Doing, Not Speaking

One of the most common mistakes in the world of spirituality, mysticism, and alchemy is this: people believe that knowledge itself is enough. They think if they fill their heads with the right books, memorize enough obscure theories, collect enough references to saints, philosophers, and hidden masters, then they’ve accomplished something. Their minds become bloated with facts, with names, with concepts. And yet, when it comes time to actually live the teaching, to embody it in the present moment, they find themselves empty-handed.

I don’t say this with judgment. I say it because I’ve been there. When I was younger and desperate for anything that might help me survive, I devoured every book I could find. Alchemy, Hermeticism, Buddhism, the Golden Dawn, Taoism….it didn’t matter. If it smelled of mystery, I consumed it. The problem was, it never went deeper than my head. I knew words. I knew phrases. I could hold my own in conversations with other seekers, dropping references to Tibetan masters or quoting obscure texts. But all of that was nothing more than fuel for my ego. I hadn’t yet taken the leap into deep practice.

— The Poverty of Words —

Here’s the problem with words: they point, but they cannot show.

Ask most people, “What is enlightenment?” and watch what happens. Their mouths fly open. They’ll start telling you everything they’ve ever read about it. They’ll recite descriptions from Buddhist sutras, Sufi poetry, Hindu scriptures, and Western philosophy. They’ll pile words on top of words, spinning concepts into the air like so much smoke. And none of it brings you one inch closer to enlightenment itself.

Why? Because enlightenment isn’t a theory. It’s an experience. You can’t describe fire to someone and have them feel its warmth. You can’t explain music to someone and expect them to hear the melody. You can’t define water and expect someone’s thirst to be quenched.

That’s the poverty of words. They’re maps, not the territory. And yet most of the esoteric world is content to keep studying maps, arguing about maps, collecting maps, and never once setting foot on the land itself.

— Zen’s Answer —

Ask a Zen master what enlightenment is, and you won’t get a lecture. You won’t get a list of scriptures or a tidy definition. More likely, you’ll get silence. Or you’ll get hit with a stick. Or you’ll see him take a slow sip of tea. Or he’ll simply hold up a blade of grass.

Why? Because he’s not telling you - he’s showing you.

Zen is merciless in cutting through the ego’s games. The ego wants to explain. The ego wants to collect knowledge. The ego wants to feel smart, important, and safe. But Zen refuses to play that game. Instead of telling you what enlightenment is, a Zen master confronts you with direct experience. He shakes you awake with something you cannot reduce to theory.

It’s like asking me, “What is a bell?” I could spend an hour describing how bells are cast, how different religions have used them, the physics of sound waves, the cultural symbolism. Or I could simply pick up a bell and ring it in front of your face. One way fills your head. The other way actually transforms you.

— Alchemy and Experience —

Alchemy, too, suffers from this confusion. Most people today treat alchemy like an intellectual puzzle. They analyze symbols, debate historical figures, cross-reference texts, and argue about whether the work was chemical, spiritual, or psychological. All of this has its place. But without practice, it’s sterile.

The true alchemist doesn’t sit in a library arguing about whether sulfur represents the soul or the will. He takes sulfur - inner or outer - and works with it. He embodies it. He refines it within himself until its meaning is revealed not as theory but as transformation.

The work of alchemy is practice. It’s the heat of the furnace. It’s the long grind of refinement. It’s the sweat of discipline, the ache of repetition, the stillness of meditation, the pain of stripping away illusion. No book can give you that. No lecture can substitute for it. The only way to know is to do.

— The Language of Ego —

One of the surest signs that someone is still trapped in their head is this: the moment you ask them about enlightenment…or presence, or alchemy, or God ….their mouth opens and a flood of words comes pouring out.

It’s not that words are evil. It’s that words are the language of ego. The ego thrives on concepts. It wants to appear knowledgeable, accomplished, superior. It wants to talk about transformation instead of being transformed.

Real practice is humbling. When you sit zazen day after day, you can’t hide behind words. When you practice Tang Soo Do forms until your muscles burn and your breath is ragged, you can’t bluff with theory. When you sit alone in a cell and face the silence of your own mind, you can’t distract yourself with clever quotes. Real practice strips away the ego’s defenses and leaves you bare.

That’s why most people cling to intellectual knowledge instead. It’s safer. It gives the illusion of progress without the risk of actual transformation.

— The Leap into Practice —

The hardest part is making the leap from knowing to doing.

It’s easy to read about meditation. It’s harder to sit down every day, close your eyes, and actually face yourself. It’s easy to talk about presence. It’s harder to notice your breath when you’re washing dishes or walking down the street. It’s easy to discuss the philosophy of kaizen. It’s harder to change one small habit today and stick with it.

But this is where the work is real. This is where transformation happens. Not in talking, not in theorizing, but in doing.

When I was on death row, I couldn’t afford to live in theory. Theory wasn’t going to keep me alive. What kept me alive was practice: sitting zazen three times a day, doing rituals at the same time every night, disciplining my body and mind into stillness. That wasn’t intellectual knowledge. That was survival.

And the same is true outside of prison. If all you do is read about enlightenment, you’ll never taste it. If all you do is study alchemy, you’ll never be transformed by it. The only path forward is practice.

— Show, Don’t Tell —

The world doesn’t need more people telling others what enlightenment is. It needs more people showing it.

If you want to know what enlightenment looks like, don’t listen to the person quoting sutras. Look at the one who is simply present. Look at the person who washes a cup with total attention, who bows with sincerity, who trains their body with devotion. Look at the person who embodies stillness in the middle of chaos. That’s enlightenment. Not as concept, but as lived experience.

The same applies to alchemy. You can argue endlessly about what the Philosopher’s Stone symbolizes. Or you can live it. You can become presence itself. The stone that transmutes every experience into something sacred. That’s showing, not telling.

— The Bell —

So let me return to the bell.

If I ask you what a bell is, you can give me a thousand words. You can tell me its history, its design, its uses. But none of that will give me the sound of the bell. None of that will let me feel its vibration in my bones.

But if you pick up a bell and ring it, I know instantly. I don’t know ABOUT the bell. I know the bell.

That’s the difference between knowledge and experience. Between speaking and doing. Between theory and practice.

—?Conclusion —

The path we’re on, whether we call it Zen, alchemy, martial arts, or the Great Work, is not a path of accumulation. It’s not about collecting facts, piling up books, or proving how much we know. It’s about stripping away. It’s about returning to the raw immediacy of experience. It’s about doing, not speaking.

Words have their place. They can inspire, they can point the way. But they are not the thing itself.

Don’t be the person who fills the room with explanations of enlightenment. Be the person who takes a sip of tea with complete presence. Don’t be the one who writes essays about bells(like this one). Be the one who rings the bell.

Because in the end, the only thing that matters is this: not what you can explain, but what you can embody. Not what you say, but what you do.

That is the Way. That is the Work. That is the difference between illusion and transformation.