What Is the True Nature of Form, Sensation, Perception, Mental Formations, and Consciousness?

The true nature of form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness is impermanent, subject to change, unstable, empty, suffering, not-self, not other than self, and not existing within self. Since it is non-self, how can one speak of being superior, being inferior, or being no less than others? How can things that are not-self, devoid of self—whether two phenomena or many phenomena, empty phenomena or many phenomena, suffering phenomena or many phenomena, unreal phenomena or many phenomena—be compared? How can one speak of which is higher or which is lower? Or of being equal? How can empty phenomena, unreal phenomena, be compared? How can one compare the length of a rabbit's horn? How can one judge whether a turtle's fur is beautiful or not? How can one say "I am stronger than you" or "You are weaker than me"? How can one say "I am as healthy and wealthy as you"? Worldly beings, deluded and inverted, have long grown accustomed to this, taking it as natural, unaware that such talk is utterly devoid of real meaning—it is all idle chatter. This includes language and sound, all of which are illusory and insubstantial.

When two people hurl insults at each other, who is actually being insulted? Is the insult directed at the aggregate of form? At the aggregate of feeling? At the aggregate of perception? At the aggregate of volitional formations? Or at the aggregate of consciousness? Where do the sounds of the insults land? The one being insulted feels discomfort—what is this discomfort? Which phenomenon feels discomfort? What is called discomfort? Do phenomena like comfort and discomfort truly exist? The insulter feels relieved and satisfied—what is this feeling of relief? Does a phenomenon called "relief" exist?

Through profound meditative concentration, contemplating and investigating these phenomena, a time will come when the mind internally empties these phenomena, and body and mind will drop away. This too is a feeling, and likewise unreal. Yet it is liberating. Without meditative concentration, even if one understands these doctrines, no matter how many books one writes, it is all empty talk—misleading both oneself and others.