Then there’s only one way to participate in history, and that’s to have no will at all—to function solely as a shining, beautiful atom, eternal and unchanging. No one should look for any other meaning in human existence.
- Yukio Mishima, “Spring Snow” (Chapter 13)
Oddly enough, living only for one’s emotions, like a flag obedient to the breeze, demands a way of life that makes one balk at the natural course of events, for this implies being altogether subservient to nature. The life of the emotions detests all constraints, whatever their origin, and thus, ironically enough, is apt eventually to fetter its own instinctive sense of freedom.
- Yukio Mishima, “Spring Snow” (Chapter 15)
Complements, I’d say. Aligning emotions with the course of natural events, and vice-versa, is the name of the game.
Also, “The life of the emotions detests all constraints, whatever their origin, and thus, ironically enough, is apt eventually to fetter its own instinctive sense of freedom.” is a really great insight. To the extent that emotions are blind to natural events, they are fettered, and to the extent that they can account for natural events, they are free. Beautiful.
Functioning in the complexity of everyday life requires balancing the content of our subjective world with the content of the objective world. This happens naturally when we manifest our essential nature, no self, and merge with our content. Then the natural dynamic interaction of inner needs and external conditions is realized selflessly. When we assert, judge, or interpret, when we are “busy,” our very busyness obscures our realizing our true situation, no self. When we believe in personal self, we feel we have to act, have to decide, and have to assert ourselves. In this way, we make ourselves busy and simplicity is lost. When we manifest no self, we melt into our experience: nothing is ignored, nothing is denied, nothing is asserted, and nothing is interpreted. The will-less, selfless reuniting of self and world is clear. There is no busyness. This is simplicity.
From:
http://www.purifymind.com/Simplicity.htm
The web design’s horrible, I’d recommend copy-pasting this into a word doc or something. But well worth the read. Except I’d change “no self” to “no self-concept”.
The small part of me that still feels awkward at offering silence in exchange for cherished words of wisdom feels compelled to tell you that the small part of me that still feels awkward at offering silence in exchange for cherished words of wisdom…
Ah well.
I’m grateful for our correspondences.