فعالانه یک

Equanimity – Interactive Essay Lesson A

Hi, this is AJ, and welcome to this month’s VIP lesson, interactive A. In this lesson I will narrate a chapter from a book and then I will explain the vocabulary. And in part B I’ll ask you questions about it. This comes from a book by Alan Watts. The name is Become What You Are.

One sees so many faces, dulled by a seriousness which, if it were born of grief would be understandable. But the kind of seriousness which drags man down to the earth and kills the life of the spirit is not the child of sorrow. But, of a sort of play acting in which the player is deceived into identifying himself with his part. There is a seriousness in the play of children, but even this is different, for the child is aware that it is only playing and its seriousness is an indirect form of fun.

But this seriousness becomes a vice in the adult, because he makes a religion of the game.

So, identifying himself with his part or position in life that he fears to lose it. This is especially so when the unenlightened man attains any degree of responsibility. He develops a heaviness of touch, a lack of abandon, a stiffness which indicates that he is using his dignity as stilts to keep his head above adversity. His trouble is that instead of playing his part, his part plays him and makes him the laughing stock of all who see through his guise.

The message of the Eastern wisdom is that the forms of life are maya, and therefore, profoundly lacking in seriousness from the viewpoint of reality. For the world of form and illusion, which the majority take to be the real world, is none other than the play of the spirit.

He is enlightened who joins in this play, knowing it as play.

Okay, this is a fairly deep topic and some parts of this chapter are a bit difficult, so let’s go through it now. I will teach you the meaning of the vocabulary and also just the general meaning of the sentences. From the beginning.

Vocabulary

One sees so many faces, dulled by seriousness…

So here, one means anyone. It’s a pronoun here, one sees means anyone sees, so many faces dulled. Here dulled is used as a verb and the meaning is bored, to be bored. So he’s saying he sees so many people who look bored that are bored by seriousness. They’re too serious that’s why they’re bored. That’s why they’re dull. So dull can mean bored.

This seriousness if it was born of grief would be understandable.

Born of grief, that’s kind of like a poetic language. It means coming from sadness. If it were coming from sadness, then it would be understandable. Grief means sadness, especially sadness from losing something, especially sadness when someone dies, we feel grief, a deep sadness. So he’s saying that if most people were sad because of grief, because of sadness, 7

then he would understand, that would be understandable. But that’s not why most people are so serious.

He’s saying the kind of seriousness which drags man down to the earth… Drags man down to the earth, again, this is a kind of poetry. It’s just, you can imagine you have this heavy, heavy weight on your shoulders. It’s so heavy that you are pushed down to the ground. This is the image he wants you to see or imagine.

So he’s saying, that kind of seriousness which drags man down to the earth and kills the life of the spirit

Kills the life of the spirit, life of the spirit means the life of wonder, the life of gratitude, the life of love and happiness and enthusiasm, the spiritual life. Saying too much seriousness kills all of that.

That seriousness he says, is not the child of sorrow.

Again, poetic language, child of sorrow means, coming from sadness.

This seriousness is a sort of play acting in which the player is deceived into identifying himself with his part.

Play acting just means pretending, pretending. Like actors, they pretend to be other people.

So it’s a kind of play acting in which the player, the actor, the person is deceived, is tricked into identifying with his part.

Identifying with… identifying with means, believing something is part of you. It’s who you are.

For example, I’m a teacher, if I identify with teaching, if I identify with it, it means I believe that is who I really am, like it’s my deep identity. I am a teacher that’s who I am. It’s my deep identity, but of course, we’re more than just our jobs. Of course, I’m a human being, a spiritual person, a soul, a spirit, I’m much more than just a teacher. Teaching is a role, it’s a part that I play that’s what he’s saying.

There is a seriousness in the play of children, but even this is different… So, when children play sometimes they look serious but it’s different than adults.

For the child is aware that it is only playing and its seriousness is an indirect form of fun.

So children they sometimes look serious when they play, but they always know they’re playing, they’re always having fun doing it. So, for example, a child might pretend they are a teacher, but they know they’re pretending. They might look serious but they always know that it’s just fun they’re just playing.

This seriousness becomes a vice in the adult…

A vice… a vice is a sin or a very unhealthy habit, a very unhealthy habit, a vice. So, for example, drinking too much alcohol is a vice. Some people think it’s a sin, they don’t drink at all. Everyone, I think, realizes it’s a very unhealthy habit if you do it too much, it’s a vice.

Smoking, same thing. Smoking cigarettes it’s a vice. It’s an unhealthy habit.

So he’s saying that seriousness, too much seriousness for adults it’s a vice, it’s an unhealthy habit, because adults makes a religion of the game. They make a religion of the game.

What’s the game? He’s saying that life is a kind of game. Our social life is a game. Your career, the roles that you play in life, in society they’re a kind of game, but we make them too serious like a religion.

So, identifying himself with his part or position in life that he fears to lose it.

So he’s saying that most people, they identify with their position in life too much. So much that they’re afraid to lose it, they’re afraid to lose their position in life. So, for example, maybe someone becomes rich, they get a lot of money and that’s okay, that’s a kind of game and they make a lot of money and they’re a rich person that’s their new position, rich person. But he’s saying the problem is people become too serious about it, then they’re afraid, they become afraid of losing their money, afraid of not being a rich person anymore. They think that being a rich person that’s who they really are, that’s their deep identity. They don’t realize that they’re much more than that. It’s just a position. It’s just a role.

This is especially so when the unenlightened man attains any degree of responsibility.

Unenlightened man, unenlightened, unenlightened, let’s talk about first the opposite word, enlightened. To be enlightened means to be wise, to understand life deeply. To be enlightened can have a religious meaning for some religions, to be enlightened means to fully understand or maybe not understand is quite the word, but to fully connect with God or Dao or Buddha or whatever, that’s the religious meaning. But, the more generally meaning is just wisdom, to really deeply understand what’s important in life, what life is really like, what life really is.

That’s to be enlightened.

So unenlightened is the opposite, it means you’re not wise. You don’t deeply understand, so an unenlightened man doesn’t really understand life. And when the unenlightened man attains any degree of responsibility… so attain means to get, to achieve or to get, attains; to achieve or to get. So attains any degree of responsibility. Here degree means amount. So gets any amount of responsibility. And, of course, responsibility right, it means just achievement in any kind of power, ability to do something. Mostly he’s talking about, like job positions, economic positions that kind of thing. So any time a man or a woman achieves any level of success, that’s really what he’s saying, he or she develops a heaviness of touch, a lack of abandon, a stiffness. Let’s go through each one of these.

A heaviness of touch… so these are poetic images, heaviness of touch.

Though you can imagine if you touch someone, let’s say with your hand you touch your wife or your husband, you touch them on the shoulder. Well, if you love them usually you’re gentle right, you kind of touch them gently? But, if you have a heaviness of touch it means you can’t really control your touch, you’re too heavy or too hard, so maybe you grab them kind of hard.

You’re not trying to hurt them, but it’s uncomfortable for them, they don’t like it. You kind of hit them or touch them too heavy, too hard. So that’s the image he wants you to imagine and it’s a metaphor. It means in general in life you’re just too hard, too heavy with things.

A lack of abandon, that’s the next phrase that people who are too serious they have a lack of abandon. Here abandon means wildness. It really means wildness, right? Sometimes in life we need to be wild and free, not always controlling ourselves all the time, right. We need to dance and play and have a good time sometimes. Not always 100% every moment or maybe not, maybe we could do that, but certainly we all know, I think, in life that to be happy we need some feeling of freedom and wildness and openness. We call that abandon. It means you abandon, you let go of control, you abandoned control.

But he’s saying that people who are too serious they lack that, they don’t have that freedom, that wildness.

People who are too serious also have a stiffness. To be stiff means to be rigid. To be stiff, it’s the opposite of flexible. If you’re flexible you can easily move. You can bend your body and move your body easily, it’s a kind of softness in your body. Stiff means you’re hard you can’t move easily. So again it’s kind of a poetic image.

And these things they indicate that he, the serious person, is using his dignity as stilts to keep his head above adversity.

He’s got some long sentences in this chapter, that’s why we have to break them into small parts. So the serious person who is stiff, lacks abandon and all that, he’s using his dignity… dignity means your self-respect and dignity is a good thing usually. But he’s saying if you’re too serious, these people, they use their dignity, their self-respect as stilts… a stilt is like a stick that you stand on top of. You see them in circus’ sometimes, right? They put them on the bottom of their feet and then they can walk around on them, on these long, long sticks. So they’re very, very, very, very, very tall. Those are stilts. So again, this is a poetic image.

Using dignity, using self-respect, using seriousness, as stilts to keep his head above adversity.

Adversity means difficult situations in life, tough times.

So whew, what does all that mean, geez? So he’s saying that using their seriousness to try to stay above other people, to try to stay above fear, to try to stay above problems. But it doesn’t work, you can’t avoid problems in life, so trying to be so serious and try to act so superior, like you’re so successful in trying to be above other people. It just doesn’t work because you can never get away from challenges. You can never get away from problems. Even rich people have problems.

So he’s saying, this person’s problem is that, instead of playing his part, instead of playing it, being light and fun about it, his part plays him. So, in other words, his role, his part controls him. It’s like an actor that really believes they’re the character. Like they play Hamlet for example, the actor pretends to be Hamlet, but if the actor really believes they’re Hamlet they forget who they really are and they start to believe they really are Hamlet. Well then, they’re crazy.

I’m saying that’s what most people do in life, they have a part to play as a mom or a dad. They have a part to play as a rich person or a poor person or a successful person, but they forget that it’s just playing a part. That who they really are is much deeper, they forget who they really are and when they do that it makes him the laughing stock of all who see through his guise.

Laughing stock means a fool, a fool, it makes him a fool. It means someone that people laugh at, someone that people laugh at. So he becomes the laughing stock of all, all people, who see through his guise.

To see through something means to see it in reality, to see the truth. So, if someone is pretending to be something and you see through them, it means you see the real person. See, guise means disguise, disguise. It’s a short form of that word, guise or disguise, it’s a mask.

So, if we see through the mask it means see what’s under the mask.

Okay, so to summarize all of that long sentence, he’s saying that people who are too serious in life, they’re too serious they don’t know who they really are. They think that their role is who they are and because of that they’re so serious about it they lose their freedom. They lose their enthusiasm. They lose their passion and joy for life, they become stiff.

And, those people, some people see through their disguise. These people, they pretend to be very serious. They pretend to be very important. They pretend to be superior, but some people see through the disguise. They see them and laugh at them. They see that they’re just fools.

The message of the Eastern wisdom is that the forms of life are maya… Maya is not an English word, I believe it’s sanscrit perhaps. It comes from Indian, I know that. Maya means illusion. It means something that appears real but it’s not, maya. So Eastern wisdom says the forms of life are Maya. All these roles that we play they’re illusions. They look real but they’re not quite real. And therefore, these roles, these illusions are profoundly, meaning deeply, lacking in seriousness, deeply lacking seriousness. So they’re not serious they’re just illusions that are just roles. It’s things we pretend to do from the viewpoint of deeper reality.

For the world of form and illusion, which the majority take to be the real world, is none other than the play of the spirit.

So this is a very spiritual essay. What he’s saying is this. Everything we see in the world with our eyes and all these things we do in human society, being businessmen, teachers, parents, and experts in all these things. They’re all kinds of illusions they’re not the deep reality. The deep reality is spirit or soul. Even physicists tell us this, that we look around and we see, we think that everything is solid and hard like the table I’m sitting at right now, but it’s this hard thing but it’s very solid.

But then the physicist will tell us it isn’t really, it’s actually made of energy. The deeper reality is not what we see, so what we see, this life that we’re living, it’s a kind of illusion and we shouldn’t be too serious about it, because the deeper reality its spirit, or soul or whatever you want to call it, energy. Doesn’t matter the name you give it, but there’s a deeper reality.

He is enlightened who joins in this play, knowing it as play.

So a person who… how do you become enlightened? How do you become wise? You become wise when you realize and you join life as play, when you see it as something to play, that it’s a playful illusion and that there’s a deeper reality, that’s what he’s saying.

Okay whew, that’s quite a difficult one I think, for a lot of people. The reason is the vocabulary actually in this narrative, in this audio, the vocabulary the actual words are not so difficult, but the phrases and the sentences are quite difficult in many places. He’s using very long sentences. He’s using very poetic phrases, so it’s a good example of why you must learn phrases, not just words.

You might know most of the individual words in this essay, but the phrases are quite challenging. You see how difficult it was that we had to go through and explain so many of those phrases. So it’s the way words come together, that’s what’s important.

So anyway, listen to this interactive A lesson many times. If it’s difficult for you look at the text also, reading it sometimes can help you understand it a little more clearly. Then go back and listen, listen, listen, listen until you understand it completely. In part B I’ll ask you more questions about the phrases to help you learn it more deeply.

See you in part B.