What is the Problem?

In life it is said, we often find “more problems than answers”; we attract calamities to ourselves with an almost superhuman ease, while grace and fortune stubbornly resist all our efforts of charm and cunning. It is also a well-known truth however, that one man's problem is another man's blessing to which the rule may also be inversely applied, and so before we complain about our problems we better be sure that we are actually in possession of a real one.

In the strictest possible sense, we might distinguish a real problem from a false one by the condition that any real problem will always work against our advantage in every case, whereas a false one will only prove problematic here and there. But very rarely if ever can we imagine such a cast-iron example: Failing to gain asylum to a country might seem like a predicament free of any possible benefit, however for all we know gaining it may have very well lead to a fate worse than death. Losing the love of our life may seem unbearable with no positive outcome at all, but we could well imagine a situation in which their continued presence may have indirectly lead to the death of our whole family. Even taking an extreme example in which we ourselves die an untimely and tragic death, such a tragedy may also be considered a great blessing in that it has ultimately delivered from the slow and tedious death of old age. And so if there is any real predicament to be faced, it is really no more than our inability to know for certain whether our disappointments are blessings in disguise, or whether our blessings merely conceal further disappointments.

So let us look at this problem; the only one we ever have – our predicament of not knowing whether we have been cursed with problems or graced with good fortune, what would happen if we could know for sure whether a situation would in the long-run turn out to be advantageous or not? Well naturally we would be able follow each and every path we knew would lead to a favourable outcome, and in doing so create heaven right here on earth. But if we are convinced such a world would be heaven manifest, we have perhaps misunderstood the entire notion of paradise altogether: While it may be 'heavenly' to see every one of our plans come to fruition immediately and exactly as we envisaged, we would have also in the process cut ourselves off from the possibility of generating any new ones, since as every successful person knows: 'Good plans are not conceived in the comfort of security but in the turmoil of defeat'. By necessity then, our paradise would have to be one in which we could just as much expect disaster and defeat as success and bliss; an ethereal wonderland where good luck and bad luck happily existed side by side. If this is our definition of heaven however, could it not be that we are already in it? We seem after all, to have just described the exact conditions we find ourselves in.

Such a conclusion may not immediately seem obvious. It could well be argued in fact that the central flaw with our world is that our problems are often so many that we are not propelled by them into greatness, but mired down by them into self-despair. We are all familiar enough with those unfortunate individuals who have been disproportionately burdened with homelessness, terminal illness as well as a lack of steady employment. For these sorry people the possibility of rendering their situation as hopeful rather than tragic seems slim if not impossible. However, before we judge how many problems is one too many, it seems that we must first ask whether such a person would in fact recognise the blessing in having their situation completely transformed. All too often we accept good fortune not in the manner of a thankful adult but as a spoilt child finally receiving a present: "About time! I wondered when exactly you were going to give me my just deserts. Thank goodness you finally have!" And in this way it seems that our over-riding burden is not whatever positive accumulation of burdens we feel we have we have been unfairly apportioned, but rather the negative burden of simply failing to appreciate our blessings. It is perhaps only the individual who expects nothing from the universe and seeks nothing in return who is able to transcend this thankless state of mind and cherish every blessing that comes their way. This is the archetypal monk or sage presented to us throughout world religion. The person who has finally 'got it'. But if we think for one second that that we can transform ourselves to become this sort of person then we will have only succeeded in multiplying our burdens even further: If there is any central canon to the world's religions it is that as much as we would like to be Dogen or one of Christ's apostles we can only really succeed in being ourselves. This does not of course mean that we should not seek inspiration from the sage. It simply means we should not frustrate ourselves by mimicking something impossible. The sage after all is not some cosmic super being immune to all the horrors and disappointments that life naturally brings, the sage is only a sage in as much as he understands one simple thing – that in frustration resides the seeds of peace, and that in peace lurks the embryo of frustration.

Reflecting upon this subtle yet obvious truth and applying it to our original problem then: 'How do we distinguish our blessings from our misfortunes?' it appears we already have our answer: 'There are no inherently problematic or fortuitous situations. I’m afraid all this time you’ve been trying to work out whether the hill is an interpolation of the valley, or the valley an interruption of the hill when there is in reality no correct view to be had. Both perspectives may be interchanged ad infinitum.' Realising this we may no doubt get it into our heads that we have finally uncovered the secret that will win them the game: 'If every crisis is potentially a blessing in disguise then how wonderful! From now on I shall invert my perspective from now on so that all I see is blessings!' But this is quite mistaken. Being enlightened to the fact that problems and good fortunes are only constructs of our minds does not now mean it is practical (or even possible) to embrace every woe as a blessing. It means having the good sense to embrace our woes as woes. It is only in this way that they will take root as our catalysts for future growth and blossom into blessings. In doing so, we may natrually wish to recognise and cherish our blessings once they have finally flourished as well, and in many ways this can often prove the greatest challenge of all. But in reality our challenge is really no more strenuous than the spontaneous deduction our eye makes that there must be a 'hill' every time it sees two valleys next to each other. In the exact same sense, we need only take note of the problems going on all around us in order for the blessings right in front of us to fall into view. If we can adeptly master this, then in the most practical sense possible we will have grasped what every sage has known all along: “problems and successes are only a matter of perspective.”

The Detachment of Appearance, the Clinging of Reality (part 2)

Even if we are able to identify with these particular states of mind however, we still might not be convinced by the idea that appearance and reality are nothing other than ‘active strategies’. We may feel instead that the more common belief that appearance and reality are ‘concepts’ or ‘mental categories’ is much closer to our own intuition. While this point of view may be common place it is often one completely at odds with our actual practice: As we have seen, when we mediate our experiences we do not lump them into two mutually exclusive categories called ‘reality and appearance’ we freely interchange our experiences between the two – dreams, waking life, and fiction may either be real or unreal depending on our immediate requirements.

This is could be argued however, does not prove that our intuition that appearance and reality are two separate categories of experience is wrong, only that we are likely to become muddled and inconsistent when caught out by rapidly changing experience. But if the actual measure of our intuitions is our daily practice, then it seems once again that we have a position which runs counter to ourselves, since how often in practice do we find ourselves placing experience into separate mental boxes, whether consistently or otherwise? When we experience we have no time to categorise and compartmentalise experience, our choice is either to dive headfirst into the experience we are presented with, or to mentally detach ourselves from it.

To this it may be replied that even if we don’t in practice divide all our experiences into two separate piles, that we really ought to, and this is exactly why we need Philosophy to show us how. But even if such a prescription were possible to carry out in the moment, it seems we would still be missing the point of what appearance and reality are for – When we react to experience with real or illusionary intent, we do so not with the intention of being right, but for the purpose of living, and thus our behavior is not ‘inconsistent’ but ‘adaptive’.

Prima facie we might detect a faint air of ‘resigned pragmatism’ to all this, but in truth all we have really done is to describe appearance and reality as they are available to us. This does not mean that it is impossible to think of appearance and reality as two mutually exclusive concepts; in fact it is quite usual for us to do so. However if we persistently find that our abstractions do not match up with our own experience, then it is difficult to see how our concept of two exclusive things named appearance and reality is no less a thin caricature than the view that people are either “good or bad” “winners or losers”. It seems that if we are to think about appearance and reality at all, it is only by thinking about them in terms of ‘active strategies’ that we are able to arrive at a representation which both includes our own active input in their creation, and which conveys the survivalist rationale behind ‘interchanging’ them. Upon this view there is no longer even any worry about being inconsistent, since actions, unlike propositions and beliefs, are not subject to the principles that guide truth and falsehood. And thus in the same way that a door can be both opened and shut, a ball thrown and caught without implying any contradiction, so it is with our movement towards and away from experience.

  

Looming over this however is perhaps one remaining question: “What is this mysterious ‘experience’ that we are continually detaching embracing and retracting from? Is it something real, or is it unreal?” Assuming we have so far understood that appearance and reality are nothing more than activities, it should be clear that this is really to ask “do we feel moved or unmoved by it?” Any other interpretation we might be tempted to give will likely amount to a pseudo-worry over whether there is something beyond us that exists because of us, or in spite of us - a concern not only impossible to answer in practice but irrelevant to the question of how we lead our lives. If we wish to know anything about appearance and reality it seems all that is required is that we observe our own experiences. By introspecting in this way we will quickly come to know that all illusion and reality refer to is the two opposite poles of action known as expansion and contraction. Like all representations such labels are of course ‘the map’ rather than the territory itself, but if we aspire to share our experiences then it unlikely we will find a more faithful way to define them than by this active relation - a relation not only strategic, but hopefully one in which there is also the possibility of play as well.  

The Detachment of Appearence, the Clinging of Reality (part 1)

That there are two modes of experience called ‘appearance’ and ‘reality’ is a commonly view within philosophy, how we might distinguish appearance from reality however is often the cause of wide debate and dispute. Some philosophers in line with popular understanding have defined ‘appearance’ by that which is fleeting and transient and ‘reality’ by whatever is stable and regular, while others have found it more critical to designate appearance as that which is ‘mind-dependent’ and reality by that which is ‘mind-independent’. Such theories have rarely met with universal approval however, and many have sought to place the emphasis on direct perception instead– if I am able to make visible contact with something then it is real, otherwise I have reason to doubt it and it is not.

While these theories only constitute a small sample of the many positions available, even within this small selection alone we may find it possible to generate an entire range of conclusions starkly at odds with both convention and our intuitions. From the theory of mind-dependence for instance we may conclude that since we cannot transcend our minds to verify which entities are truly real or ‘mind-independent’ we may as well assume all phenomena are illusions contingent upon the mind. In this way rather than distribute experience between appearance and reality, sometimes it may seem more plausible to consign experience in its entirety to either one.

No matter whether we claim experience is ‘all appearance’ ‘all reality’ or a mixture of both however, the true test of such theories is often not how internally consistent or resistant to attack they are, but how resilient they are to everyday life. Unfortunately when we do test our intellectual virtues against the chaotic barrage of everyday life we may often find our closely cherished theories are impossible to live up to – in practice life not only demands to be split between both reality and appearance, but also that both categories are inter-changeable. While the idea of inter-substituting reality and appearance in this way might strike us as inconsistent and contradictory, such flexibility is often essential to our survival and fulfillment in life.
  

For example; even though I may 'know' that fictional books are just made up stories to entertain people, it is may also be necessary for the purpose of enjoying them that I am able to take the characters to be every bit as my family and friends. Similarly, while it is essential in order to scare myself with nightmares that I suspend disbelief in order to enjoy them, it is equally as essential that I am able to tell myself that they weren't real when I wake up. Although even when I wake up, reality may still prove just as frightening as my dreams, and so in this case I must calmly remind myself that this is only the subtle illusion created by billions of atoms dancing together, creating the collaborative fiction of ‘solid matter’.

If any of these examples offer an honest reflection of ordinary experience, then it seems that to find something ‘real’ is to do no more than embrace an experience, while to find something ‘unreal’ is to retract from it. While it may seem contradictory and irrational to react to our experiences as both real and unreal depending on our whims, if we understand appearance and reality as active movements of the mind toward and away from experience, then it should be apparent that to find something both ‘real’ and ‘unreal’ on separate occasions is no more contradictory than to both climb a ladder and descend it, to rise from a bed and later lie down in it.
  

As a tradition largely build upon the foundations of rational discourse rather than self-observation, the idea that appearance and reality might be nothing over and above the mind’s grasping and releasing of experience probably seems counter-intuitive. It is perhaps only in the Eastern tradition where introspection or ‘mindfulness’ is typically given priority over verbal discourse that we are likely to find practitioners more easily accustomed to the idea of appearance as “detachment” while reality as “clinging”. Even if such a view is relatively lost to western philosophy however, we may still find traces of the same basic intuition within our everyday speech. It is quite common for instance to hear people say of someone who is mentally ill: “That man doesn't have a firm grip on reality” “he’s taken leave of his senses!” “He isn't in possession of his mind”. Similarly if someone is regarded as sane, we are usually reassured that they are “in full possession of their senses” or have a “firm grip on reality”.

From these examples it should be apparent that appearance and reality are not only playful activities of the mind as relates with experience, but also important coping strategies we unconsciously employ to mediate it - Sometimes experience may prove desirable and of benefit and we will instinctively embrace them, other times experience may appear threatening and confusing and it will become more desirable to disengage from them. The mental patient is particularly adept at this second type of strategy, and may even be regarded as ‘sane’ in as much as he is able to demonstrate that he still has enough survival instinct to detach himself from socially standardised experiences which have long ceased to be bearable for him. While we probably do not regard ourselves as having quite such a loose grasp on reality as this, we can perhaps recognise something of own behavior in this form of detachment, and in turn appreciate how difficult ordinary experience must have become in order for someone to take such drastic action.

Go to part 2 

On Spontaneity

I remember once having a conversation with a friend about the nature of mind in which I remarked that even if the mind was ultimately no more than a collection of neurons, that it was never the less quite profound and mysterious that these neurons should fire spontaneously of their own accord. My friend as I recall immediately took issue with my dreamy profundity and reminded me that every-time a neuron fires it is simply because it has received either an internal or external input to make it fire; thus there is really nothing mysterious or profound about the process at all.

While this seemed plausible enough at the time, in retrospect it seems to me that to get rid of spontaneity by finding something else that caused it, is really to conceal spontaneity by pushing it so far out of the way that we forget its really there. To use a imaginary example; although we may say a thought we just had about an Indian head-dress was caused by the bird we momentarily glanced outside our window, we might just as well ask where birds come from, which if we traced its origins back far enough would lead us to the birth of the very first cell, which if we traced its inception back far enough would lead us to the inception of the universe itself - an event which for most modern people was neither caused nor preplanned but rather occurred spontaneously. If we are religious we may of course object and say: “Well God created the universe and he certainly had a plan” but if his creation is anything to go by it is a plan so perfectly concealed amongst chance and spontaneity that we might suspect there is really no plan at all.  

For a certain breed of fundamentalist to say that God is not in control of his own creation is a clear case of heresy. But if God is anything like our best artists, his ability to let his work run away with itself is if anything, a testament to his divine skill. A good director after all, cannot become 'brilliant' until he has learned that the best performances happen when the actors are allowed to direct themselves. A competent musician cannot acquire the mantle of "virtuoso" until he has abandoned the sheet music and permitted the instruments to play of their own accord. It is only in other words, when the music is allowed to play itself or the performance is freed up from the script that true art presents itself. To otherwise take charge of our creation without permitting it to deviate one inch from our plan, is to create something devoid of art and thus bereft of life. And in this respect it should be apparent that it is when we call God the ‘Grand Designer' or ‘Chief Architect' that we commit the true act of heresy; since this is to find creation empty of life and barren of anything we might call 'art'. 

In practice It should not be necessary to coerce ourselves into religious feeling in order to appreciate the fact that life at its root is fundamentally spontaneous.To appreciate that life is fundamentally spontaneous only requires us to reflect upon the most pivotal point in our lives; our own inception. Since as much as your parents might insist that they ‘planned' you, in actuality they weren't expecting you at all. The fact that you were born on a particular day, with a particular character and set of traits was as much a surprise to your parents as it probably is to yourself now. This is surely what parents mean when they talk about the ‘miracle of childbirth - it is not that they are not being naive about the mechanics of sex, rather it seems they are expressing the wonder that the most precious thing of all came about with the least amount of planning, care or attention.

Science may of course inform us that to call such events ‘spontaneous' is really to apply an uneducated person’s term for that which cannot yet be predicted, and that one day all phenomena, including the exact appearance of children, will be predictable and there will no longer be any need to apply these sorts of superstitious terms. But even if it were possible to live in a depressingly predictable world free of surprises like this however, it does not necessarily follow that this would be a world free of spontaneity. We can for instance, predict with relative safety that the sun will rise in the morning and then set in the evening, but this surely does not make the event any ‘less’ of spontaneous. That is to say, there was no prior arrangement between the sun and the earth to a line roughly as they did the day before, the two planetary bodies did not meet up behind Jupiter the Monday previous to hash out their maneuvers - the event occurred without plan or for any reasonable purpose.  

For a human race obsessed with reason, to exist in in an unreasonable universe such as this might be so alarming to even consider. But to be alarmed by the lack of reason in the cosmos in this way is really no more ridiculous as being scared by one's shadow or frightened by one's own reflection, since you yourself are unreasonable. As we have already seen, even assuming you were the type of person to set deadlines and meet them, to draw up five year plans and rigorously sticks to them, like everyone else you still failed to plan for the most important event in your life of all - your own birth. And so to feel that you have any control over life is really as ludicrous as saying that you are the master of your own destiny while riding a runaway horse which you do not even remember agreeing to ride in the first place - no matter how well you are able to steer in your direction, it is still you who is being taken for the ride.

To feel that we are as helpless in life as a person on a runaway horse may be even more terrifying than the previous suggestion that life is essentially unreasonable. But I have not illustrated life in this way to show that 'you' the 'spontaneous you' is helpless. I have only illustrated life in this way to show that the ego; the part of you that insists that it is in control despite having had nothing to do with its own coming into existence, is the thing which is beyond help. This of course does not offer us very much hope if we are particularly ego-driven people who will not hear of loosening the reins on life and allowing it to follow its own direction. But for this type of person it should be pointed out that much like the creative who refuses to 'give in' to creativity does not get very far in being creative, the egoist who cannot relinquish their own ego now and then will not get very far in their egotism. If in other words, we really want life to go our way, it is essential that we are at some point able to permit life to go of its own accord. This does not mean allowing life to control and push us around, it simply means allowing ourselves to become as one with it so that the whole process becomes natural and undivided. When we approach life like this, the artificial division between controlled and controller should eventually begin to dissolve away, and as every good horse-rider knows this is when cups begin to spontaneously arrive on shelves, when bottles of champagne suddenly appear in your hand, and there is a glorious joke at play where everyone commends you on your force of will and determination when you know full well that the whole thing simply happened by itself.

In this sense my friend was perhaps quite right right; there is nothing profound or mysterious about spontaneity. To harness events in such a way that they happen by themselves is really just to practice the basic truisms we are all familiar with - that love cannot be forced but must be allowed to happen, that all great art is the product of happy accident rather than laboured design. If such common sense facts do appear profound at all, it is apparently only because we are looking out at the world with our ego; the part of ourselves naturally finds the idea of anything occurring with our its own conscious intervention completely inexplicable. If however we look out at the world in the same spirit that the world considers us; as a spontaneous happening of itself, we find that spontaneity no longer presents any mystery, for this is the world as it has always been.