What Is Manifested Activity?

What if I told you… you don’t actually exist? At least, not in the way you think.

Welcome to an examination of manifested activity, where we explore the dance between nothing and something—between the Zero-Self and the Manifested-Self. If that sounds confusing, don’t worry. That just means your brain is working.

In our last episode, we asked: What do we mean by a manifested activity? We discovered that before anything happens—before fire burns, before you choose to binge-watch this video—there must first be the right conditions. That’s what we called Zero Activity: the potential energy, the stillness before the spark.

And today, we take things further. Because once an activity emerges—once it manifests—something fascinating happens. Every activity, no matter how strong or vibrant, carries within it the seeds of its own undoing. Fire burns, but it also consumes the fuel that keeps it alive. A new passion ignites, yet old habits resist. Expansion and contraction. Plus and minus. These opposing forces shape everything we know.

And here’s the kicker: when these forces cancel out, when plus and minus dissolve, activity disappears. What does that mean for you?

Zen Master Joshu Sasaki once said:
“Zero inevitably splits into naturally opposing activities—plus and minus, expansion and contraction—which inevitably disappear back into Zero.”

This is more than philosophy. It’s a radical perspective on impermanence. On identity. On self. And perhaps, a clue to freeing the mind from its own illusions.

So stick around. Because today, we unravel what it means to manifest—and why every manifested thing is already on its way back to Zero.