The thirtyfourth morning.
The sky was clear, but the wind was strong.

Golden leaves fell onto the surface of the pond in front of the hermitage,
sending out round ripples that spread far across the water.

The young man stood by the pond, watching a leaf just as it touched the surface—
and he saw how a single point of contact affected the stillness of the entire pond.

The teacher approached, stood beside him, and watched the fading ripples.

“What are you seeing?”

The young man answered, eyes still following the water:

“I… see that there is no clear boundary between the ‘point of contact’ and the ‘pond.’

They feel like one continuous movement.”

The teacher smiled—
the smile of someone who knows the student is ready for the next lesson.

“Good.

Today we speak of the place where Jiddu meets the Avatamsaka teaching:

breaking boundaries.”

He sat down by the water and picked up a dry leaf.

“You think there is a boundary between ‘you’ and ‘others.’
Between ‘you’ and ‘the world.’
Between ‘you’ and ‘the past.’

But these boundaries… are only ideas.”

He held the leaf up in front of the young man.

“Do you see this leaf?”

“Yes.”

“In this leaf is the sun—without sunlight, it cannot be green.
The earth—because the earth nourishes the roots.
The rain—because water sustains life.
The clouds—because rain comes from clouds.
Time—because the leaf needs time to grow.
The universe—because every condition contributes to its existence.”

He placed the leaf into the young man’s hand.

“So where is the boundary between this leaf and the universe?”

The young man fell silent.

He looked at the leaf, then at the pond, then at the sky.

And he saw clearly: boundaries are only lines drawn by the mind.

Inside him, a sentence from Jiddu Krishnamurti lit up like a candle:

“The observer is the observed.”

The teacher continued:

“Jiddu breaks boundaries in the mind.
The Avatamsaka teaching breaks boundaries in the universe.

When boundaries dissolve, suffering dissolves.
When boundaries dissolve, fear dissolves.
When boundaries dissolve, loneliness dissolves.”

He looked deeply into the young man’s eyes:

“When there is no boundary between ‘me’ and ‘others,’
you no longer feel anger.

When there is no boundary between ‘me’ and ‘the past,’
the past no longer binds you.

When there is no boundary between ‘me’ and ‘pain,’
pain is no longer an enemy.”

The young man listened,
feeling as if the walls inside him were cracking—
not shattering violently,
but dissolving gently like mist under sunlight.

The teacher stood up and brushed the dust from his robe.

“Come.

Today, whenever you look at anything, ask yourself:

‘Is this boundary real?’”

The young man rose and followed him.

The wind blew across the pond,
causing the ripples to merge—
no longer distinguishable as ripples from the leaf or ripples from the wind.

This morning, the world became an infinite mirror—
where every boundary was nothing more than a line drawn on water.