Posted by jonvon on July 30, 2001 at 00:59:15:
In Reply to: Re: Shoulder Tap... posted by John on July 26, 2001 at 19:04:18:
on stick beatings... i've read there are two practices in zen for getting to enlightenment. one is the slow way. an initiate might stare at a wall for ten years until he understands what it is he is there to understand. the other way is the shock method. for instance, a student might be told that if he doesn't understand the meaning of the question, "what is the sound of one hand clapping" he must commit suicide in the morning. somehow during the night the student comes to enlightenment.
john, when i read your words about wanting to hit someone with a stick so that they would understand something or wake up to some reality i immediately thought of the latter zen practice.
on instinct, this is what they refer to in zen or in chinese philosophy in general as wu wei, which is acting without thinking. or pure action. i think there is an awful lot in your thoughts that really smacks of eastern thought. wu wei is the cry of a child - it is pure, it is completely purposeful, it requires no forethought, it just happens, as it should, as it was always meant to happen. we wei might also be the action that someone comes to after much training if the training is meant to pare you down to your real being, your truest action, that action which flows from who you are. sometimes we forget who we are, we forget our ability to cry as a child cries, so we go through some kind of discipleship training. we learn a new vocabulary so that ultimately we can discard it. john coltrane, the great jazz saxophonist said that you have to learn the rules before you can break them. wu wei can be like that. you learn all the scales, all the arpeggios, you learn all the standard licks, you complete your vocabulary, your training, and then one night as you are playing something happens. you lose yourself in what you are doing, you play outside the limits of what you have been taught. you know that you were always meant to be doing this. you begin to invent a new language, a new paradigm, you break the old sacred rites. your new wine bursts your old wineskins. you are acting. the action is pure, you are not there, it is only the action flowing through you. there is some other voice pouring out new knowledge. this is also wu wei. and somewhere in what has happened you have come to enlightenment.