Inexhaustible Things

Ah - meant to say that neither answer is completel...

2009-10-10T21:05:48.597-04:00

Ah - meant to say that neither answer is completely correct nor completely incorrect in the case of the empty room. The matter of how to finish answering such a question is greatly considered in rigorous practice of koans in Zen.

Whether your eyes are open or closed, you are seei...

2009-10-10T20:56:34.111-04:00

Whether your eyes are open or closed, you are seeing. Whether your ears are unobstructed or plugged, you are hearing. All the machinery for seeing and hearing is operating just the same.

I am typing a response to you. I am sitting in a room void of furniture. Noticing that there is no furniture broke my "just responding." The noticing "took my mind," albeit very briefly. Fortunately, I recovered!

But what about before there was no furniture? I don't mean when someone else lived here; rather, I mean while I was typing to you: was there furniture or was there no furniture? Depending on how you would like to define mushin, you could say that neither answer is correct.

The pretty girl and the incoming text message: are they there or are they not there when you are just driving?

Between "just driving" and "just reading the text message," what happened?

Let me take the driving example one step further a...

2009-10-10T18:09:35.753-04:00

Let me take the driving example one step further and examine the case where the driver actually, say, looks at his or her cellphone or at the pretty girl walking by for the sake of clarification.

'Breaking' mushin does not occur simply by reading the text message or looking at the pretty girl. If either of these actions occurs within the 'observer' perspective free from emotion or intention, then the state persists. As such, it seems to me that mushin is a state that is preferable to any other mental state, regardless of the activity.

Is this a rehash of what you were trying to say or am I moving in a different direction?

"... but in your opinion, which would be more effe...

2009-09-21T20:00:01.798-04:00

"... but in your opinion, which would be more effective or practical in an ordinary situation, aikido or taekwondo?"

Of aikido and tae kwon do, the one that is best for you is likely the one that appeals to you, is local, is within your budget, has a good good teacher, and has camaraderie among the students that matches your personality. That's the one that you will stick with over the years, and that's where you will develop your skills, confidence, and everything else.

i guess what you meant by coffee taste the same as...

2009-09-21T16:10:35.194-04:00

i guess what you meant by coffee taste the same as tea is, they're both martial arts that would achieve the same goal. but in your opinion, which would be more effective or practical in an ordinary situation, aikido or taekwondo?

"I don't get it Joe. Your child studies aikido, so...

2009-09-02T18:36:17.408-04:00

"I don't get it Joe. Your child studies aikido, so are you saying that is better than takwondo, that it is less agressive?"

In exactly the same way a hammer is better than a screwdriver, sure. :-)

I don't get it Joe. Your child studies aikido, so ...

2009-08-30T01:42:47.961-04:00

I don't get it Joe. Your child studies aikido, so are you saying that is better than takwondo, that it is less agressive?
And coffee and tea don't taste the same, the effects of the caffeine aren't the same either.

"so what is the aftermath? is aikido much better t...

2009-08-28T11:06:00.312-04:00

"so what is the aftermath? is aikido much better than tae kwon do?"

Coffee and tea taste the same.

so what is the aftermath? is aikido much better th...

2009-08-26T14:43:19.748-04:00

so what is the aftermath? is aikido much better than tae kwon do?

By the way, Andrea, congratulations on your decisi...

2009-06-23T17:02:20.915-04:00

By the way, Andrea, congratulations on your decision to intern with MDA! All of the MDA representatives and counselors we have met have truly impressed me with their compassion and their want to help us. I don't know where we would be now without them!

[We were going to be camping with the Maryland group, but have met several of the crew from DC Metro through our clinic visits to Children's Hospital in DC.]

Thank you, Andrea :-) It should not be a terrible...

2009-06-23T16:58:58.811-04:00

Thank you, Andrea :-)

It should not be a terrible surprise that we, the parents, are the one's who are dealing with residual impact, much more so than my son. While his devastation was very honest and very real, he was just as thoroughly excited about joining my wife and me for lunch at Chick-fil-A today and just as much looking forward to a trip to the pool.

Undoubtedly, it'll always be the parents worrying about what the kids are worrying about until we understand clearly how to see things through their eyes. The roller coaster is more of our ride than his ;-)

This is a great, and very sad post. I am also a bl...

2009-06-23T15:57:09.182-04:00

This is a great, and very sad post. I am also a blogger, and am interning with MDA this summer in the Washington DC metro area. I am so sorry about camp; I know I was looking forward to going and I am sure your son's excitement was tripled that. I hope your family finds comfort this week and finds some fun as well. I loved the farmer's story "Maybe" you posted as well.

Just a quick response---all I have time for right ...

2009-06-12T17:38:44.890-04:00

Just a quick response---all I have time for right now---before I give your comment some deeper consideration, Ron:

For part 1, I agree with the basic premise that we have available what we've practiced or experienced, not necessarily anything else. What is notably absent, though, is any mental obstacle that either obstructs or compels action.

For part 2, mushin is just one, named, of state of mind. So is full concentration. So is completely distracted. One is not inherently good or bad; they're all naturally occurring, after all. I suspect that there is value in practicing the first two, though, and training ourselves to recognize when we are distracted.

A good scenario to consider is driving: Full concentration, or full immersion in driving is simply too exhausting. That's the state that student drivers are in when learning the skills, integrating sensory information, and so forth. Mushin is available to the experienced driver as a base state---"just driving." The radio is on, no big deal. Easy conversation, no big deal. We're basically alert and safe without concentration. Concentration on an aspect of driving, such as focusing upon the speedometer, takes away from what is happening outside the window. Similarly, text messaging may be a distraction that does the same. A pretty girl walking by may distract from what is happening inside the car. All can break mushin. But in this state, we can identify and shift our focus to different things as necessary, and we can recognize when distraction is happening, all as a matter of choice rather than habit.

From this reference scenario, mushin is the preferred natural state. Note that I am not saying that mushin is avoiding doing what is necessary (even if that is focusing upon something), since the conscious act of avoiding something is in itself a distraction that breaks mushin. For example, if I am thinking, "I'd better not read that text message in this traffic," I am already distracted by the thought---I am not fully driving.

I doubt that is the best explanation, but I'll reconsider a bit later. Feel free to comment in between, though!

Lots of food for thought Joe, couple of comments. ...

2009-06-12T09:58:30.348-04:00

Lots of food for thought Joe, couple of comments.

You wrote, in part, "(1) Does mushin's appearance guarantee action, let alone an appropriate action? The clarity to see something falling and to grab it---is this mushin or simply instinct?"

Comparing mushin to instinct in this way brings about a clash of orders of hierarchy, in my mind anyway. Mushin is a state of being, that of no-mindedness, while instinct is a classification of certain types of behavior. I believe that instinctive behavior, which by definition precludes conscious intent, is predicated upon the state of mushin already being in evidence. Put in terms of a metaphor, I view mushin as a backdrop or coordinate system upon which events play themselves out, not as an active determiner of outcome. The hot pan falling off the stove analogy goes to the question of choice which is based on learned behavior. For instance, someone with no knowledge of heat who has never been burned may simply reach out and grab the pan in a state of mushin (just like I did with the die careening off the table) and end up getting burned in the process. Repeat the experiment and I expect that same person’s experience with getting burned will cause an override of the no-minded state, evoking the more appropriate response of letting the pan fall to the floor. Change the experiment slightly and put a child in the path of the falling pan and the person may override the override and grab the pan in spite of the danger of being burned in order to save the child, all of which will happen with no conscious thought.

You wrote, “(2) Is there value in maintaining mushin under other-than-extreme circumstances?” Quite frankly I don’t see how anyone could function on a daily basis in a state of continuous mushin. The state of no-mindedness precludes so much of what we, as thinking, reasoning human beings do, as to be a pretty impractical state of being for normal everyday living.

Hi, Carolyn, and thanks for commenting!I hadn't ev...

2009-03-09T20:44:02.154-04:00

Hi, Carolyn, and thanks for commenting!

I hadn't even considered IRC; it really is a good example.

In retrospect, it is amazing how much time I've put into crafting different emails to be just so, making sure my meaning was clear, working that there were no "barbs" in it where a reader might get stuck, and so forth. Hours and hours at times... It doesn't help that my default preference is writing (so, email), versus a phone call or a face-to-face meeting.

And, really, for all the effort, if the reader had an agenda of some sort, my message would inevitably be misinterpreted. It's a challenging lesson that you cannot ultimately know how you will be understood. ("Damned if you do, damned if you don't!" so to speak.) With that realization, though, how would you do things differently? There are many Zen koans that have this kind of dilemma at the core.

I find more and more that, even in face-to-face talks with people whom I've known deeply for years, it's easy to go off track: one of us is misreading the other, or one of us is actually projecting something subconsciously and the other is accurately reading it. It's good to have someone close to you so you can check these things out---a neat experiment. I find that even my senses will lie to me if I communicate with some set point-of-view; I'll notice the few non-verbal cues and see them and reinforcing my view. Undoubtedly, removing those extra cues just adds to the challenge---and maybe helps you know what you're dealing with when those cues are there?

Interesting blog post. I've had some interesting e...

2009-03-09T20:15:00.000-04:00

Interesting blog post. I've had some interesting experiences about written miscommunication in a freelance job I hold.

A lot of the workers, including me, are remote workers, so the bulk of communication is done over e-mail. E-mail's usually fine because there's plenty of time to think about what to say and compose a careful phrase.

But, we also use irc, which is real-time chat communication. The IRC chats can be difficult to use to communicate sometimes because it's the worst of both worlds: No nonverbal cues, and not a lot of composing sentences and phrases on the fly without filter.

We all have to make sure to ask for clarification and do our best not to misinterpret things. We do a pretty good job, but not always perfect.

If publishing in the magazine where we still have ...

2009-02-24T10:00:50.777-05:00

If publishing in the magazine where we still have an unexpired subscription is the criteria, I think I'd be limited to National Geographic - ha!

It's so good to reconnect with everyone after so many years, seeing how everyone has changed and how they've stayed the same. I'm looking forward to more chats with you and Erin soon :-)

A fascinating read. This should be published in E...

2009-02-24T09:28:00.000-05:00

A fascinating read. This should be published in Esquire. Why Esquire? Because I have a subscription to it that hasn't expired yet. I'm glad your cousin Erin sent this to me.

Her husband, Roy

I figure that like most people, smart or stupid, p...

2008-12-18T16:00:00.000-05:00

I figure that like most people, smart or stupid, prosaic or inspired, he assumes that if he can think and articulate it, its perfectly clear for anybody to understand it. Therefore, no secrets.

So true... Being popular is a viable survival skil...

2008-12-13T09:52:33.066-05:00

So true... Being popular is a viable survival skill. Of course, what survives, then, is the want or need to be popular...

What was ultimately amusing to me was that this fellow was absolutely rigid in his insistence that things must change, taking every opportunity to deride those with opposing views as "elitists"---you know, people who proclaim to know better than everyone else. There was simply no showing this fellow that he was barking at a mirror image of himself like a dog.

If popularity is the goal, then perhaps you should...

2008-12-13T09:21:00.000-05:00

If popularity is the goal, then perhaps you should be speaking of de-evolution.

"The Wire" lives on in Baltimore!

2008-07-03T13:12:00.000-04:00

"The Wire" lives on in Baltimore!

Hi,Thanks for your comment on 53 beers. I just no...

2008-05-28T22:00:00.000-04:00

Hi,

Thanks for your comment on 53 beers. I just now read your post.

I share your concern about a road leading to the absorption of Oakland Mills into a mini "city center" with Town Center. Which is why I feel that any such connection out to make it as hard as possible for drivers to use it as a thruway. Broken Land and MD175 already exist as through connections between east and west Columbia-- and they border Oakland Mills. I don't think we need a third.

Bill

Great Post. At work I've often encountered compan...

2008-05-15T13:18:00.000-04:00

Great Post.

At work I've often encountered companies (I won't publicize which ones) that have whole IT "Testing" departments with multi-million dollar budgets but they don't actually DO any testing themselves. Instead they just provide methodologies and tell the project teams HOW to do their own testing (and of course audit their testing).

Both and work and in the general culture we are bereft of true talent, but we are flooded with the knowledge of (supposedly) how to be talented.

I suppose that personally, this could be viewed positively. As long as the world is full of such un-productivity, then it makes my own mediocre usefulness all the more valuable.

For all the words in my blog post, the one thing I...

2008-03-20T16:26:00.000-04:00

For all the words in my blog post, the one thing I did not address is the validity of Clint George Sensei's teachings. Your post has helped me answer the question - that his message is not invalid even if the deliverer is flawed. I like the analog you made with the Torah. Very apt. Thank you.