Chapter 15

Chapter 15

The Sages of old were profound
and knew the ways of subtlety and discernment.
Their wisdom is beyond our comprehension.
Because their knowledge was so far superior
I can only give a poor description.

They were careful
as someone crossing a frozen stream in winter.
Alert as if surrounded on all sides by the enemy.
Courteous as a guest.
Fluid as melting ice.
Whole as an uncarved block of wood.
Receptive as a valley.
Turbid as muddied water.

Who can be still
until their mud settles
and the water is cleared by itself?
Can you remain tranquil until right action occurs by itself?

The Master doesn’t seek fulfillment.
For only those who are not full are able to be used
which brings the feeling of completeness.

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The Sage described in the above “poor description” by Lao Tzu is certainly far from an ideal lofty person looking down on his neighbors from atop an ivory tower. I don’t have any intention to disparage a Confucian sage, but it is my belief that a practitioner of Confucianism is prone to fall in the error of developing condescending attitudes towards non-practitioners; this is like several Jehovah’s Witnesses condemning “foreigners” for not following their doctrines. As a matter of fact, I believe that Confucius’ intent in itself was innocent and pure because the only thing he ever wanted was to establish order and bring lasting peace and stability to families and society. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that Confucianism as an organized effort –especially, as in the case of medieval Korea, or Chosun – was an utter failure. Confucius himself was a good Master; he personally reminds me of an oriental stoic sage. He even said, “What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the ordinary man seeks is in others.” (I like this quote.) Just as the majority of the sects of Christianity now and then severely distorted the original teachings from Jesus, the later self-proclaimed followers of Confucius also distorted him or at least failed to realize the real intent of his teachings. They instead clang to their dogmatic interpretations of Confucius and were, most of the time throughout Korean history, incorrigible hypocrites. They were rigid and inflexible. Their attitudes were somewhat similar to the European Catholic priests of the dark ages. They are geniuses at rhetoric. I believe a current psychologist can rightly diagnose them to have suffered personality disorders. The scary thing is that they truly seemed to have believed they were good people. No ordinary person has the ability to think they are good people while destroying the spirits of others. They were like the Jon Jones’ of our community – some pathological liars and deceivers having no scruples. There was something about these thick-skinned characters that deeply maddened and frustrated good ordinary people.

Some may suspect I am all against Confucius. That is not true. I certainly have a decent respect for the man. In some way, he reminds me of Nietzsche in that he persevered to the end in the mission of morally perfecting himself and society despite cold responses from people.

Now I will turn to Lao Tzu. If one confines Lao Tzu to a sage that practices wu-wei and only stays away from a mess; and contrasts Lao’s “idleness” with the unending zealous efforts of Confucius to correct a corrupt society, one will see only one facet of Lao Tzu. My renewed version of Lao Tzu, however, is a sage that embraces even that Confucius. This renewed Lao Tzu embraces both the conventional Lao Tzu and Confucius. Such a Lao Tzu would know when to be a conventional Lao Tzu or Confucius.

“Who can be still until their mud settles and the water is cleared by itself? Can you remain tranquil until right action occurs by itself?”

The above quote illustrates a beautiful metaphor illustrating the wu-wei philosophy of the tao te ching.

However, as much as I do really appreciate the beauty of this metaphor (I emphasize this again, I really love the muddy water metaphor), I need to add qualification to Laozi’s metaphorical advice.

In Chapter 2, I stated as a possibility a case in which one may achieve inner piece by harmonizing himself between the conscious and the unconscious by putting faith in the self-correcting power of the self. Lao Tzu compares this autonomous power to natural purification of water that is made to remain still. A river or sea has the ability to get clean by itself.  Likewise, a depressed patient – although it is highly advised that he should take antidepressants and consult a psychiatrist – may also heal after a long, long period of time.

However, I must say that there are cases where mental, psychological pain never disappears. You may even have to continue to carry this heavy load on your mind throughout your lifetime. If that is the case, instead of waiting for the pain to disappear, you may have to learn to exist in relation to this perpetual pain, like Sisyphus narrated by Albert Camus. There are moments when your pain feels insurmountable. There doesn’t seem to be an exit. In fact, the more you wait for the muddied water to purify by itself, the longer it takes for your unconscious to work it out (this is my “psychological theory of relativity,” which is not really difficult to understand based on common sense). You may or may not be able to heal from your trauma or immense emotional pain that weighs you down. Nobody can tell.

As for myself, I think about this constant nagging noise. What noise? The literal noise. I am allergic to noise and hate every unwanted noise – especially, the loud noise from people that I am not acquainted with, noise from cars on the street, noise from the motorcycles that I wish I could flip over, noise from an airplane in the sky, noise from the people next door, noise from the pulses in my earlobe which are made audible when I put my ear-plugs as I try to fall asleep, noise from my coworker in the next cubicle constantly chatting with her colleagues, and especially, noise from that goddamn repugnant printing machine in the office. It pains me. I am not kidding. All these noises are extreme irritations to my life, and I do seriously believe that they are taking a heavy toll on my cardiovascular health. In fact, I am not able to urinate at ease in the bathroom when a different person is making sound in a bathroom for the other gender's use. I sometimes have minor heartaches because of stress coming from noise and people. You may think I am an erratic, easily irritable person.  I am. But this recognition does not help me any better. I even thought about consulting a doctor taking some pills that can kill down my nerves. But I am worried about their side effects so haven’t tried one. It turns out that the only sound that cures me is Linkin Park’s instrumental and Chester Bennington’s voice – along with some other alternative rock music such as Limp Bizkit.

Why am I talking about noise? Personally, I do not believe that I am able to grow immune to noise. I have suffered this since I was about fifteen and things never got better for me. There were several occasions of arguing with my neighbors which could have escalated into a violent altercation. When I lived with a roommate in my freshman year at college and could not fall asleep because this guy would constantly make noise while playing a computer game, this guy once asked me, “Haven’t you got used to all this?” I did not tell him this then, but I never got angrier with him than that. Noise is constantly wearing down my inner peace, piece by piece. It hasn’t improved at all. Likewise, if some psychological problem is constantly nagging you and hasn’t improved even a little since a long time ago, perhaps we may have to rethink if this water metaphor can work for you. You may begrudgingly have to accept that this is your fate. In other words, you must learn to exist your pain. We all have thorns in the flesh as Apostle Paul did. Do not fight it. The more you fight it, the stronger it binds you. Do not wait for it to disappear, either. Befriend it. The previously muddied water, even after having been “cleared by itself,” is more likely to get muddy again as time goes by. This is, I believe, a way of practicing our amor fati.