"In European thinking things are seen as causing one another and having effects, whereas in Oriental thinking this seeing of cause and effect is not emphasized but instead one makes an identification with what is here and now. [Suzuki] then spoke of two qualities: unimpededness and interpenetration. Now this unimpededness is seeing that in all of space each thing and each human being is at the center and furthermore that each one being at the center is the most honored one of all. Interpenetration means that each one of these most honored ones of all is moving out in all directions penetrating and being penetrated by every other one no matter what the time or what the space. So when one say that there is no cause and effect, what is meant is that there are an incalculable infinity of causes and effects, that in fact each and every thing in all of time and space is related to each and every other thing in all of time and space. Being so there is no need to cautiously proceed in dualistic terms of success and failure or the beautiful and the ugly or good and evil but rather to simply walk on "not wondering," to quote Master Eikhart, "am I right or doing something wrong." -John Cage
Thought I: Astronomical Physics
The fact that each one of us is at the center of the universe has been proven by Physics in the study of the history of the universe, General Relativity, and gravity, and I believe the conclusions reached can be extrapolated to human experience. Since the Big Bang all matter has been radiating out from a point whose location has been lost to inconsequence. Because all of this stuff is moving away from all the other stuff despite gravity it constantly growing farther and farther apart, thus the expansion of the universe. There is no center of chaos, no origin, and so for all practical purposes the "center" may and must be taken to be the subject itself in relation to all other objects, whether it be a star, a galaxy, a particle of gas, or a human being. There's little physical difference between any of these things really as even we are ultimately made of particles that were once stars exploding several billion years before. There is however, as Suzuki and Cage note, consciousness, which adds the gravity of subjectivity to the center of 7,000,000,000 new universes. The idea of interpenetration can also be supported by Physics though the idea may be harder to apply to us. During the Big Bang, the production of light in star cores and the eventual explosion of stars subatomic particles called neutrinos are created as byproducts with no seeming purpose. They are so small that the mass of one must be estimated to weigh as much as 1.3 electron volts (varying from type to type)- neutrino mass is equivalent to the mass of electricity, if that can be grasped. It has been estimated that several hundred thousand neutrinos enter and exit every cubic centimeter of your body every second without trace.
Thought II: White Noise; White & Noise
One sound of one pitch can be heard clearly, two gets more complicated, five may become dissonant and unpleasing, but eventually so much noise enters our system that it effectively becomes a single sound. The same phenomena occurs with light: white is not actually a color, it is the over stimulation of the eye until the brain produces what we perceive to be white. Sometimes a beautiful sound or person or thought makes it's way to the forefront of this white noise produced by infinite interpenetrations and becomes consciousness for a moment. The unconscious, aware of everything in that it is aware (consciously) of nothing, never forgets the white noise always in the background, never mistakes an instance of beauty for Everything because ultimately that instance will recede into nothing and leave only a renewed awareness of white noise.
"Only take the position of doing nothing, and things will of themselves become transformed. Neglect your body; cast out from you your power of hearing and sight; forget what you have in common with things; cultivate a grand similarity with the chaos of the plastic ether; unloose your mind; set your spirit free; be still as if you had no soul. Of all the multitude of things, every one returns to its root, and does not know that it is doing so. They are all as in the state of chaos, and during all their existence they do not leave it. They do not ask its name; they do not seek to spy out their nature; and thus it is that things comes to life of themselves."
-Hung Mung to Yun Kiang
Though I: Wu Wei, Non-Action
An understanding of wu-wei can be integrated into a life of active seeking. Set goals and work toward them but do not be disappointed by their disappointment- you can make new ones as easily as thinking. So really goals are without substance or meaning. One cannot be more accurately identified than by their behavior: now I am sitting later I will be standing and both states are not particularly meaningful except that they are both modes of existing. Are any modes better than others? Is "doing good" better than "standing" or are they just different?
Thought II: ?
Humans are most unique in their freedom. To entrap themselves, to destroy themselves, to transcend themselves. Can we transcend ourselves? Is there greater freedom within us unactualized? Where is it? How can we become it? Why is there not a verb to describe this becoming? Is the way of unconsciousness (rejection of consciousness in favor of unconsciousness) unnatural to beings endowed naturally with consciousness?
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