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Nan-in, a Japanese master during the Meiji era (1868-1912), received a university professor who came to inquire about Zen.

Nan-in served tea. He poured his visitor’s cup full, and then kept on pouring.

The professor watched the overflow until he no longer could restrain himself. “It is overfull. No more will go in!”

“Like this cup,” Nan-in said, “you are full of your own opinions and speculations. How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your cup?”

And then there is Pete Townshend of The Who singing on his song Empty Glass: “My life’s a mess I wait for you to pass. I stand here at the bar, I hold an empty glass.”

Here Townshend is saying that he has emptied his cup, surrendered his mind and his heart, that he is ready for the real wine.

This principle of having an empty cup is fundamental in holistic personal development. For instance, if you have a heart filled with desire for things that are not lasting, how will you ever receive love? There is no room for it.

Having an empty glass means to surrender your opinions, your vanities, your anger, your dirty laundry. In essence you are emptying a bucket of dirt for a bucket of gold.

You become empty so that you can have what the deepest part of you longs for. You don’t want to fill up on junk food on your way to a royal banquet. Instead, you want to arrive at the banquet table with an appetite for the best food and with a longing for the best wine.

But how do we become empty? How do we rid ourselves of what our highest self doesn’t want but what our lowest part of our self does want? We do it by the utilization of consciousness. We do this with perception of lasting values. We do this with a realization of what brings joy. We do this by sacrificing the lower for the higher. We do this by saying “I love you.” We do this by focused attention on the highest vibrations of thought.

With true perception, the power of addictions fade. The false is seen as false. When the illusory is seen as illusory, we are no longer under its sway. Perception leads the way.

For example, look at Malcolm X. He had a hatred of all white people. There wasn’t anyway that he could get over that. But when he went to Mecca on a pilgrimage, his perception changed. He saw white men bowing down with black men at the Kaaba and he saw that his perception was wrong, that race had nothing to do with whom he could embrace as a brother. With a change of perception he was able to drop the hatred that was poisoning his heart.

Or take any alcoholic. Alcohol rules their lives. It rules their lives until one thing happens: the perception of a higher power. When they see that they have a higher power, they are able to surrender the addiction. It’s a replacement of an addiction to the low with an addiction to the Highest of the High.

This points to the fallacy of how most people mishandle the Law of Attraction. Without looking at the whole person, people simply start imagining themselves with riches and success. They try to control life. They don’t let life unfold from the source of being. This is trading one mind-program for another.

Here is what Joe Vitale said in Zero Limits: “Too many people, myself included, were visualizing and affirming in order to manipulate the world. I now know that isn’t necessary. You’re better off going with the flow while constantly cleaning whatever comes up.”

“Cleaning whatever comes up” is another way to say “emptying the cup.” The cleaning disperses the false notions of self. This allows an influx from the source of being in the form of inspiration. When you can get to that level in life, you are beyond what the power of intention or the law of attraction can deliver. You are a soul on fire. Your life becomes one of unlimited creativity, and with it, blissful ecstasy.

I like how the 14^th century poet Hafiz expresses it:

I am

A hole in a flute

That the Christ’s breath moves through–

Listen to this

Music. ¹

1. (from The Gift, by Daniel Ladinsky, with permission)