I thought I would briefly revisit this topic.
What is the Buddhist emptiness? I am not exactly sure what they refer to, and it probably varies a bit with tradition, teacher, and context.
Here are a few things that come up for me:
When I find myself as capacity for the world, I find I am no-thing full of the world as it appears to me. My true nature is open for the world. It’s empty allowing all these experiences as they are. My field of experiences happens within and as this awake no-thing.
When I find myself as capacity for the world, I find that all my experiences happen within and as what I am. To me, the world is one. Any ideas of separation and distinctions come from an overlay of thought. In my own experience, I am oneness and empty of any separate self.
This human self is still here, in my field of experience, but it’s not what I ultimately am. I am not any particular thing within this field, including any ideas of an “I” or “me” or “observer” or “consciousness” or “awake” or “emptiness”.
When I notice this, I also find that my experiences are inherently empty of substance. They happen within and as what I am. Just like a dream, my waking experiences happen within and as consciousness. (And it still hurts when I stub my toe.)
When I investigate my thoughts, I find they don’t and cannot hold any absolute or final truth. They are empty of any final or absolute truth. Reality is its own truth, and thoughts can only imperfectly point to it.
I am sure there are more ways to talk about emptiness in this context, but these seem some of the main ones.