Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah (Illusions 1)

or lies, or to tear

the pages.

12

The original sin is to

limit the Is.

Don't.

It was an easy warm afternoon between rain-showers, sidewalks wet on our way out of town.

"You can walk through walls, can't you, Don ?"

"No "

"When you say no to something I know is yes, that means you don't like the way I said the question."

"We certainly are observant, aren't we ?" he said.

"Is the problem with walk or with walls ?"

"Yes, and worse. Your

question presumes that I exist in one limited place-time and move to another place-time. Today I'm not in the mood to accept your presumptions about me. "

I frowned. He knew what I was asking. Why didn't he just answer me straight and let me get on to finding out how he does these things ?

"That's my little way of helping you be precise in your thinking," he said mildly.

"OK. You can make it appear that you can walk through walls, if you want. Is that a better question?"

"Yes. Better. But if you want to be precise..."

"Don't tell me. I know how to say what I mean. Here is my question. How is it possible that you can move the illusion of a limited sense of identity, expressed in this belief of a space-time continuum as your 'body,' through the illusion of material restriction that is called a 'wall'?"

"Well done!" he said. "When you ask the question properly it answers itself, doesn't it:"

"No, the question hasn't answered itself. How do you walk through walls?"

"RICHARD! You had it nearly right and then blew it all to pieces! I cannot walk through walls . . . when you say that, you're assuming things I don't assume at all, and if I do assume them, the answer is, 'l can't. "'

"But it's so hard to put everything so precisely, Don. Don't you know what I mean?"

"So just because something is hard, you don't try to do it; Walking was hard at first, but you practiced at it and now you make it look easy."

I sighed. "Yeah. OK. Forget the question. "

"I'll forget it. My question is, can you?" He looked at me as though he hadn't a care in the world.

"So you're saying that body is illusion and wall is illusion but identity is real and that can't be hemmed by illusions. "

"I'm not saying that. You're saying that."

"But it's true."

"Naturally," he said.