist, it will appear to be solidly there. Yet if one can penetrate all the way to the subatomic level, there is simply nothing to be found that is solidly "wall." Thus, what appears to be "provable" at one level is completely devoid of "proof" (indeed meaning) at another level. While one does "really experience" the wall when one strikes it with the fist, upon deeper investigation, one cannot truthfully say there is anything "there" at all.

Until one has seen the true nature of all phenomena, one simply cannot say, or know, what is "Real." When one experiences Emptiness directly, however, one may know what is "Real," but still one may not be able to say what is "Real." All this leads us to the point of recognition that one should always question what appears to the mind. This is not to say the mind is wrong, exactly, in what it perceives; but we must hold that due to the way in which the mind "fills in the blanks," it simply cannot be trusted to see the full, or whole, story. In simply allowing that the mind may be projecting whatever is perceived based on past experiences and beliefs, one leaves the door open (so to speak) to perceive other "realities" as well. If one believes completely that what one sees is actually what is, then one will never see in any other way than one has always seen. In other words, such a one is not likely to be calling forth a direct experience of Emptiness, for what the mind believes is all-powerful in determining (or interpreting) the moment.

Simply stated, one cannot trust one's mind to perceive, or hold, anything that could be termed "ultimate truth," or "ultimate reality." What one can do, however, is to keep the door to "other realities" open through questioning the mind's perceptions at every turn. Thus, if someone says to you, "You're a closed person," instead of replying, "No I'm not," inquire as to how they came to their conclusion. You may think you know how you appear to someone else, but in truth, that perception is coming only from your mind. As you learn to question your mind's "take" on the appearances that arise for interpretation, you become profoundly interested in how things appear to others. You become perhaps even more interested in how things appear to others than how they appear to you, since you know you cannot trust the interpretations of your mind, anyway. Of course, you cannot trust the interpretations of another person's mind, but you can stay open to the possibility that another might just see something a bit more clearly than you see it. As you become freer and freer of the conditions of your own mind, you awaken to the delightful possibility (indeed, probability) that much more is going on than appears to "meet the eye." You may even awaken to the recognition that there are an infinite number of "realities" all compressed into the same "space," neatly co-existing and superimposing themselves upon each other in a truly magnificent creative expression of Divine Mind.

Happy discovering!