the ultimate truth

"The ultimate truth, the ultimate mystery of life and being, is absolutely transcendent. One cannot define the absolute. One cannot picture it. One cannot name it. Nevertheless, that which is absolute being and absolute mystery is also one's own inner reality: one is that. The absolute is both transcendent and immanent: that is to say, both beyond the universe of the senses and within each particle of the universe. All that can be said about it is . . . nothing. All that can be said points to it. Therefore, the symbols, the rites, the rituals, and the acts are involved in a world of human experience but point past themselves to that transcendent, immanent force; the rites and symbols lead one to the realization of one's identity with that absolute. Identity with the transcendent is one's essence . . ." --Joseph Campbell, Pathways to Bliss.

what i've been reading . . .

"Your bliss can guide you to that transcendent mystery, because bliss is the welling up of the energy to the transcendent wisdom within you. So when the bliss cuts off, you know that you've cut off the welling up; try to find it again. And that will be your Hermes guide, the dog that can follow the invisible trail for you. And that's the way it is. One works out one's own myth that way. --Joseph Campbell, Pathways to Bliss