A function of ruthlessness is the ability to rise above your feelings. Like a drowning man coming up for air. This doesn't mean you don't feel. You do – acutely and finely, and you can act on those feelings instantly. You just don't wallow and dwell in them. You don't indulge. No sentiment.
The positivity of the warrior is his constant willingness to fight, come what may. To fight effectively he needs something to fight for – a vision – a feeling that his life means something, a feeling that as long as he remains true and pure he will be taken far beyond the bounds of both his conditioning and his imagination, a feeling for destiny. This word – destiny – many find offensive. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because it implies an arrogance – a feeling of impending greatness. Or maybe because it requires a responsibility above and beyond the socially acceptable ones of getting to work on time and rearing the next generation in your image and likeness. Whatever. What I have found though, as a teacher, is that those with a difficulty with this concept make poor students. Unless a student has a feeling for their own destiny they cannot have a feeling for anyone else's, not even their teacher's. If they have no feeling for this then they cannot align themselves alongside it – they cannot be taught, not internally anyway. A feeling for destiny has nothing to do with foresight – with seeing, into the future or elsewhere. Who knows where you're going or where you'll end up? Who cares? It is simply the deep internal conviction that your life and existence have a meaning and significance beyond the usual, and an understanding that to realise this requires you to live a life beyond the usual. Such a life requires great strength. Where does that strength come from? It comes from your teacher, from the teaching, from God, and from your comrades, but above all, and this is absolutely imperative, it comes from not having it in you to compromise, or as my teacher puts it, knowing you have no choice. If you know this then the strength always comes first from inside; then the work and the living make you stronger – better able to bear the suffering and hardship that inevitably accompany spiritual work – work in the service of Truth. Knowing you have no choice is really the same as destiny. If you think you have a choice then the chances are your grasp of destiny, as a concept and an actuality, will be slender, to say the least.
The warrior's ruthlessness, plus his feeling for destiny, make him formidable indeed. And one requires the other. Ruthlessness without destiny can become disconnectedness or even cruelty, and destiny without ruthlessness is unrealisable. The spiritual warrior is always moving on. He remains just long enough to complete a task and then is off, refusing to celebrate or carry away the spoils. In fact with each battle he sheds a piece of armour – a piece of the mundane, the physical world, and enters a little more the world of heart and soul and energy, the world in which he knows he belongs but which also terrifies him with its lack of landmarks and signposts. Permanent immersion requires complete transformation – you must almost learn to breathe a different medium to air – like returning to the sea to become a dolphin: Jean-Marc Barr at the end of Luc Besson's The Big Blue.
The positivity of the warrior is his constant willingness to fight, come what may. To fight effectively he needs something to fight for – a vision – a feeling that his life means something, a feeling that as long as he remains true and pure he will be taken far beyond the bounds of both his conditioning and his imagination, a feeling for destiny. This word – destiny – many find offensive. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because it implies an arrogance – a feeling of impending greatness. Or maybe because it requires a responsibility above and beyond the socially acceptable ones of getting to work on time and rearing the next generation in your image and likeness. Whatever. What I have found though, as a teacher, is that those with a difficulty with this concept make poor students. Unless a student has a feeling for their own destiny they cannot have a feeling for anyone else's, not even their teacher's. If they have no feeling for this then they cannot align themselves alongside it – they cannot be taught, not internally anyway. A feeling for destiny has nothing to do with foresight – with seeing, into the future or elsewhere. Who knows where you're going or where you'll end up? Who cares? It is simply the deep internal conviction that your life and existence have a meaning and significance beyond the usual, and an understanding that to realise this requires you to live a life beyond the usual. Such a life requires great strength. Where does that strength come from? It comes from your teacher, from the teaching, from God, and from your comrades, but above all, and this is absolutely imperative, it comes from not having it in you to compromise, or as my teacher puts it, knowing you have no choice. If you know this then the strength always comes first from inside; then the work and the living make you stronger – better able to bear the suffering and hardship that inevitably accompany spiritual work – work in the service of Truth. Knowing you have no choice is really the same as destiny. If you think you have a choice then the chances are your grasp of destiny, as a concept and an actuality, will be slender, to say the least.
The warrior's ruthlessness, plus his feeling for destiny, make him formidable indeed. And one requires the other. Ruthlessness without destiny can become disconnectedness or even cruelty, and destiny without ruthlessness is unrealisable. The spiritual warrior is always moving on. He remains just long enough to complete a task and then is off, refusing to celebrate or carry away the spoils. In fact with each battle he sheds a piece of armour – a piece of the mundane, the physical world, and enters a little more the world of heart and soul and energy, the world in which he knows he belongs but which also terrifies him with its lack of landmarks and signposts. Permanent immersion requires complete transformation – you must almost learn to breathe a different medium to air – like returning to the sea to become a dolphin: Jean-Marc Barr at the end of Luc Besson's The Big Blue.
Forward to the seaJack Kerouac
and the Sea comes back to you
and there's no escaping
when you're a fish
the nets of summer destiny
2 comments
I think one difficulty with the word 'destiny' initially is that in common parlance it means that your life is settled in advance, like the Calvanist being elected by God; in other words, precisely that you have no choice, you will live and die as pre-ordained. That was why I balked at the word at first, anyway. Pat
I guess the problem with certain words (such as destiny) is their associations with ideological constructs that one may or may not subscribe to. This post describes perfectly what I now understand to mean following the/my Tao, something that I used to view with suspicion due to it being rooted in a culture that I wasn't a part of; later, I came to see it as some sort of holy grail that would eventually be bestowed on me, if I was diligent enough in performing various practices i.e. I had a choice whether to follow it or not. Now, I do not think it is either of these things and (most of the time) I know I have no choice. Kevin
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