Zen, Oversimplified

Inspired by every Mr. Meeseeks yearning for the sweet release of death

Try taking more when your hands are full

You just can't do it.

Existence is only pain for a predetermined raison d'être. Meeseeks live to perform a singular purpose that "they'll go to any length to fulfill."

They want only what is not already - there is no concept of life separate from purpose - their hands are full.

We, however, are born fumbling for meaning. Human life has purpose - multiples, even. Some are predetermined; others up for debate, but that duality is, by definition, not singular.

There's more than one way to be.

As embodied egos, it's our responsibility to decide for ourselves what to hold or drop. Human existence is only pain either when we're holding on too many of the wrong things, or too few of the good ones.

Let go of everything that might disturb your peace

Loosen the hold of your desire to have, go, or be more and you'll let go of suffering.

If you tell me you want happiness, I'll tell you to drop the "you" (ego) and the "want" (desire) and happiness will be the only thing left. It's definitely not a Buddha quote, and this flow of awareness didn't write it, but it works on several levels*, and "I" like it.

(*A digression: It's very Zen to answer a spiritual question with a functional answer, and a functional question with a spiritual answer. It plays out the absurd idea that there's a deeper quality to being than being. There's no deeper quality to life - being is as deep as it goes - but that says nothing of the infinite ways one might be.)

"You" must've been happy at some point in life, or "you" wouldn't know what feeling you're looking for. It's been there all along, your unhappy awareness only needs to stop smothering it with desire.

Release the control of the you that needs to be, feel, act, or look a certain way to be happy. The balance of humility and ego is to have a healthy relationship with it rather than cutting it off entirely.

Balancing humility & ego

Acknowledge that, on a macro scale, we can't see many of the infinite variables and connections running through reality. There's knowledge out of reach in many domains.

So we'll never know with certainty what's "good" or "bad" from a logical perspective because we'll never have all the facts. And this isn't something to understand; it's something to feel.

If you "know" this, there's no reason to do anything. But if you feel this, there's only reason to decide what possibilities you'll entertain.

Ego wants everything and humility wants nothing. Balancing them creates space to witness your personal raison d'être and align with its realization.

Let humility tailor ego's holdings.

Intention

As humans, we're free to balance our awareness between what is and what is not, in intervals appropriate to our surroundings. So, instead of attending to non-sense, divest emotions from uncertainty and they'll take every fear with them. You might even unravel some impossibility along the way.

Letting go is the journey's greatest struggle because it requires us to stop resisting a truth we don't like and be comfortable with the difference between what is, what we see, & what we want to see.

Physiology of discontent & restlessness

Emotions reflect our body state and vice versa. Worrying elevates your heart rate, while not worrying lowers it (barring cardiovascular complications). In a state of whole-being peace, theirs nothing invoking the amygdala's cognitive & emotional bluster.

Choose when to direct your attention towards or away from the brain’s cognitive churn. Filter which thoughts you entertain and your life will change dramatically.

Peace is all that remains when you declutter the mind-body, and shift from what isn't to what is. So, if you're trying to add, attract, inhabit, embody, or any-other-verb the concept "peace", you've missed the point. Understanding Zen is the least zen thing you can do.

Pick nothing else up

Acknowledging that, despite what's wrong, so much is right soothes the mind and relaxes the body. The process contradicts our instinct to control our environment, but that's the point.

A centred emotional life, unencumbered from the time-consuming act of micromanaging its own state (to a healthy degree), can reinvest that psychological energy back into itself, leading to a positive feedback loop.

Despite our best & worst intentions, the animalistic tendency is to aim at an idea of a good life - the stories we've internalized about what we "should" want.

A global design can't be unequivocally yours until it's deconstructed and reconfigured. It's on you to build your world, so pay attention to your ideas that seem true when you can't explain why.

To me, the only idea conscious awareness should aim towards is an inner life open to change, prone to luck, and fun to experience. That state is most conducive to balancing whole-being peace and the ego's drive to accomplish.

When you set your intention with resolve, and remind yourself often, the humble ego lets go of its preconceptions to make it happen. To put it colloquially, "free your mind and your ass will follow" (Funkadelic, 1970).

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