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Warriors, warriors we call ourselves. We fight for splendid virtue, for high endeavor, for sublime wisdom, therefore we call ourselves warriors.
I was lost for a time, seeing nothing but those eyes, the unyielding and curious eyes of an infant.
“Can I help you?” Prophetic words!
“Excuse me, but... ” “You are excused,”
“If I had a twin, do you think I’d be the one wasting my time standing here talking with ‘nobody’s fool’?”
“We’re all fools together,” he replied. “It’s just that a few people know it; others don’t. You seem to be one of the latter types.
“The world’s a puzzle; no need to make sense out of it.”
“My name doesn’t matter; neither does yours. What is important is what lies beyond names and beyond questions.
In your case, however, I may have to perform some very difficult magic. It looks as if I’m going to have to transform a jackass into a human being.”
“Beyond that, who I am depends on who you want me to be.”
“How do you know you haven’t been asleep your whole life? How do you know you’re not asleep right now?”
but Socrates treated one and all with the same courtesy — as if each person were his personal guest.
“The world out there,” he said, waving his arm across the horizon, “is a school, Dan. Life is the only real teacher.
It offers many experiences, and if experience alone brought wisdom and fulfillment, then elderly people would all be happy, enlightened masters. But the lessons of experience are hidden. I can help you learn from experience to see the world clearly, and clarity is something you desperately need right now.
You know this is true, but your mind rebels; you haven’t yet turned k...
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“Like most people, you’ve been taught to gather information from outside yourself, from books, magazines, experts.” He stuck the gas nozzle into the tank. “Like this car, you open up and let the facts pour in. Sometimes the information is premium and sometimes it’s low octane. You buy your knowledge at the current market rates, much like you buy gasoline.”
“Dan, like this gas tank, you are overflowing with preconceptions, full of useless knowledge. You hold many facts and opinions, yet know little of yourself. Before you can learn, you’ll have to first empty your tank.”
“It’s not a matter of facts; it’s a matter of body wisdom.”
“Everything you’ll ever need to know is within you; the secrets of the universe are imprinted on the cells of your body. But you haven’t learned how to read the wisdom of the body. So you can only read books and listen to experts and hope they are right.”
“Understanding is the one-dimensional comprehension of the intellect. It leads to knowledge. Realization is three-dimensional — a simultaneous comprehension of head, heart, and instinct. It comes only from direct experience.”
He listened patiently and intently, as if he had all the time in the world, until I finished several hours later.
“But you still have not answered my question about where you are.”
“That is the point. You cannot answer it, and you never will. There is no knowing about it. You are ignorant of where the universe is, and thus, where you are. In fact, you have no knowledge of where anything is or of what anything is or how it came to be. Life is a mystery.
“My ignorance is based on this understanding. Your understanding is based on ignorance. This is why I am a humorous fool, and you are a serious jackass.”
you must appreciate that a secret’s value is not in what you know, but in what you do.”
“Use whatever knowledge you have but see its limitations. Knowledge alone does not suffice; it has no heart. No amount of knowledge will nourish or sustain your spirit; it can never bring you ultimate happiness or peace. Life requires more than knowledge; it requires intense feeling and constant energy.
Life demands right action if knowledge is to come alive.”
“That’s your problem — you know but you don’t act. You’re no warrior.”
“You may experience the mind of a warrior on occasion, resolute, flexible, clear, and free of doubt. You can develop the body of a warrior, lithe, supple, sensitive, and filled with energy. In rare moments, you may even feel the heart of a warrior, extending compassion to those around you. But these qualities are fragmented in you. You lack integration. My task is to put you back together again, Humpty.”
“The warrior acts... ”
and the fool only reacts.”
“Your feelings and reactions, Dan, are automatic and predictable; mine are not. I create my life spontaneously; yours is determined by your thoughts, your emotions, your past.”
“You had better reconsider your ‘importances’ if you are to have even a chance of becoming a warrior. Right now, you have the intelligence of a jackass; your spirit is mush. You do have a great deal of important work to do but in a different classroom than you now imagine.”
“To survive the lessons ahead,” he continued, “you’re going to need far more energy than ever before. You’ll have to cleanse your body of tension, free your mind of stagnant beliefs, and open your heart to loving-kindness.”
That night there was a great celebration. The people rejoiced, for their beloved king had “regained his sanity.” I realized then that the crazy world that Socrates had referred to was not his world at all, but mine.
First of all, I speak to you from my own experience; I am not relating abstract theories I read in a book or heard secondhand from an expert. I am one who truly knows his own body and mind, and therefore knows others’ as well.
“You know, this is very amusing work, if you really pay attention to it.”
“The young warrior, when still a child, would be trained in jumping in the following manner: He was given a corn seed and told to plant it. Just as the stalk was beginning to grow, the young warrior would jump over the small stalk many, many times. Each day the stalk would grow; each day the child would jump. Soon the stalk was higher than the child’s head, but that wouldn’t stop him. Finally, if he failed to clear the stalk, he would be given a new seed and would begin over. Eventually, there was no stalk that the young ninja could not leap over.”
You’ve changed your mind many times in the past. Soon, you’re going to do it in a more profound way.”
Once he ran screaming after a little white dog that had just peed on the station steps — right in the middle of a lecture he was giving me on the “supreme benefits of an unshakably serene composure.”
“It is better for you to take responsibility for your life as it is, instead of blaming others, or circumstances, for your predicament. As your eyes open, you’ll see that your state of health, happiness, and every circumstance of your life has been, in large part, arranged by you — consciously or unconsciously.”
“When you become fully responsible for your life, you can become fully human; once you become human, you may discover what it means to be a warrior.”
Only the supremely wise and the ignorant do not alter.’”
I was too busy taking in the colors and textures of the room, feeling the energies of the people around me. The sounds of my professors’ voices were far more interesting than the concepts they conveyed.
“I am part of your path, baboon. And I didn’t exactly rob you from the cradle and lock you up here, you know. You can take off whenever you like.”
Much of a warrior’s path is subtle, invisible to the uninitiated. For now, I have been showing you what a warrior is not by showing you your own mind. You can come to understand that soon enough.”
“This journey is real — more real than the waking dreams of your usual life. Pay attention!”
When my body was active, my mind rested in the moments of silence.
I felt it all, and I understood. The world was peopled with minds, whirling faster than any wind, in search of distraction and escape from the predicament of change, the dilemma of life and death — seeking purpose, security, enjoyment, trying to make sense of the mystery. Everyone everywhere lived a confused, bitter search. Reality never matched their dreams; happiness was just around the corner — a corner they never turned. And the source of it all was the human mind.
Some very powerful stuff my friends! I suggest you read and contemplate
“Did you hypnotize me or what?” “Not in the way you mean — certainly not to the same degree you’ve been hypnotized by your own confused mental processes.”
