Hope, Fear and Attachment

I decided this was too long to post as a comment here, but it is a continuation of thoughts begun at Café Press. I actually started on this several days ago, and only now made it back to edit what I had written. Essentially it began as a discussion of the relationship between hope and fear, and that led into the question of whether hope itself had any intrinsic value.

What I realize now is that there are at least two ways that the word "hope" is used. One is in reference to a specific event. "I hope that X will happen." The other is very vague and ill-defined, but it generally has no object. "I have hope." I think it might be described as a positive expectation directed toward the future, but without any further specifics attached. A sort of "trust" in the future. Unlike hope's counterpart, fear, there doesn't seem to be a more specific word for "generalized undirected hope," whereas we have "anxiety" for "generalized undirected fear."

Primarily I'm criticizing the first kind of hope, the "hope that X will happen." That kind of hope is automatically associated with the "fear that X will not happen." They can be distinguished, but they cannot be separated. They are at opposite ends of an emotional teeter-totter. As Heidegger noted, however, hope and fear can only be felt for uncertain events. As soon as something is certain, there is no more room for hope or fear. We know whether or not X has happened. So long as X remains uncertain, it is possible to have hopes or fears associated with it. My opinion is, why bother?

Seriously. What is the point of hoping you can keep your job? If you want to keep your job, do it well, don't annoy any of the people who make the decisions, etc. etc. What is the point of fearing that you'll be in a car accident on the way to work? Wear your seatbelt, pay attention, don't drive while impaired, etc. etc., and you minimize your chances. Hope and fear just get in the way of doing what is necessary. In the worst cases, they are paralyzing. Accept the possibility of losing your job, getting in a car wreck, or what-have-you, take appropriate action, and move on. What do fear and hope add to this?

Of course, fear and hope will sometimes arise of themselves in relation to a situation. That's fine. That's what emotions do. The problems come when people become attached to the hope or the fear. That's when it can escalate and, eventually, result in paralysis. The stronger forms of hope are almost like a drug, so much so that the intermittent bouts of fear almost seem worth it if we can experience the high of that hope once more. But this can only occur if we do not let go of that hope and that fear. Accept that X might or might not happen, and act to increase the chances of whichever outcome you most favor. Hope is nothing more than attachment to a specific, uncertain outcome, and it is more often harmful than helpful.

The only exception I can see is in a situation that is so miserable, so devoid of any chance of a positive outcome, that hope for something better is the only thing that might keep a person from giving up. In that case, and that case alone, the manic-side of hope can be useful, but it will be balanced by a similarly frantic fear.

So, what about that other kind of hope? The kind which has no particular object? I'm going to call it "positive expectation" just to distinguish it from the other form of hope. It might be expressed in the sentiment, "Things will work out for the best." Or maybe, "The future will be better than the past." Used in the mildest sense, as a means of coping with unfortunate events, this has its place. But becoming too attached even to this form of hope can cause problems. Things don't always work out for the best; the future is often worse than the past. So long as this is recognized, allowing positive expectation to arise is less likely to cause problems than is the more particular form of hope. However, it has as its counterpart anxiety. The more strongly we become attached to positive expectation, the worse the anxiety will be when it arises. I would still advocate a simple acceptance of possibilities. It's possible to prefer one possibility over another, and act accordingly, without becoming attached to that possibility.

Non-attachment is not indifference. It is simply recognizing that we cannot control everything. It is acknowledging our limits even as we seek to find a way beyond them. A way will be found, or it won't. X will happen or it will not. Non-attachment is, most simply, recognizing these possibilities. It means starting from where you actually are and doing what you actually can. Hope blinds us to the possibility of failure while fear blinds us to the possibility of success. They see-saw back and forth, and up and down, without bringing anything of use to the table. The real result will most likely be somewhere in between the most-hoped-for and the most-feared outcomes.

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Simple Way to Have a Koi Pond

A few weeks back, I ran across the koi pond screensaver while my mom had a coupon for 10% off of "anything that would fit in this bag" at Office Max. I had to buy it. I've often thought that if I lived in a warm enough climate, I'd like to have a koi pond in the back yard. Here you'd either have to have a place to keep them in the winter, or heat the pond, or just replace them every summer, none of which appeals to me. The screensaver is absolutely beautiful, and allows you to take screenshots. A few of my favorites are below:


This one is actually cut down from the full image, because I particularly like this bit. The other images are full screenshots.







I have a few slight complaints. It would be nice if there were an option to choose which pond would be visible and/or how long it will be before it switches to a new pond. As is, the software is automatically set to randomly cycle through all its ponds with no user input. It would also be nice if you could specify how many and/or what kind of fish would be visible, the frequency of dragonfly appearances, and so forth. On the other hand, not being able to specify those does make it a bit more like a real koi pond. However, no real koi pond that I have ever seen has such crystal clear sparkling water! I'm not sure koi can live in that type of water. I realize it wouldn't sell very well if the water looked dingy and murky, and the images are quite beautiful, so this is more of an observation than a complaint.

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Thoughts on the Tao of Dao

Over at the Useless Tree, there are some very good posts discussing the nature of the Tao (Dao) and the I-Ching (Yijing):

Is Dao the Sum of All De?
Randomness
Teaching the Yi Jing (I Ching)

Asking "What is Dao?" is not particularly useful. There's no conceptual answer that encompasses all that Dao is. And even putting a name to it (Dao) changes the nature of what it is. Since I've been reading Heidegger, I was somewhat tempted to identify Dao with "the nature of being," but Dao is also the nature of nonbeing. Dao is everything and in everything, and Dao is nothing and in Nothing.

A contrast with the traditional Abrahamic god might be useful... Usually, this god is described as "omnibenevolent, omnipotent, omniscient." Dao is not omnibenevolent. It just is; that's all. All things, both good* and bad*, meet in Dao. Omnipotence is no match for the power of doing nothing, which belongs to Dao. As for omniscience... what is there to know? Does the river need to know the law of gravity that pulls it down to the valley? Dao allows, where a god must forcibly "create." Dao notices and is aware of, where a god must "know". In Dao, there is no good* or evil*, as all things are One, where a god must separate and distinguish.

*If these labels even exist, one has already fallen away from Dao. To call Dao "good" is either meaningless or an insult, and quite possibly both. When all things flow as One, there can be no good or bad, but only being. When the flow stops, when it breaks, that is where good and evil can arise. At least, that's my limited understanding of it.

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Being and Time: Hints of Zen

Much to my surprise, I'm actually enjoying reading Being and Time. It's not an easy read, but not as insanely difficult as I'd expected. Of course, my expectations came largely from the copied pages of Heidegger that we were given in the Tragedies class, which made no sense whatsoever lacking the context of the rest of the book. This is a big part of why I've been reading from the beginning, rather than just reading the numbered sections that Levenson suggests. What I find most interesting, and even somewhat bizarre, is the undercurrent of zen that seems to run through the work.

The most obvious way this shows up is in Heidegger's insistence that an object's function is more primary to its being than the mass which makes up the object. For instance, a hammer is not truly a hammer until one hammers with it. More to the point, we don't experience it as a hammer until we hammer with it. The object simply being present in awareness is termed "presence-at-hand" (zuhanden) and awareness that the object may be put to use is termed "ready-to-hand" (vorhanden).

Heidegger rejects "presence-at-hand" as having much of use to tell us about the nature of Being, particularly the nature of Being Human (Dasein). One is already at one remove from the object if it is merely "present-at-hand". Similarly, in zen thought (and other places), words put us at one remove from the object. As soon as we've named it, we've lost touch with what it really is. There's a beautiful zen koan that relates the idea. I'll summarize it as I remember it:

The head of a monastery needed to choose his replacement, so he gathered together all the monks of the monastery and placed a pitcher of water before them. "Who can tell me what this is without naming it?" he asked. The monk that most expected to be chosen hesitantly said, "It cannot be called a shoe." The head cook scoffed at this and pushed the pitcher over with his foot. The head of the monastery smiled. "Ah, that's the one."

(For a more detailed, and slightly different, version, click here)

Another point that came up in class ties Heidegger's thought to Taoism as well. The idea is that we don't always notice "readiness-to-hand" until it fails us. The lead of the pencil breaks; the hammer-head flies off; we can't find a pencil sharpener for the pencil or nails for the hammer. We're more likely notice the readiness-to-hand just as it disappears on us. That is, we realize that everything was functioning smoothly as one entity ... until something goes wrong and dissolves that unity. Then we notice the unity as an absence. What was one has become many.

As it turns out, Heidegger has an essay about a (probably fictional) dialogue he had with a Japanese sage. It was published later than Being and Time, and I'd be curious to see what it says. However, I have not yet tracked down a copy. As I have not seen it online, I can only presume that it's still under copyright (or at least that any English translations of it are).

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Meditation Benefits

They Call Him James' post on a study showing that zen meditation could help with pain control inspired me to look for other recent studies relating to meditation. I found more than I expected to.

Here's the article James linked to: Zen Meditation Alleviates Pain, but there are plenty more.

Compassion Meditation May Improve Physical And Emotional Responses To Psychological Stress

No differences were seen between students randomized to compassion meditation and the control group, but within the meditation group there was a strong relationship between the time spent practicing meditation and reductions in inflammation and emotional distress in response to the stressor.

Mindfulness Meditation Slows Progression Of HIV

Participants in the eight-week group showed no loss of CD4 T cells, indicating that mindfulness meditation training can buffer declines. In contrast, the control group showed significant declines in CD4 T cells from pre-study to post-study. Such declines are a characteristic hallmark of HIV progression.

Meditation Can Lower Blood Pressure

"Adding Transcendental Medication is about equivalent to adding a second antihypertension agent to one's current regimen only safer and less troublesome," Anderson said.

Zen Training Speeds The Mind's Return After Distraction

After interruption, experienced meditators were able to bring activity in most regions of the default network back to baseline faster than non-meditators.

Compassion Meditation Changes The Brain

The scans revealed significant activity in the insula - a region near the frontal portion of the brain that plays a key role in bodily representations of emotion - when the long-term meditators were generating compassion and were exposed to emotional vocalizations. The strength of insula activation was also associated with the intensity of the meditation as assessed by the participants.

Mix Of Taiji, Cognitive Therapy And Support Groups Benefits Those With Dementia

Participants in the program benefited in a variety of ways. After 20 weeks, those in the treatment group improved in several measures of physical function, including balance and lower leg strength, while those in the comparison group did not. There were also positive cognitive and psychological effects, Burgener said.

Cognitive Training Can Alter Biochemistry Of The Brain (not directly related to meditation, but some meditation could arguably be considered 'cognitive training')

Professor Klingberg and his colleagues have previously shown that the working memory can be improved with a few weeks' intensive training. Through a collaborative project conducted under the Stockholm Brain Institute, the researchers have now taken a step further and monitored the brain using Positron Emission Tomography (PET scans), and have confirmed that intensive brain training leads to a change in the number of dopamine D1 receptors in the cortex.

Selflessness -- Core Of All Major World Religions -- Has Neuropsychological Connection (Note:I don't care for the wording in some places in this article, but it's still an interesting finding)

“This research also addresses questions regarding the impact of neurologic versus cultural factors on spiritual experience,” Johnstone said. “The ability to connect with things beyond the self, such as transcendent experiences, seems to occur for people who minimize right parietal functioning. This can be attained through cultural practices, such as intense meditation or prayer or because of a brain injury that impairs the functioning of the right parietal lobe. Either way, our study suggests that ‘selflessness’ is a neuropsychological foundation of spiritual experiences.”

Admittedly, some of these focused on very specific meditation techniques, but there's still a pretty clear message that meditation, in any form, is likely to be beneficial to a person's health.

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Existential Musings, III

This is likely our last selection from Husserl before we move on to Heidegger. I'm not sure that all of it comes from the same document (Dr. Levenson did a lot of cutting and pasting on his photocopy), but at least some of it is from Husserl's Cartesian Meditations.


“if what belongs to the other’s own essence were directly accessible, it would be merely a moment of my own essence.” I think this is trying to get at the idea that we cannot perceive anything directly from any point of view but our own … which begs the question of how we know for certain that any point of view but our own actually exists.

“what is appresented by virtue of the aforesaid analogizing can never attain actual presence, never become an object of perception proper.” Similar to the previous point: if another’s point of view exists, we will never be able to perceive it directly. We can only perceive apparent results of that point of view, and infer its existence. However, if Husserl wants to build a certain foundation for knowledge, this sort of inference requires an awful lot of assumptions.

“I, as the primordial psychophysical Ego, am always prominent in my primordial field of perception, regardless of whether I pay attention to myself and turn toward myself with some activity or other.” In most cases, I would tend to agree, but I know of at least one exception. Push-hands. You cannot do push hands well while being aware of ‘I’. Instead, all of your focus is on your partner, your partner’s movements, your partner’s balance. In that instance, when push-hands is happening correctly, there is no ego. There is only the moment and the movement. After a good exchange, the ego can come back and analyze it, so it is in the background somewhere, recording data, but it is not “prominent in my primordial field of perception.” There is no conscious awareness; there is only the movement and the response. Somewhere underneath the ego, there is something that is aware, but it is not the ego: the ego is continually surprised by the resulting exchanges. Don had a student who became supremely frustrated with this; he’d say things like, “But I wanted to do it!” To me, that misses the point entirely. While absorbed in the ego, one cannot be completely aware of and one with the moment.*

“my animate bodily organism (in my primordial sphere) has the central ‘Here’ as its mode of givenness; every other body, / and accordingly the ‘other’s’ body, has the mode ‘There’.” Brings to mind a zen quote: “The fundamental delusion of humanity is to suppose that I am here and you are out there.” ~ Yasutani Roshi

* And suddenly it dawns on my why the concept of a "personal god" makes no sense at all to me. In order to have a personal god, the ego, the personality, must be prominent, and that requires such a god be unaware of the actual moments. I suspect "all-powerful" would be the rallying cry for those who object, yet that, too, is an idea of ego. When the ego is the least of that-which-is-myself, why should I take seriously a god who seems to consist only of ego?

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Never Finished

In the most recent Yoga Journal (February 2009), Matthew Sanford shares this thought about Yoga:

I feel wonder as I realize that every pose is infinite and that ultimate mastery is not possible. I feel wonder as my practice teaches me to trust that time, dedication, and curiosity are what bring me progress, not the intensity of my will. Most of all, I feel wonder about the little things—how my breathing is such a sensual experience, how my lifted chest directs awareness through my extremities. Finally, I am filled with a sense of wonder as I realize that my yoga practice allows me to refine the quality of my existence.

The same sentiment applies to taiji. It is a task that is never finished. It's hard to imagine what it would mean to be finished. Perfection? Professor Cheng Man Ch'ing himself never felt he'd reached perfection, and said that he had only done the form perfectly perhaps three times in his lifetime ... and he created that form.

This is something that constantly puzzles me about adherents to mainstream religion. Except for the ones who emphasize proselytizing, their task is done the instant they convert. There is nothing left to do or perfect. What's the point? What meaning can there be? What is left to explore? There is no path to be found there: only a destination. This is true, also, of the common view of heaven. It is a destination with no purpose other than to be a destination: there's nothing and no where left to explore. How can that be a heaven? If perfection is ever genuinely achieved, that is the time to give up, as there is nothing left to perfect. That is ultimate hopelessness and despair. But just as there can be no largest prime number, there is no such thing as perfection. Any so-called "most perfect" point can still be improved upon.

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The Phenomenology of Qi

This had been on my mind anyway, and Ebonmuse gave me the perfect excuse to expound on it. The problem with telling people that there is no such thing as qi, is that many people have experienced a sensation that they interpret as qi. Ebonmuse even has a physiological explanation for one of these sensations: The Ideomotor Effect. Beautiful stuff, particularly as something like this very effect is taken advantage of in push-hands. From Wikipedia: "The ideomotor effect is a psychological phenomenon wherein a subject makes motions unconsciously. As in reflexive responses to pain, the body sometimes reacts reflexively to ideas alone without the person consciously deciding to take action."

Mark once asked Kayo Robertson how to follow someone who wasn't moving. Following in push-hands means, essentially, responding to another person's movements, and simply staying with those movements (without tensing up). Kayo responded, "You think you're not moving?" Kayo placed one hand on the center of Mark's chest and told him to try and not move. There were still small movements that Kayo could follow and use to push Mark out. Wikipedia describes reflexive movements, but I think unconscious or unintentional would be a better descriptor in this example.

Ebonmuse also suggests that most of the other reported effects of qi flow are due to suggestibility in the practitioner. There are some instances where I strongly suspect that is the case; look for Henry Wang's push-hands videos on You-Tube, for example. There are some problems, however.

My first experience with qi was before I had any idea there was such a notion. I was riding on a bus, either in junior high or high school. My feet kept getting hotter and hotter and hotter, as if there were a coal burning roughly in the center of the bottom of each foot. I looked around, wondering if something was wrong, but no one else seemed to notice. With great effort, I managed to pull my feet up off the floor, and the sensation decreased noticeably. Years later, I had a similar sensation during a qigong exercise, and suddenly I knew what it was I'd felt on that bus. Even stranger, the place where I'd felt the hot coal has a name: the bubbling well. Certainly, my latter experiences could have an element of suggestibility to them, but that begs the question of why I felt heat in a location that is believed to be a center for qi flow before ever hearing of qi flow or that there was an energy center in that location.

Another problem with the pure suggestibility hypothesis is that beginning taiji students often spontaneously report feeling heat in their hands. Usually I don't even mention qi unless students express interest in it, or mention such sensations. I'm not claiming that the only explanation is a metaphysical energy source; I am claiming that the sensations are real and a result of the taiji practice. What the practice does to result in those sensations, I can't say, at least not in physical terms. It's simpler, and more useful, just to call it qi-flow.

Why? Because it feels like an energy flow. Mentally, it can be manipulated as if it were an energy flow, at least in one's own body. If it's not an energy flow, then it's probably an artifact of the way the brain processes information coming in from the body. That's not going to help people figure out what to do with those sensations, however. And they are useful sensations in the context of taiji. They tell practitioners when the body is lined up correctly, and treating the sensations as actual energy flows tends to give people exactly the right impression for adjusting their own postures. Most of the time. Every so often I locate a different flow that turns out not to be the one we're aiming for in the taiji form, and then Don and I argue about it, and he nearly always turns out to be right.

As for where the maps of the meridians and such came from, I would bet solid money that they came from practitioners of the martial arts and meditation, noting where these "energy" concentrations felt like they were located, and whether they felt any flows between them. One more personal anecdote: in our morning warm-ups, we rub the centers of the right palm around the center of the left foot 36 times, and then switch to left palm on right foot. I was told this was supposed to be good for the kidneys. After a few weeks of practice, I could feel a sensation, almost like an electrical current, running from the center of my palm, up the arm, over the shoulder, and down to the middle of the back, where it seemed to collect. I had to look up where the kidneys were, and it turned out that they were exactly where the energy felt like it was collecting. It took several years before I got a similar flow running up from the center of the foot to the opposite kidney, and I still don't always get that one: it seems to depend on getting the presumed energy centers in the feet and hands precisely lined up.

Do I think there's actual electricity flowing from my limbs into my kidneys? Possibly. Then again, it may just be another artifact of the way the brain processes sensation. What I know is that I experienced that in the absence of any expectation of feeling such a flow, and before I knew for certain where my own kidneys were located. So I'm inclined to be dismissive of anyone who just dismisses the meridians as hokey nonsense with no physiological correlates. There is something to them, even if it's not a literal energy flow.

For the record, I would like it if qi turned out to be energy in the sense that the term is used in physics. That would just be cool. However, I don't think I'll be convinced of that until/unless I manage to physically affect some inanimate object without physically touching it. And, yes, periodically I do try. I suspect that if I ever did succeed, my first thought would be to wonder if I was having a psychotic break-down.

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On the Scarcity of Eight by Eight Frames

A while back, I found a piece of embroidered artwork at the Purple Moon (an import store in downtown Pocatello). The art itself is about 4 inches by 4 inches, and still pricey since the process of making the art is extremely intricate, and it was mounted on an 8-inch piece of backer-board with an 8" by 8" matte attached.

There started the attempt to find a frame for it. My first find was an actual eight-by-eight frame from, of all places, a dollar store. It wasn't until I got it home that I could take it out of the plastic and discover that the backer-board was too thick to slide into the frae. Trying to separate the embroidered silk from the board would likely have ruined it, and trying to widen a very cheap, plastic frame would have ruined the frame. So that was out. Next I came across a frame that I thought was eight-by-eight, though it was matted for a four-by-six photograph. I pulled the matte out... and discovered that it was just slightly smaller than eight-by-eight. I debated using a jig-saw on the backer-board, but figured I'd look around some more before risking ruining the piece.

Finally, I came across some framed artwork on clearance at Ross. The bits that had been mounted inside the sealed frames had come unglued. The frames were larger than eight-by-eight, but they were square, and the display area inside was roughly eight-by-eight. So I bought one of these and used a paring knife to get the backing off. Then I removed the intended artwork, glued the backer-board in its place ... and needed a way to seal the frame back up. I could have glued or nailed it, but I liked the idea of being able to get back into the frame if I wanted. I wandered through various hardware sections, and found these connectors at Fred Meyer:

The screws actually came from Lowe's, as Fred Meyer didn't have any that were small enough. But these work beautifully. Attach them just outside the backing for the frame the frame, and you can rotate the plastic piece in to hold the backing in place ... or out to allow the backing to come out again. I attached four of these.

At any rate, here's the finished, framed piece:



I would have loved to get one of the larger pieces, but the prices went up rather steeply from this one. I think the 8.5" by 11" matted ones were $45, and the next size up (can't remember dimensions now) was around $60 or $80. Not bad, considering that the embroidery is done by hand, but more than I could afford.

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Adding to the Practice

At the taiji camp that I usually go to, Bataan opens each day with a 30 minute meditation session. He refers to his style as "Vipassana meditation", and he or one of his students always gives a brief introduction for those who haven't done it before. The interesting thing is that a quick internet search turns up all sorts of information on Vipassana, and there is little resemblance to what I have been introduced to as Vipassana meditation.

The practice that I have learned is to focus on the breath, and allow the breaths to become deeper. Then just allow the mind to be empty. Thoughts will arise. Notice them, then let them go. In the beginning, it's very easy to become distracted or fixated on a thought. When you notice, acknowledge the thought, and let it go. Trying to force a thought to go away just gives it more power.

The last time I tried adding this into my regular practice, I was ... somewhat impatient with it, to be honest. I would set a timer for whatever time I could allow (usually 5-10 minutes), then focus on my breath, to the point of counting the breaths, and, assuming that each count took one second, trying to figure out how much time was left. I didn't maintain the practice for long at that point but, honestly, I don't think it's possible to get much out of it that way. This time around, the thoughts stay empty on their own much more easily. Some do arise, and I note them, and wait for them to fade so I can return to the emptiness.

I don't know if I'll manage to continue when the semester gets going, but I hope that I can. So far, the time has passed smoothly and continuously, so that I'm surprised when the timer goes off. It's not that the time has gone quickly... it's more that it feels like there is no time. And if there's no time, how can time pass? It's a bit hard to describe the sensation.

At any rate, here is what Wikipedia has to say about Vipassana, and here is a brief summary of some of the recent research into the benefits of meditation.

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The I-Ching

I've been curious about the I-Ching (yi jing in pinyin) for quite a while, but whenever I'd pick up a copy of it, I'd get the sense that now was not the time ... right up until I found Deng Ming Dao's Living I-Ching on my trip down to Salt Lake last summer. The title is usually translated as "The Book of Changes". "Ching" or "jing" generally means "classic text".

The idea behind the Changes is simple. All things in life are constantly changing. They change according to observable and predictable cycles. If we can figure out where in the cycle we are, we can be prepared for what's likely to come next. The Book of Changes attempts to organize the cycles of change. It is often used as a tool for divination. Use some random method (usually the casting of yarrow sticks or coins) to choose a hexagram. Rules will determine if any of the lines of the hexagram are about to change, and the changing lines will yield a second hexagram. The first is believed to be the situation as it is now; the second is the situation about to come into being.

While I do cast coins and look up the corresponding passages, I don't think of it as divination. It's more...inspiration. The imagery in the poems may take my thoughts in a different direction with regard to some problem or question. I have noticed that I'm more likely to consult it in times of stress, where I feel a bit out of control, and that fits recent research which suggests superstitious behaviors in part serve to re-establish a sense of control over an uncontrollable situation. For me, I recognize that I will find in the imagery something to soothe my mind, whether it represents an accurate forecast for the future or not.

As for Deng Ming Dao's version, I like that he includes the Chinese character with its partial* pronunciation and some of its meanings. I like that the beginning of the book discusses some of the history of the I-Ching, and the way it progresses through a cycle itself, just as the Changes do. I also like the discussions of each hexagram. He includes the poem, two of the interpretations, the readings for each changing line, and then goes into his own commentary. Interestingly, his commentary is always on a separate page from the "classic" material. I would consider this an excellent version for someone just getting started.

For the record, there is a part of me that takes the I-Ching more seriously than I've indicated here. According to Master Jou (my teacher's teacher), you can't master the Changes by casting coins or sticks: you've mastered them when you know which hexagram applies in a situation without any extraneous ritual. Whether that's truly possible or not, I don't know. I do know that I've had some eerily applicable readings, but I also know that, once I've primed myself with a question, I'm going to see an answer to it in what I read.

One final oddity: when I found the copy of the book in the bookstore and picked it up, it was warm in my hands. My hands almost tingled. I frowned at the book, put it back, and picked up another from the same shelf. No warmth or tingling. So I picked up the Living I-Ching again, and the warmth and tingling came back. I still get it if I hold the book for very long. Does it mean anything? It does to me, at least, but to anyone else, it probably indicates some sort of subconscious appeal of the book to me. However, it's not an appeal for any version of the I-Ching. I found an older translation in an antique store (Jung, or one of Jung's students, iirc), picked it up, and it was painful in my hands. *shrugs* I was actually thinking of buying it until I picked it up. Make what you will of that. I find it a curiosity worth exploring.

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Happy Rebirthday to Me

Yesterday marked two full years of keeping up my daily practice. I've stopped caring so much about the number (and found when I went to check that my count must have gotten off somewhere along the way), but it now stands at 731 days of practicing breathing exercises, yoga, chanting and taiji. So what have I learned through 2 years of practice?

It took getting through the first year to get over my obsession with "How many days have I made now?" For a while, part of my motivation was sheer desire to see the number build. If I missed a day, it would start over at zero, and I didn't want that. Now... I still don't want to miss a day, but the numbers don't really enter into it. Thinking about missing a day is a bit like trying to imagine going through the day without breathing. There were times early on when I hadn't managed to practice by 11:00 pm or so, and I groaned when I realized it. When that's happened more recently, there was no groaning. It was more matter of fact. I needed to practice, and this was the time I had.

The other thing that motivated me early on was trying to overcome my depression. After practicing, I always felt better. It seemed logical to think that a regular practice might help me climb out of it. It did. It's actually a bit strange now to feel that weight gone. Every so often, a tiny bit of it reappears, but it's a bit like being hit by a rock after having a mountain sit on you for a year. The rock isn't pleasant, but it's almost laughable.

What I've noticed most is how differently I experience time now. I can remember when it went by quickly, and I wondered where it had all gone. Now... Most days seem to be two or three days long. The semester seemed to last a year or more. I'm actually aware of time as it passes. There's a lot more of it than people realize. I suspect that people don't know how to deal with all the time, and so they subconsciously find mental ways of making it go away. Then they wonder where it all went. I used to do that, too, but at some point over the past year, time just started opening up for me.

I've also found that the time I most want to practice goes in cycles. For a while, it will be steady in the mornings, then it will gradually shift over to evenings. Occasionally, other commitments dictate the time, but usually a morning or evening time just feels right for that day. Part of me would like to get something going both in the morning and in the evening, but I know full well that there would be days when that would be nearly impossible. So for the moment, I'm just keeping the commitment steady.

Sometime this year I'll pass the 1000 day mark. Supposedly, some of the breathing exercises I do have cumulative effects that show up past the 1000 and 10,000 day marks. I'll be curious to see if I notice anything unusual.

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Mirror, Mirror

Subject and object from the start
Are no different,
The myriad things nothing
But images in the mirror.
Bright and resplendent,
Transcending both guest and host,
Complete and realized,
All is permeated by the absolute.

~Zhitong (d.1124) 2008.12.21 Daily Zen

For the rest, head below the fold:

A single form encompasses
The multitude of dharmas,
All of which are interconnected
Within the net of Indra.
Layer after layer there is no
Point at which it all ends,
Whether in motion or still,
All is fully interpenetrating.

The image is of Indra's net, which is often used to represent the interconnectedness of all beings. There is a parallel in Christianity, though it's a touch ironic (and gruesome, at the end):

34"Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.'

37"Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?'

40"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'

41"Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.'

44"They also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?'

45"He will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.'

46"Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."

~Matthew 25:34-46

Ironic in that, by extension, the lord must then be sending himself to eternal punishment, just as he is doing to the least of his own flock. The gruesome should speak for itself. I always liked the thought that whatever good deed was done, it was done also to the "most high", and I more or less ignored the other part.

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Silence

"To hear, one must be silent." ~Ursula K. LeGuin

It seems that some form of 'existential dread' is common in most societies; some fear a sense of emptiness, or of meaninglessness. Sometimes dubbed the "god-shaped hole", I think the best name I found for it is 'the ineffable ache'. The thing that I find strange is that most people either try to deny that the ache is there or try to cover it over somehow. Sometimes the covering over is a symptom of the denial, particularly in people who avoid introspection at all costs.

What I have to wonder, though, is why people do not explore this emptiness that they find inside themselves. It's there, a part of the identities of many people, yet they refuse to acknowledge it except in trying to hide it or escape from it. It's also odd that they assume emptiness is a bad thing.

Thirty spokes converge on a hub but it's the emptiness that makes a wheel work
pots are fashioned from clay but it's the hollow that make a pot work
windows and doors are carved for a house but it's the spaces that make a house work
existence makes something useful but nonexistence makes it work

~Dao de Jing, 11, trans. Red Pine

That emptiness inside, that sense of no-self, of a void, maybe that's telling us something, and maybe we need to be quiet enough to hear it. Not paper over it. Not cover it with music and chat and games. Not blind ourselves to it through the false comfort of religion. Just experience it, and listen.

It can be difficult going at first. We're so used to the constant chatter of our thoughts, of the people around us, of the television or radio or computer. Allowing the mind to become still so that the world can be reflected in it goes against most of what society tries to ingrain in us. Many people work so hard to cover up that ineffable ache that they don't even notice who they themselves are. Their very self-image comes from the constant chatter.

What is that you hear, when you allow the mind to be silent? I don't think it has a name. Giving it a name just reinforces our tendency to chatter chatter chatter. Some might call it 'God', but what is gained by that? Invariably, people begin to argue about the proper label, and claim that they've found the one true religion. Calling something the 'one true religion' makes about as much sense as going on about the 'one true science' or 'the one true toaster oven.' Reality never fits into the small box of any 'one true religion' (or any 'one true toaster oven', for that matter).

So stop trying to cover up that 'hole', and you may be surprised at what you hear.

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Tao Te Ching, character by character

Okay, technically "dao de jing" is more accurate, but more people recognize the text under the old transliteration. Either way, I found a site that links to one version of the Chinese text and every character hyperlinks to its definition. The site is Zhongwen.com and the Dao de Jing is here. Oh, "zhongwen" is usually translated as "the Chinese language," though apparently "wen" technically refers only to the written component.

Before ever taking Chinese, I made an attempt to decipher some of the characters. I didn't get very far. The problem is that you need an understanding of the language structure to figure out a lot of the meanings. Even then, the Dao de Jing is a very old text, and character usage tends to change over time. Complicating matters, the original text contained no punctuation marks, so translators have to figure out where the breaks ought to go. Comma placement does matter, after all. There's even a book out. "Eats shoots and leaves" is quite different from "Eats, Shoots and Leaves".

Still, I quite enjoy going through the text character by character and comparing it with the various English translations I've got lying around. Though it's almost too easy at the site I just linked to. Last night, I began playing around with the Chinese dictionary that was an optional buy with my Chinese textbooks. It took me a while to work out how the thing works. The English side was easy enough, but looking up a Chinese character is tricky. Each character is made up of smaller units called "radicals". To start, you pick off the "first" radical (usually the leftmost one; possibly the upper leftmost one in a complicated character) and find it in a list ordered by the number of strokes in the character. That gives you a number, and when you go to that number in a second list, there's a list of characters that begin with that particular radical. From that list, you find the pinyin equivalent of the character. Then you go into the actual dictionary part and find the pinyin alphabetically, watching out for homophones. There you find potential English translations. It's a good idea to see if any of them contain the character you want plus the next character in the sentence, in case there's a compound word there where the separate meanings don't help you figure out the combined meaning.

While the process is complicated, it also makes the end result more memorable. It took more work to get there, so I have more of a chance, as well as more motivation, to try and remember it. Of course, I got stuck pretty quickly with Red Pine's version of the Chinese text. I suspect this is because he's using older versions of some of the characters, and I barely know enough to recognize some of the basic modern ones, let alone try to figure out what the older versions might have looked like. Still, it's enjoyable to be able to puzzle out bits and pieces of the text. It will take lots more practice and study before I can get much out of it without the help of existing translations, but it will be fun to try anyway.

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Religion, Spirituality and Mysticism

I’ve been musing lately on the relative similarities and differences between religion, spirituality and mysticism. I had a clear grasp of what I meant when I used the word religion, but the other two terms are rather slippery. In fact, I didn’t find any definitions for "spirituality" that really fit the way that I understand the term. I tried "spiritual" and didn’t have much better luck. But here’s my attempt to make sense of the three.

Religion is primarily external. In particular, it involves acceptance of some external set of dogma and, usually, exhibition of certain external behaviors: going to church/temple/synagogue/mosque/etc., reading a particular sacred text, burning incense/heretics/candles, and so on. It is primarily a social phenomenon in that regard. It is about being observed to follow a certain set of principles and behave in a certain manner. The internal state matters not at all as long as the external matches up.

Mysticism is primarily internal. The best dictionary definition I found was:

In religion, the attempt by an individual to achieve a personal union with God or with some other divine being or principle. Mystics generally practice daily meditation.

Union is the key word. It is no longer about spouting memorized dogma or adhering to behavioral standards. It is about experiencing the divine (whatever label you happen to give to it). More specifically, it is about experiencing a sense of oneness with all-that-is. Even the word "divine" is too divisive. It suggests something separate, when the experience is one of unity.

Spirituality seems to be somewhere in between the two, but probably lies closer to mysticism. There’s no particular dogma to it. Maybe the best description is that it involves a sense of being connected to something larger than the self: that sense of awe and wonder that often comes when looking at a sunset, or at the stars at night, or at a flower unfolding from a bud; a sense of amazement that anything exists at all; and a feeling of gratitude at being there at that moment to observe the intricate beauty of all-that-is.

Of the three, I have the least patience for religion. Yes, I’ve adopted some external trappings that I find conducive to my private meditation practice, but I have no use for "dogma for the sake of dogma." When a dogma helps set someone on a path, then it is useful. When the external trappings provide a mood conducive to seeking enlightenment, then they are useful. When the external becomes more important than the internal, then it is time to throw the external away.

When the spiritual teacher and his disciples began their evening meditation, the cat who lived in the monastery made such noise that it distracted them. So the teacher ordered that the cat be tied up during the evening practice. Years later, when the teacher died, the cat continued to be tied up during the meditation session. And when the cat eventually died, another cat was brought to the monastery and tied up. Centuries later, learned descendants of the spiritual teacher wrote scholarly treatises about the religious significance of tying up a cat for meditation practice.

~Zen Koan

For another depiction of spirituality, visit Science Musings (HT: James McGrath)

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Another Mental Excursion

Science requires methodological naturalism. All this talk about “materialist ideology” is all a diversion from the truth, which is that creationists, dualists, and proponents of various kinds of woo want to change the fundamental and necessary rules of science to allow their religious beliefs to pass as science. They are doing this for purely ideological reasons, and they don’t care if they have to destroy modern science in the process. Yet, they have the gall to accuse scientists of being “materialist ideologues” when they are just defending of method of inquiry from ideological assault.

Neurologica

From the summary of a very good article discussing the DI's latest tomfoolery (HT: Pharyngula). One bit puzzles me...

"The Buddhist connection perhaps explains Schwartz’s predilection for abusing quantum mechanics to “justify” his claims for dualism."

I was under the impression that Buddhists, as well as Taoists, rejected Duality in favor of seeing all things as One. Admittedly, Buddhism isn't a single, monolithic entity, so its adherents may disagree on certain points, but this still strikes me as very odd. I suppose he might be trying to argue for some unit separate from the body that can be 'reborn' into the karmic cycle. But I think the only way to make that scientific would be to isolate the unit (whatever it might be), place it into a new body, and somehow show that there was a continuity of consciousness. If that were possible, however, it would no longer be supernatural speculation; it would become part of the naturalist model.

To be honest, I've never really seen the point of making a distinction between "natural" and "supernatural." If it exists and can be observed, it is part of Nature. Period. This is part of why I find it so absurd when people describe the greatest being of all as a god who is separate from the universe. In the first place, there's no way to observe such a being until it interacts with the universe; in the second place, it cannot really be the "greatest being of all." Take the union of said god with the universe and you've got a greater being. In the third place, how can a supposedly "omnipresent" god be separate from the universe in which it is omnipresent?

I have a sneaking suspicion that people who espouse such a viewpoint don't really feel connected to their own bodies. I can bring my awareness to any part of my body that I choose. With the right training, I could probably learn to control many bodily processes that are normally dealt with subconsciously*. How is it meaningful to say that I am separate from my body? Separable from my body is another issue. But as of this moment, whatever it is that I call "I" is one with my body. To be aware of something, truly aware, is to be One with it. Thus an omnipresent god who is aware of all that goes on in the universe is necessarily one with it. There is no room for the "supernatural" with such a viewpoint.


*One example: I used to play around at a mirror, trying to make the pupils dilate or construct at will. At one time I got pretty good at it, but it was a lot of work for very little pay-off, so I haven't been practicing it lately.

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Kung Fu Panda

Spencer finally climbed out of his World of Warcrack haze (no, that's not a typo), so I got to see him and Kim and the kids for the first time in roughly a year. Okay, there were also mega-family things going on, but the primary culprit was World of Warcrack. So we caught up yesterday, and went to see Kung Fu Panda at the $2 theater. It would have been worth a full price ticket, honestly.

The story will be instantly familiar. Clumsy nobody gets chosen to be the prophesied hero who must save the day. However, this version is unusually well done. The animation is superb, and the characters are a lot of fun. Also, the writers did at least some research, as all of the Fabulous Five represent actual styles of Kung Fu. You can see them in the picture above: Tiger, Crane, Mantis, Snake, and Monkey.

Some of these even show up in taiji. Legendarily, the founder of the original taiji was impressed by the fluidity of a snake who was fighting with a crane. In the Cheng Man-ch'ing form, we have poses called "snake strike", "embrace tiger; return to mountain", "white crane spreads wings", "step back to repel monkey". I can't think of any mantis examples in our form, but that is certainly a classic Kung Fu style.

It was also enjoyable to see the usual martial arts training sequences turned on their head and pelted with dumplings. Use what works, not what you think ought to work! That's a particularly zen/taoist attitude, and there are plenty of other examples throughout the movie. It's rare to see zen or taoism represented so well in a mainstream work. I suspect they got it right primarily because it was intended as a kid's movie, so they weren't trying to get it right. Then there's the secret ingredient, which I can't tell you; you'll just have to go see the movie. (Or you could read to the spoiler section at Useless Tree's review; he also comments on Chinese political reactions)


All pictures from here.

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Quote of the Day

My religion has nothing to do with either “self-power” or “other-power.” It’s beyond them both. My proof is this: While you face me and listen to me say this, if somewhere a sparrow chirps, or a crow caws, or a man or woman says something, or the wind rustles the leaves, though you sit there without any intent to listen, you will hear and distinguish each sound. Because it isn’t your self that’s doing the listening, it isn’t self-power.

On the other hand, it wouldn’t do you any good if you had someone else hear and distinguish the sounds for you. So it isn’t other-power.

~Bankei

If there are sounds, and there are ears to hear them, the sound will be heard by the ears. You don't do anything, except pay attention. And even if you don't pay attention, the ears still hear the sound. Incidentally, this was found whilst wandering around Daily Zen.

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The Void?

I'm basing this title on the notion of "The Void" in Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time. For those not familiar with it, the idea is to "light" a small flame in the mind and use it to burn away superfluous thought and emotion, leaving only pure awareness behind. It's an idea I've played with off an on since starting to read the series, but yesterday I think I finally experienced it, or something similar enough to it that I feel the name fits.

It wasn't a completely new experience. It was a feeling of being awake and aware, and fully here. I've had this several times before, but I had no idea how to get there on my own. I would be in that state or I wouldn't. If I wasn't there, I didn't know how to get there. If I was there, I wanted to hold onto the state of mind but didn't know how. Yesterday, I found myself in that state, and found I could put myself in and out of it nearly at will. To explain how, I'm going to have to talk about chakras:


They are usually presented as literal energy centers in the body. I will say that I feel a concentration of energy in those centers, but what I can't say is whether I would feel that if I hadn't been exposed to the idea of chakras. I do know that I have always experienced physical sensations in the heart chakra (center of the chest) in connection with strong emotions: cold and blue for sadness; a raw lump of flesh when I was mourning my grandmother, etc. Whether that's something physical or a mere mental artifact ... *shrugs* I find them useful as a way of taking stock of myself each day.

The picture is a classical representation of where these centers are supposed to be. It's been part of my breathing-meditation for the past 648 days to mentally visit each center and "open" it: imagine the color for it flaring around it in a disc of light. I started this practice after reading Your Aura and Your Chakras. It's written in a down to earth style that, while credulous, can easily be read as a useful series of visualizations. I wrote about it once before on my nearly defunct blog. The interesting thing was that the author adds an eighth chakra, which she refers to as the "golden sun". We often use that visualization in taiji exercises: a source of golden yang energy about a foot above the head.

My general practice is to start with the root chakra (at the bottom of the diagram, red) and work my way up to the crown chakra (violet, just above the head). Then I started adding in the "golden sun" chakra, above that. Then I would work my way back down, "closing" each chakra back into a single "gem". Then, one day, just out of curiosity, I mentally explored the region even further above the golden sun, and found myself thinking of it as the moon or the void. It seemed... black and empty, but empty in the sense of pure potentiality. It somehow felt like it was everywhere and everything at once. I immediately associated it with Jordan's Void, but it didn't seem particularly useful at the time I first encountered it. Still, it seemed to be a ninth chakra, so I played around with it on days when I had time for it.

Then yesterday in taiji, I found myself bringing my mind into that empty ninth wheel, and something clicked inside me. I sat up straighter. I looked around me and every detail seemed crystal clear. It was like flipping a switch and finding myself in that state of clarity and wakefulness that before had simply come and gone without any intervention on my part. I brought my mind down out of the void, and the world around me faded. Colors weren't as bright; my focus went fuzzy. I brought it back up into the void and was back in that state of clear wakefulness. I didn't know if this would last, if I would maintain the ability to move in and out of that state, but it's lasted one day at least. I can still put myself into that mental state. It's...fascinating. It's also easier to get things done. It's like... when I sink back down, there are conflicting impulses, multiple wave-functions of myself fighting to coexist. In the Void, those pulses unite into One.

It would be interesting to know if a brainscan would be able to detect the difference between those states, and what that difference might be.

Disclaimers: I'm not making any metaphysical claims for this state of mind. I'm just describing my experience with it. And if anyone feels like trying the meditation I've outlined, don't be disappointed if you don't get results right away, or don't get the same results I did. Meditation is a very subjective thing. Visualizations that one person finds incredibly helpful may do nothing for the next. The flame/void visualization never did much for me, but I still think that this Void is very similar in nature to the one Jordan described.

I should probably mention that in Hindu thought, as you go up the chakras, you are getting closer to the point of origin. Climbing up out of the body's gravity well, as it were. After meditating on the chakras, I can see where they got this idea. The experience feels somewhat like climbing out of the body. Thinking of it that way, though, seems likely to lead to trouble, imo. I prefer to think of it simply as visualizations that lead the mind into a particular state. It's equally important to know how to get out of that state: for this method, that is simply to climb back down the ladder, closing the chakras on the way.

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