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In Praise of Apparent Idleness
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Life is a busy affair. Even as we sit and do nothing, complex and energy-consuming events are occurring. Breathing, digestion, heart rhythm are all proceeding, unmarked by us. Further, mind states and emotional triggering are happening continuously, pheromones are in the air and bodily sensations are ever present. Often we are only dimly aware of our thinking, as anyone who has driven a car long distances can tell you. More amazingly, often when we drive for a few hours, we can have no idea what we drove through and, more insidiously, even if we were 'present' for that time. Imagine then plunking oneself down on a cushion and purposefully doing nothing for, say, an hour. Sensations arise. Bodily aches and pains, twitches and itches. Muscle tensions are noted. Our outer focus registers sounds, temperature, sights, smells and so on. Our minds drift. We think about work, food, friends, enemies, sex, money, and often just about those inevitable little tasks like going to the post office, doing the dishes or fixing the table leg. We bounce between all of these phenomenon like a cork on the sea. Sometimes we are relaxed, sometimes edgy. Often this is enough -- we eject from our cushion and head off into our daily affairs. Curiously we feel more relaxed, more centered, calmer. This sensation often evaporates quickly. The more experienced we become at sitting 'doing nothing' the longer we can propel this state into our day. Many meditators consider this the highlight of the spiritual life next to bliss states or penetrating insights that arise from deep calm. (I'll skip over these last two, although from a developmental point of view they are so important as to often be the end of the discussion) But I'd like to return to something that is to me even more fascinating. Back on the cushion. There you are sitting and spouting with all the above noted phenomena. But what exactly is it that registers, notes, evaluates and speculates about this data? Of course, in some meditations, one is just 'removed,' as it were, and the meditator only knows that s/he was meditating after it was over -- sort of like deep sleep, but different. More likely, we are present for the show, sometimes depressingly so. And given all the fascinating stuff in the universe (and in our lives), why do we go over and over the same trivial nonsense? How many different ways can we examine the same event and still go over it? More than we would like; exasperatingly more! It is amazing that our habit patterns can drive us like mindless cattle to a slaughterhouse of inconsequentials. But wait. In those moments in between arisings -- if we just stay present and watch this roaming consciousness have its feeding frenzy -- vast doors of space/time open. Sure it is easy to be pulled by our addictions/aversions, back into the maelstrom. We get a big kick out of it actually, as our ego awareness feeds on our self importance. Alas, as that poor ego is a creature of habit, it also gets incredibly tedious. But for the one who stays alert, the ending/opening of space/time is the beginning of what has often, far too glibly, been called emptiness. So this morning, sitting there, registering traffic (cars, birds, ideas, smells, aches, blisses etc.) the mind, catching its breath as it were, opened into a vast clarity. Poised silently, like a cheetah stalking an eland, any whiff or whisper capable of reupting into wild and fruitless chase. But this time I decide to idle, to remain aloof, to not go down that path. I reside in the deep of a vast speechlessness, unobstructed, at peace. Then -- a sensation arises, and it's as if a bomb has gone off: all the various entrapments of habit, form and mentation begin to arise: the dialogues and debates; the evaluations and judgments. The game is afoot, again. To me the fascinating moment is at the bridge, where 'the game' does not have the same obsessive power as it does when life is more 'goal-oriented.' The bridge-sitter, unlike the fisherman, throws no casts, carries no bait, and so catches no fish. Perhaps, by doing nothing nothing gets done, but by doing nothing, nothing done needs undoing either. The idler, sitting in the gap between emptiness and somethingness, does things that are empty (without identification or attachment) and so nothing gets done. Curiously that makes all those somethings incredibly more interesting. (And to any impostor idlers hiding behind the cloak of indifference, it needs to be said that mere indifference is the fear of failure, while true idleness is the garb of the fearless victor.) The true idler stands naked and alone in the moment, alert and poised. As my teacher once said, "awakening is a spectator sport."
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