What is Maya? The Veil and the Flame

 

                                                     I Am a Pigment of Your Imagination.

What is Maya? The Veil and the Flame

“You are seeing many things, but there is only one thing.”
— Sri Ramakrishna

“The energy of the mind is the essence of life.”
— Aristotle

These two statements—one from a mystic, the other from a philosopher—feel like twin reflections on the same still pond. One points to the illusion of multiplicity, the other to the creative force that animates that illusion. Both, in their own way, speak to the mystery of Maya—and our place within it.

The Multiplicity that Hides Unity

Ramakrishna's words are a gentle strike on the bell of Advaita. They remind us that what we see—people, places, problems, pleasures—are many only in appearance. Behind them, within them, is only one thing. One Being. One Self. One God. The rest is shadow play.

Maya is not mere fantasy. It is Divine projection—the power that conceals and reveals. It makes the One appear as many, not to deceive, but to awaken. To test. To soften us through beauty, and break us open through contradiction.

Even in Islam, the mystics knew this. Ibn Arabi spoke of wahdat al-wujud—the Unity of Being. Rumi said, “The Beloved is all faces.” So too in Zen, where mountains and rivers are no different from the true nature of the mind. Everything points back to the One.

But Maya is not the enemy. It is the veil and the invitation.

The Mind as Flame and Mirror

And then comes Aristotle—cutting through with clarity.

“The energy of the mind is the essence of life.”

Here we shift not to illusion, but to vitality. To what moves us. To why we create, choose, imagine. The mind, in Aristotle's view, is not just a thinking machine—it is the animating fire, the source of motion, will, and attention.

The mind is what gets caught in Maya—and also what can see through it.

In Zen, the mind is both monkey and mirror. In Islam, it is nafs—ego or soul—capable of ruin or return. In Sufism, it is polished like a heart-mirror until it reflects only Divine Light.

So yes, mind-energy is essence. But what it does with that energy determines whether we spiral into illusion, or burn it away in silence and presence.

Standing Between Two Worlds

For some of us, this path is not theoretical—it’s personal.

Like myself, raised both in temple and mosque. Chanting Pāli on Saturdays, reading the Qur’an on Fridays. Hiding from accusations of being kafir, yet sensing no contradiction between the Compassion of Buddha and the Mercy of Allah.

Later, I would sit in zazen in Green Gulch, California, and years after that, raise two children in a Muslim village. I carry both worlds in me—the stillness and the fire, the One and the many.

And perhaps, like you, I too wonder:

Who is breathing?
Who is sitting?
Who is watching all this unfold?

The ancients asked. The mystics answered. The prophets pointed. But ultimately, the path is always walked alone—through the veil, into the light.

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"What you intend is what you become. If your thoughts are of taking, you create a world of takers. If your thoughts are of giving, you create a world of grace."
— Gary Zukav, The Seat of the Soul

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