Flower Lounge (4) -- Heart over Mind

The predawn chorus of early birds comes through the dark windows tentatively, sounding incongruously pleasant. If I come back as a worm in the next life, I would stay in bed till nine. Early worms get the birds.

Still gazing with empty wrath. I have many reasons to be angry. But after hours of mental tempest, I no longer know what these reasons are.

So what. I don’t need justifications.

But venting my spleen through maledictions is futile, tiring, and irrational…

Wait, irrational? There isn’t any rationality here, there, everywhere. Can’t believe I’m still worrying about ‘rationality’.

No! This can’t go on! I’m grilling myself in blind fury. Herbalists say anger hurts the liver. My liver will turn black and brittle if I don’t put the fire out.

Breathe slowly, mindfully, deeply, into the abdomen.

Breath in. Hold. Breath out. Fire — like a European dragon.

Sleep, dream, escape to another situation, any situation.

Really? Think again. Imagine. Life could be worse, infinitely worse in another situation…

I could have been born in one of those war torn countries, rich in oil, poor in defence. This afternoon, I watched my wife and kids playing in the field, happy about something urbanites don’t care about, such as harvest. A drone appeared out of the bright blue sky, gliding noiselessly, controlled by a bespectacled ‘brave young man’ thousands of miles away. ‘Look, Papa,’ the children yelled excitedly: ‘Look!’

Boom.

I screamed and threw a rock in the direction of the murderous drone, long gone by then. That was all that I could do in revenge, like a terrorist.

The ‘brave young man’ watched online.

Oops, wrong target. Nah, no target is wrong. They all grow up to be enemy combatants anyway.

He shrugged, logged off, mission accomplished. He bumped fists with colleagues, then drove home to his son’s birthday party. My only wish left in life would be to get a glimpse of his face before I die, so I can take his image with me to Hell. Don’t want to go to Heaven. Don’t want to meet God, or Allah, or whatever His real name may be. If I did, I’d be kicked right back to Hell anyway for being extremely disrespectful to the Ultimate One.

See? Helplessness comes in much crueler forms.

This, is Mickey Mouse.

Breath in. Hold. Breath out. Bring it all out. Flare. Dissipate.

Another pathetic scenario comes to mind.

I could be lying in my deathbed prematurely right now. Instead of a wigged judge, I was victimised by one of numerous non-drinking, non-smoking, non-aggressive, clueless drivers plaguing the streets of Hong Kong. He drove his shiny car onto the sidewalk, knocked me down at well below speed limit, then reversed over my legs in innocent panic, screaming Oh sorry! Oh my God! sincerely apologetic.

Would that be more fair?

Be real, what’s fair? I’m a diehard realist — a cynic, actually — remember? Would it help to strangle the hypothetical idiot? Incompetence and stupidity have become the norm, manufacturing victims everywhere, not only in the justice factory. Shit happens, as always, though never with as much popular justification as now. Reasons are irrelevant when shit happens.

All kinds of terrible misfortunes strike out of the blue all the time. Hypothetical? Of course, but possible, even likely — more likely than this. Life’s a hazardous journey. This, is relatively nothing. At least there’s an excellent chance that I’ll go home with both legs functional in twenty five months, thirty and a half days — merely a few million blinks of the eyes — unless I internally immolate myself in the meantime…

Breath in. Hold. Breath out, thoroughly, dissipate.

And what about my numerous lucky breaks in life so far? What had I done to deserve them? Were they not equally chancy? Were they not events coalesced out of fortuity, just like this murky fiasco that emerged from profound misfortune? Have I ever complained about being unfairly lucky?

What shameful double-standards.

Imagine again: I could have been born stupider and lazier, into a different family, a different world, a different reality, always meeting the wrong people, having only bad decisions made on my behalf since nursery. I could have been living in and out of juvenile jails since thirteen. I would be so conditioned to injustice by now I won’t feel it any more than fish feel water.

Breath in. Hold. Breath out.

Also, at fifty-seven, my natural deathbed isn’t that far away, a few decades at most, much less than a mere blink of the cosmic eye. Soon, I’ll have to let go of everything. Rights and wrongs, debts and favours, love and hatred, will all fade into irrelevance, insignificance, nothing. Why not use this opportunity to rehearse letting go? This is a good place to practise. No?

Let go…

But those people, evil hypocrites, heartless bureaucratic zombies, arseholes…

They don’t know what they’re doing.

Tell me about it.

Forgive them. They don’t know what they’re doing. Many a great prisoner has said that in a spirit of forgiveness, or despair.

So what? Ignorance is no excuse, at least not in their court of law.

Ah, but I don’t believe in the judgement of courts anymore, do I? Forgiveness is self-preservation, not unconditional magnanimity. Forgiving saves myself, not them. Forgive to avoid spontaneous combustion. Forgive them. They don’t deserve my anger. They don’t know what they’re doing. People seldom do. They’re only being average, and the average rules.

Do they mean to frame and jail innocent people? Don’t think so. They probably think they’re doing the right thing, if they bother to think at all. It’s only a job, a game with simple rules for simple people to play out their assigned roles in a world they don’t understand, but too lazy or afraid to ponder.

Forgive them, or turn into ashes before 27 May 2014 — a simple choice.

Breath in. Hold. Breath out. Fire. Ashes.

When desperate, I can be rather convincing to myself.

I squeeze my eyes shut to take a break from the schizophrenic monologue. They feel puffy.

The Heart Sutra comes to mind.

During the long trial, a friend gave me a little booklet on the Heart Sutra. ‘You might find it inspiring,’ she said. ‘By the way, Buddhism is not a religion per se,’ she added quickly, knowing that I’m a fundamentalist atheist. ‘Not one with a flying dictator and angelic bodyguards anyway.’

She didn’t know I have become quite curious about Daoism and Buddhism in recent years, mainly looking for easy do-it-yourself enlightenment tips to smooth out the remains of my day. An age thing, I suppose.

She also didn’t know that I was truly religious once.

Most Hong Kong schools were run by the church, and one Bible teacher after another scared me into submission long before I hit puberty. My first career ambition — one which I never revealed to my parents — was to become a priest when I’m tall enough to look ridiculous in a cassock. Eventually, with the onslaught of puberty, I realised that celibacy was a disturbing promise. That realisation sobered me up to all kinds of spooky themes in the Bible, and that God wasn’t nice and loving no matter how I psychoanalysed him. I willingly and knowingly betrayed God and became a normal, obnoxious teenager. Shouldn’t have been a surprise to He who knows absolutely everything in the past, present, and future (except that humans can always be tempted to eat an apple) anyway.

But the Buddha was a fellow atheist, so was Lao Zi, so was Confucius. China has no God, that much I already knew.

‘I know, I know,’ I assured my friend. ‘Not the kind of religion with a God, right?’

I enjoyed the literary style of the mesmerising sutra on first read, and committed it to memory easily, surprising myself. Out of all two hundred and sixty words in the laconic sutra, wu — nothingness, without, emptiness — helpfully repeats twenty-one times.

I recite it in my heart, hoping it will put me to sleep.

Bodhisattva Guanyin in deep Prajnaparamita meditation reflects upon the emptiness of the five aggregates, transcending all tribulations and sufferings…

Nothing. There's nothing. Nothing, really…

Of course! Quantum physics has practically confirmed the emptiness of so-called reality. Realising the ultimate emptiness of existence puts human tribulations to scale, rendering it veritably insignificant. Recognising the empty nature of life isn’t pessimistic. Quite the opposite, refusing to see such a plain fact of existence is illusory, unscientific, and pathetic.

I get it!

The Heart Sutra isn’t about a nosy deity perverting the course of injustice by giving bad judges giant bloody tumours, or masterminding supernatural jailbreaks in response to diligent incantations. It’s philosophical realism which puts things into perspective. It helps us open our eyes while skindiving in shit creek without a mask.

Feeling kind of enlightened.

Beyond bars, faint morning light slips through the windows, erasing the shadowy barcode. It’s gentle and warm, not intrusive like the nighttime floodlight. The prisoners sleep on. Let them sleep. Every minute counts. When they sleep, time is an ally.

Birds are twittering louder. They must have had stuffed their gizzards with worms. If one is destined to eat worms, then eating live worms for breakfast would be a happy event worthy of a song.

Abruptly, the loudspeakers come to life, startling me out of my sleepless reverie. No wonder inmates with a heart condition can’t stay here. The DJ is hysterical: ‘Good Morning Hong Kong!’ I can picture him spraying pressurised saliva at the mic. Can’t they come up with something a tad more original? Good Morning America! Good Morning Vietnam! Good Morning Saigon! Good morning Hong Kong! When they wish you good morning with over-the-top exuberance, you know they’re trying to hide something sinister. What’s so damned good about this morning anyway? So empty. The Heart Sutra is right.

I get off bed, feeling surprisingly light. I climb the big step to pee, aiming carefully. The floor can’t take any more ammonia.

‘365820, you’re nothing,’ I mumbled. A bit comical, but not funny enough to make me smile. ‘Day One survived, served. About a thousand more to go. Better get used to it. It’s really nothing anyway.’

In a moment, I’ll find out that understanding is truly nothing, but practising is really something. Maybe heart can overcome the mind, but mind can’t overcome matter. Jail is jail, harsh reality. Contingent enlightenment can’t make it soft and holographic.

* * *

Next episode Into the Cuckoo's Nest (part one)

In the Cuckoo's Nest, spiritual enlightment collapses