The Day Chaos Died
The ruler of the South Sea
was called Heedless,
the ruler of the North Sea
was called Sudden,
and the ruler of the central region
was called Chaos.
Heedless and Sudden frequently met
in the land of Chaos,
who treated them well.
Heedless and Sudden conferred
how they could reciprocate his kindness.
“All men have seven openings
for the purposes of seeing, hearing, eating and breathing.
Chaos alone does not have them.
Let us try to make them for him.
Everyday they dug one opening
and at the end of the seventh day
Chaos died.
Zhuangzi by Zhuang Zhou trans. by Hyun Hochmann, Yang Guorong, The Regulatons for Emperors and Rulers
This is a strange story. It comes as the last segment of a short chapter of advice-stories for decision makers, anyone in a policy making position. This is a story of good intentions. I am reminded of the seven days of creation in the first book of the Bible. That story does not end well either. I wonder if the deeper message should be: existence simply cannot entail a “happy-ever-after” ending.
This thumbnail parable has three characters, three beings who get along well enough. Even if the dynamic was imperfect, still it worked. Each was unique, assertive in his/her own way. Whether they are male or female doesn’t matter. Then two of them derive a great idea, a proposal to help Chaos out. It is a one-size-fits-all idea, a universal solution. And so the intervention proceeds apace.
At the end…Chaos died.
“Holy fuck! what have we done?!” the surviving observers might have exclaimed.
Have you ever had a “bright idea” about what someone else needs, a sure-fire fix for another’s problem? I have. Many times I’ve fantasized that I knew just “the thing” that would make someone else’s life better. I can remember a few times when I have attempted to intervene…
I do not need to describe for you those outcomes.
The point of view suggested by Zhuang Zhou, the Taoist attitude of “let be” is that non-intervention is usually the preferred action. A steady-state, the working equilibrium (even if not perfect) has a better than even chance of a good outcome sans direct intervention, that focus of power to “fix”, to improve, etc., etc..
Not to act is to act…
Well how about a tune! The snow is falling outside and a hot song by Bob Seger, Roll Me Away seems about right. Don’t you love this story?
“I say unto you: one must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. I say unto you: you still have chaos in yourselves.” – Thus Spoke Zarathustra by
4 thoughts on “The Day Chaos Died”
What are we doing? What do you and I and the 600,000 other people who write their thoughts, their feelings, their opinions hope to achieve by placing them on public display through the world wide web?
In today’s parable, Heedless and Sudden hope to help Chaos by offering solutions to the issues they perceive Chaos may be having, yet they end up destroying their friend. Is what we do any different?
Before I read your post today, I had been wondering about the chaos we engage in when we write and place our own thoughts into the void of the internet. I’ve been reading some of the posts on the website Medium where hundreds of offerings are made on a daily basis, each person believing they have something of importance to offer others. And yet as I read through the myriad titles I can’t help but think about the cacophony of noise created by a seemingly endless stream of pronouncements. “READ ME”, they all scream.
On occasion I reply to one of the writers in their “response” area and now and then I will actually receive an answer. But again, to what end? Mostly the writers reply with a tinge of defensiveness when all I wanted to do was engage in a conversation where we both might learn something. My sense is that you and I are outliers for the most part. I believe we both want to be called out if we are posting erroneous information. Not so for most people who appear to have a desire to be RIGHT regardless of facts or a differing point of view.
When that happens the conversation stops dead in its tracks and we all loose. And so I keep coming back to the thought that we humans are peculiar creatures, hungry for information and for contact with our fellow men and women, but only with caveats galore. Go figure!
What are we doing?
Do you mean in the abstract – as what are all who post thoughts online? Or do you mean what are you and I doing, what is our intention when we post?
I think the question in so far as a concrete motive is sought is the right one to ask. Not that we can be certain of having a clear, a definitive answer. Motives are always mixed are they not? Perhaps I would write better prose, even near poetic if I were divested of my ego… So far though, I am aware that I have a self-linked interest in what I write. I’ll keep writing nonetheless.
Who am I to save “the world”? Doing what I can to add to the quality of my own life-journey and to that of those in my zone of influence, is enough responsibility. I suppose that it is just as well that thousands are not reading my day to day reflections on the Zhunagzi. At least I’ll not be massively wrong, and destructive upon a wide scale. Nothing that I write will fuck-up your chaos. I am no one’s oracle.
Everything is important in a given context.
My questions were not meant to undermine the processes we go through when we write but more as a query within the context of the parable you quoted. Two of three entities were seemingly attempting to help the third. In writing down our thoughts and posting them in a public space, are we not doing the same thing? In offering points of view, at least for me, my hope is that I might communicate something of interest to a third party and give them a new perspective. In doing so, I certainly hope that I won’t kill them. That outcome would be both incredibly surprising and really unfortunate. That’s it!
I agree. If I did not believe my thoughts and words to have wide relevance, I would not bother. Is there a difference between offering what one has found as “good” and insisting that one has the unequivocal remedy for what ails humankind? Here is what God said to me, an offer which you cannot refuse…