Illusion Not the Opposite of Truth

The usual assumption: we tend to think truth and illusion are two separate things, like light and dark, or two rooms with a wall between them. Illusion is the "wrong" room, while truth is the "right" one. Escape one, arrive at the other.

Why that framing breaks down: if illusion were truly separate from truth, a different substance, existing on its own, then it would be a second reality alongside truth. But that would make it real in its own right, which contradicts calling it illusion in the first place. An illusion does not have independent standing. It borrows its entire existence from what it is a distorted appearance of. It is truth’s distortion. Just like a mirage is a distortion of light and heat.

Think of a rope mistaken for a snake in dim light. The "snake" is not nothing. We really do see something, really do feel fear. But the snake has no existence apart from the rope. It is not rope plus snake, two things. It is the rope, misperceived. The illusion (snake) is not other than the rope. It is a mode of encountering the rope. So, it is not asking “what is the snake made of?” It is asking “how is the rope being met right now?”

Illusion is more like a veil than a wall. It does not block truth from a separate location; it is truth itself, appearing in a distorted mode. Illusion is not a rival to truth; it is neither real nor unreal, but a dependent appearance. It appears to be real; you did feel fear, you did jump back; so we cannot say it is not real. Yet upon re-cognition, we see the fear was never real to begin with, and that the object was groundless. This is what causes the fear to dissolve: not because the fear changes from real to unreal, but because its support is gone. A fear with no snake under it cannot sustain itself once seen clearly.

If illusion and truth were opposites, spiritual work would mean fighting illusion, pushing it away, replacing one content with another. But if illusion is truth mistaken, the work is closer to looking more carefully at what is already here, not turning away from experience, but seeing through it to how it is actually made. Every illusion is technically a clue. We do not discard the rope-snake; we inquire until the snake is exposed and what remains is the rope. Exposing the snake versus conceptually knowing the snake is different. Conceptually knowing the snake is making the snake real or being involved in it, while exposing the snake is where the rope can be seen.

So, I suppose, the cycle of conditioned experience (samsara) and extinguishing of it (nirvana) are not two, not because ignorance is fine as it is, but because both are made of the same "stuff," and the difference is only in re-cognition. These are not two different places, one bad and one good, that you travel between. They are the same reality (the rope), differing only in whether it is misperceived (samsara) or rightly seen (nirvana). We do not escape samsara and arrive somewhere else called nirvana. We look at samsara itself clearly enough, and what we are looking at is nirvana. Same rope, the only variable is whether it is being seen as a snake or seen as what it is.

Coming back to more practical examples, ones that opened my eyes a bit more to this reality, and which give me hope and faith that there is nothing to be fearful of (only when there is non-forgetfulness, that is). If the rope is only ever met, never can be fully spoken, then everything said above falls short of what it points to. Whatever I say, even in the name of understanding, is not precise enough, because what is expressed is already of the world, already a projection. And if even perfect words would still fall short, then precision of words was never the real work; the work is the 3-Meditator’s Job. This, in a way, makes it feel safe, because I am no longer required to be perfect at the form level for the world (effect). I just need to take on the practice rightly (cause), and wisdom will do the right expression of words.

I used to think that when I am in an unwholesome state, for example in a rage, in a delusion with a lot of "me" in it, when there is attachment or involvement to the investigation or an experience, there is no way an understanding can arise. But it is not entirely true. When one is in a rage, knowing the nature of the rage is possible. When one is involved or believes in the outer world, knowing the nature of the involvement is possible. When one is having wrong view during the investigation, knowing the nature of wrong view is possible. So, you see, there is no need to change what already is. There is no need to change from rage to loving. There is no need to force upon right view a wrong view. There is no need to purposely be wholesome when we are unwholesome. The experience is not the illusion; the illusion is the mode of encountering the experience. And knowing the nature of that mode, whether it is Wrong View mistaking itself for solid ground, is itself the arising of Right View.

This reality of knowing is shown in our day-to-day encounter. Knowing is not separated from the barking of the dog. Knowing is not separated from the tyres of the truck in front of me — it is not out there, outside of my body, as we usually perceive it. Knowing is not separated from the words I see in the book. Knowing is not separated from the pain — pain is not of the body. Knowing is not separated from the attachment. Knowing is not separated from the ringing of the meditation bell. Knowing is not separated from the anxiety. So, what I am trying to say is that the experiences (or the being known) are not separated from the knowing. The barking of the dog is not the illusion. The illusion lies in the skewed mode of encountering the barking of the dog. The mode is whether the knowing is knowing about something or direct knowing. When we are in the mode of knowing about something, involvement with that something is imminent. But when there is direct knowing, the experiences are merely objects of knowing or being known.

So, going back to illusion is not the opposite of the truth. I see now that this was never just a philosophical position to accept, but something that can be lived out in the actual encounters of each day: while we are at work or doing our daily chores, the pain, the rage, the anxiety, the feeling of "me" itself. None of these needed to be fought, changed, or escaped from. None of these is the illusion. They only needed to be met with a little more clarity, until what looked like something separate revealed itself as the same "stuff" all along, simply encountered differently. There is no wall to break through, and no wrong room to flee. There is only this: knowing-being known, again and again, and the invitation, each time, to look a little more correctly, also known as the 3 Meditator’s Job.

In grace,
Lee Hung Leng
28 July 2026