 Ueda argues that both the ego of the Cartesian cogito, as well as the non-ego (Sanskrit: anātman; Japanese: muga) of Buddhism, must ultimately be comprehended on the basis of an understanding of the self as a repeated movement through a radical self-negation to a genuine self-affirmation. Ueda’s formula for this movement is: “I, not being I, am I.” Even when one says “I am I,” if we listen closely there is a pause, a breath, between the first and the second “I.” Precisely that opening—which necessarily occurs as a moment in the ceaseless movement by which the identity of the self is constituted—is the “ecstatic space” wherein an open encounter with another person is possible.