I’ve written often in earlier entries of the danger, or at least error, of seeking particular outcomes to one’s meditation. Mostly I ignore my own advice, and lately I have found it more difficult again to silence the straying thoughts that intrude and trouble the stillness that I remember sometimes achieving in the past.  (There is no easy way to talk about this: when I write that I sometimes “achieved” stillness in the past I turn it into an outcome, one that pleased me, one that I wish to recover.  For now, for today, I’ll set that paradox and problem aside, though it is deep.)

Lao Tzu has been my first and remains my prime guide on this question. 

“Therefore the Holy Man abides by non-attachment in his affairs, and practices a doctrine which cannot be imparted by speech.  He attends to everything in its turn and declines nothing; produces without claiming; acts without dwelling thereon; completes his purposes without resting in them.  Inasmuch as he does this he loses nothing.” (ch. 2, Medhurst translation)

“So the Tao produces.  Its energy nourishes, increases, feeds, establishes, matures, controls, broods over.  It produces, but keeps nothing for itself; acts, but does not depend on its action; increases, but does not insist on having its own way.  This indeed is the mystery of energy.” (ch. 51, Medhurst)

“The Holy Man practices non-action, hence he never injures; he never grasps, hence he never loses.  The majority are too eager for results in attending to their affairs, and spoil everything.” (ch. 64, Medhurst)

I recover these passages only now, as I write; I did not revisit them before today’s sitting.  Nevertheless today I renewed my sense, with the experience of a revelation even if it is not new, which I have also already stated in earlier entries, that the thoughts that so trouble me are all driven by my desire to attain or avoid particular outcomes in life—from the most minuscule, such as how to deal best with an appliance problem, to the grandest: how to approach the reality of death.  Fear and desire are the whips: most of what snakes through my mind are plans, strategies, and above all fantasies of conversation that will give me the control I desire over a certain situation, or physical impediment, or person.  I have heard of others whose minds are similar, and perhaps many approach meditation in hopes of easing the pressing confusion of such uncontrolled thoughts.

So the question becomes, can I learn non-attachment to outcomes?  I’m not bad at “producing without claiming,” but I have never learned to “act without depending on my action”: I still seem to believe on some deep level that pre-strategizing action and discourse will bring dependable, predictable, desirable outcomes.  Perhaps I have at least identified the weak point that will allow me to make progress away from these habits of everyday mind.

But what constitutes “right action” if the outcome of action is not the point?  How does one act without first identifying a preferred goal—which, once identified, makes some actions preferable to others?  This may be easier in a monastery, where one’s basic daily tasks are assigned.  I know that non-attachment will be key to any further understanding of this matter: non-attachment to things, goods, bodily comfort and safety, ideals, persons—the non-attachment of the monk to his daily task.  To work to a certain end without attachment to that end: the good, the Tao, must be in the work itself, and the frame of mind and spirit in which it is pursued.