The Book of Not Knowing is one of the most important books that I own. In fact, if I were stranded on a desert island and could only have 3 books this would be the one I most definitely would not want to be without. No one interested in understanding the nature of who they really are, should be without this practical text. I have come to view this book as having my own personal Zen Master on call.

The Book of Not Knowing has been described by some reviewers as the bible of consciousness and that may be more than just marketing hyperbole. Ralston’s work is culled from his years as a martial arts practioner and student of Zen Buddhism and it is as profound as the koan itself, but a hell of a lot more accessible.

As a student of things spiritual I have become dismayed to learn that what I think of as being “spiritual” is really just another layer of affectation that I have added to my sense of self. This book is providing me valuable guidance and insight into why I do this and helps me to explore a way of stripping these layers away to get at what is really, real. This is after all, the point of metaphysics to begin with. Who am I really behind this phenomenon that I experience as me?

Ralston identifies my problem rather succinctly early on. “When we know something intellectually, but fail to experience what’s right in front of us, we are only fractionally engaged with the world around us.” One of my favorite philosophers from my freshman year in college, Arthur Schopenhauer rather flatly advised that this myopia redolent among armchair intellectuals, such as me, is due to our tendency to think the limits of our knowledge to be the limits of the world. I have taken great solace in being a self educated expert. I have lost my beginner’s mind to paraphrase another great Zen Roshi.

Peter Ralston writes in a plain and interesting style. But, his subject is deceptively simple. I have found myself, after several pages behind me, realizing that my assumptions and attitudes have tripped me up. Thus this book is one to be studied and used as a guide for meditation as well as life beyond the cushion. Unlike a lot of new age and post modern offerings in spirituality available today, The Book of Not Knowing is not one that you read from cover to cover moving on to the next month’s selection in the Metaphysical Book of the Month Club. In no small way this is life’s curriculum. It is to be struggled with much in the same way the aspirant does with the koan.

Zen can be summed up quite nicely in pithy little statements that many of us have read.

Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water.

After ecstasy, the laundry.

When I am hungry, I eat. When I am tired, I sleep.

Knowledge or pride in possessing knowledge seems to be the barrier to my enlightenment…whatever the hell that is. It sure isn’t turning out to be what I thought it was going to be. If I really can say that I know anything at all it is that I have made a mess out of finding enlightenment. I love to complicate things. Yet enlightenment is found not in the extraordinary, but the ordinary; not in possession of special knowledge, but in the day to day activities of living. Enlightenment is turning out to be quite unexpectedly ordinary.

The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates is reported to have visited the Oracle at Delphi. The mouth piece for the god Apollo supposedly prophesied that of all Athenians, Socrates alone was truly wise. In the impish, self deprecating matter that Plato has depicted his beloved teacher, Socrates suggested that if he was the only one who was truly wise it was because he alone understood that he knew nothing.

Socrates identifies for me the first step to what Ralston (and Zen masters) refer to as “not knowing.” In order to get to this rather incomprehensible and seemingly nonsensical place I must find a way to get past the beliefs and assumptions that I rely on to navigate the world as I currently understand it.

A Christian may quote the proverb that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. I see this as a theistic observation of the same principle at work. The problem is that this not knowing sounds a lot like willful ignorance to most of us. Many Christians even get accused of committing intellectual suicide (and some do), but what the sages are trying to cure us of is our assumptions.

I have always preferred to operate from the belief that knowledge is power. Sometimes it is. Knowing how to cook keeps me from starving to death. Knowledge can be useful for survival but my tenacity in equating it with the “truth” (Ralston) prevents me from being open to the possibility of discovery (Ralston). It is the state of not knowing that allows us the openness which leads to the true authenticity that I play out, the genuine experience of the moment which allows for the intuitive leaps in creativity and clarity of vision that makes up enlightenment (Ralston.)