by Dan Millman
He looked at me, a startled expression on his face, then started to laugh more uproariously than I’d ever seen before. He shook all over; tears ran down his cheeks. Finally he calmed and explained his laughter. “You haven’t quite graduated, junior; your work has hardly begun. Look at yourself. You are fundamentally the same as when you stumbled in here months ago. What you saw was only a vision, not a conclusive experience. It will fade into memory, but even so, it will serve as a reminder and reference point. Now relax and stop acting so serious!”
He sat back, as mischievous and wise as ever. “You see,” he added, “these little journeys do save me some difficult explanations I must go through to enlighten you.” Just then, the lights flashed on, and we laughed.
Smiling, he reached into his small refrigerator next to the water cooler and brought out some oranges, which he started to squeeze into juice as he continued. “If you must know, you’re doing me a service, too. I’m also ‘stuck’ in a place in time and space, and owe a kind of debt myself. A lot of me is tied up with your progress. In order to teach you,” he said, tossing the orange rinds back over his shoulder into the waste-basket, making a perfect shot every time, “I literally had to put a part of me in you. Quite an investment, I assure you. So it’s a team effort all the way.”
He finished the juice and handed me a small glassful. “A toast then,” I said, “to a successful partnership.”
“Done,” he smiled.
“Tell me more about this debt. To whom do you owe it?”
“Let’s say that it’s part of the House Rules.”
“That’s no answer at all.”
“Silly it may be, but still I must abide by a particular set of rules in my business.” He took out a small card. It looked normal enough, until I noticed a faint glow. In embossed letters, it said,
Warrior, Inc.
Socrates, Prop.
Specializing in:
Paradox, Humor,
and Change
“Keep it safe. Someday it may come in handy. When you need me — when you really need me — just hold the card in both hands and call. I’ll be there, one way or another.”
I put the card carefully in my wallet. “I’ll keep it safe, Socrates. You can count on it. Uh, by the way, you wouldn’t have one of those cards with Joy’s address on it, would you?”
He ignored me.
We were silent then, as Socrates began to prepare one of his crisp salads. Then I thought of another question. “So, how do I do it? How do I open myself to this light of awareness?”
Answering my question with a question, he asked, “what do you do when you want to see?”
I laughed. “Well, I look! You mean meditation?”
“Here’s the core of it,” he said suddenly as he sliced and diced the vegetables. “Meditation consists of two simultaneous processes: One is insight — paying attention to what is arising. The other is surrender — letting go of attachment to arising thoughts. This is how you cut free of the mind.”
“I think I know what you mean.”
“Well, maybe you’ve heard the story about a student of meditation who was sitting in deep silence with a small group of practitioners. Terrified by a vision of blood, death, and demons, he got up, walked to the teacher, and whispered, ‘Roshi, I’ve just had a horrible vision!’ ‘Let it go,’ said his teacher. A few days later, the student was enjoying erotic fantasies, insights into the meaning of life, and visions of angels — the works. Just then, his teacher came up behind him with a stick and whacked him, saying, ‘Let it go!’”
I laughed at the story and said, “You know, Soc, I’ve been thinking... ” Socrates gave me a whack on the head with a carrot, saying, “Let it go!”
We ate. I stabbed at my vegetables with a fork; he picked up each small bite with wooden chopsticks, breathing quietly as he chewed. He never picked up another bite until he was completely done with the first, as if each bite was a small meal in itself. I kind of admired the way he ate as I chomped merrily away. I finished first, sat back, and announced, “I guess I’m ready to have a go at real meditation.”
“Ah, yes.” He put down his chopsticks. “‘Conquering the mind.’ If only you were interested.”
“I am interested! I want self-awareness. That’s why I’m here.”
“You want self-image, not self-awareness. You’re here because you have no better alternatives.”
“But I do want to get rid of my noisy mind,” I protested.
“More illusion — like the man who refuses to wear glasses, insisting ‘they aren’t printing the newspapers clearly anymore.’”
“Wrong,” I said, shaking my head back and forth.
“I don’t really expect you to see the truth of it yet, but you need to hear it.”
“What’s your point?” I asked impatiently, my attention drifting outside.
“Here is the bottom line,” Socrates said, in a voice that firmly held my attention. “You still believe that you are your thoughts and defend them as if they were treasures.”
“No way. How can you know that?”
“Your stubborn illusions are a sinking ship, junior. I recommend that you let them go while there’s still time.”
I stifled my rising temper. “How can you know how I ‘identify’ with my mind?”
“OK,” he sighed. “I’ll prove it to you: what do you mean when you say, ‘I’m going to my house’? Don’t you naturally assume that you are separate from the house that you are going to?”
“Well, of course.”
“Then what do you mean when you say, ‘My body is sore today’? Who is the ‘I’ who is separate from the body and speaks of it as a possession?”
I had to laugh. “Semantics, Socrates. You have to say something.”
“Yes — and the conventions of language reveal the ways we see the world. You do, in fact, act as if you were a ‘mind’ or a subtle something inside the body.”
“Why would I possibly want to do that?”
“Because you fear death and crave survival. You want Forever, you desire Eternity. In your deluded belief that you are this ‘mind’ or ‘spirit’ or ‘soul,’ you find the escape clause in your contract with mortality. Perhaps as ‘mind’ you can wing free of the body when it dies, hmm?”
“It’s a thought,” I said with a grin.
“That’s exactly what it is, Dan — a thought — no more real than the shadow of a shadow. Consciousness is not in the body; the body is in Consciousness. And you are that Consciousness — not the phantom mind that troubles you so. You are the body, but you are everything else, too. That is what your vision revealed to you. Only the mind resists change. When you relax mindless into the body, you are happy and content and free, sensing no separation. Immortality is already yours, but not in the way you imagine or hope for. You have been immortal since before you were born and will be long after the body dissolves. The body is Consciousness; never born; never dies; only changes. The mind — your ego, personal beliefs, history, and identity — is all that ends at death. And who needs it?” Socrates leaned back into his chair.
“I’m not sure all of that sank in.”
“Of course not.” He laughed. “Words mean little unless you realize the truth of it yourself. And when you do, you’ll be free at last.”
“That sounds pretty good.”
“Yes, I’d say it is pretty good. Right now I’m only laying the groundwork for what comes next.”
I considered what he said for at least ten seconds before my next question erupted. “Socrates, if I’m not my thoughts, what am I?”
He looked at me as if he’d just finished explaining that one and one are two and I’d then asked, “Yes, but what are one and one?” He reached over to the refrigerator, grasped an onion, and tossed it to me. “Peel it, layer by layer,” he demanded. I started peeling. “What do you find?”
“Another layer.”
“Continue.”
I peeled off a few more layers. “Just more
layers, Soc.”
“Keep going.”
“There’s nothing left.”
“There’s something left, all right.”
“What’s that?”
“The universe. Consider that as you walk home.”
I looked out the window; it was almost dawn.
I returned the next night after a mediocre meditation session, still brimming with thoughts. There wasn’t much business, so we sat back, sipping peppermint tea, and I told him about my lackluster meditation practice. He smiled and said, “Maybe you’ve heard about the Zen student who asked his teacher the most important element of Zen. The roshi replied, ‘Attention.’ ‘Yes, thank you,’ the student replied. ‘But can you tell me the second most important element?’ And the roshi replied, ‘Attention.’”
Puzzled, I looked up at Soc, waiting for more. “That’s all, folks,” he said.
I stood up to get some water. Socrates asked, “Are you paying close attention to your standing?”
“Yeah, sure,” I answered, not at all sure that I was. I walked over to the dispenser.
“Are you paying close attention to your walking?” he asked.
“Yes, I am,” I answered, starting to catch on to the game.
“Are you paying attention to how your mouth shapes the words you say?”
“Well, I guess so,” I said, listening to my voice. I was getting flustered.
“Are you paying attention to how you think?” he asked.
“Socrates, give me a break — I’m doing the best I can!”
He leaned toward me. “Your best is apparently not good enough. At least not yet. Your attention must burn. Aimlessly rolling around a gym mat doesn’t develop a champion; sitting with your eyes closed and letting your mind wander doesn’t train your attention. Focus! Do or die!” Soc smiled. “That reminds me of something that happened many years ago.
“In a monastery, I sat day after day, struggling with a koan — a riddle my teacher had given me in order to spur the mind to see its true nature. I couldn’t solve it. Each time I went to the roshi, I had nothing to offer him. I was a slow student and was becoming discouraged. He told me to continue working on my koan for one more month. ‘Surely then,’ he encouraged me, ‘you will solve it.’
“A month passed, and I tried my best. The koan remained a mystery. ‘Stay with it one more week, with fire in your heart!’ he told me. Day and night the koan burned, but still I could not see through it.
“My roshi told me, ‘One more day, with all your spirit.’ At the end of the day, I was exhausted. I told him, ‘Master, it’s no use — a month, a week, a day — I cannot pierce the riddle.’ My teacher looked at me a long time. ‘Meditate for one more hour,’ he said. ‘If you have not solved the koan by then, you had better kill yourself.’
“By the end of the hour, facing imminent death, my awareness broke through the mind’s barriers.”
“Why should a warrior sit around meditating?” I asked. “I thought the warrior’s way was about action.”
“Sitting meditation is the beginner’s practice. Eventually, you will learn to meditate in every action. Sitting serves as a ceremony, a time to practice balance, ease, and divine detachment. Master the ritual before you expand the same insight and surrender fully into daily life.
“As your teacher, I will use every method and artifice at my command to help you persevere with the work ahead. If I had just walked up to you and told you the secret of happiness, you would not even have heard me. You needed someone to fascinate you, to appear to jump up on rooftops before you could get a little interested.
“Well, I’m willing to play games, for a little while at least, but there comes a time when every warrior must walk the path alone. For now, I’ll do what is necessary to keep you here, learning this way.”
I felt manipulated and angry. “So I can grow old sitting in this gas station like you, waiting to pounce on innocent students?” I regretted my remark as soon as it slipped out.
Socrates, unfazed, smiled and spoke. “Don’t mistake this place, or your teacher, Dan. Things and people are not always as they seem. I am defined by the universe, not by this station. As to why you should stay, well, that may become clear. I am completely happy, you see. Are you?”
A car pulled in, clouds of steam surrounding its radiator. “Come on,” Soc said. “This car is suffering and we may have to shoot it and put it out of its misery.” We both went out to the stricken car, whose radiator was boiling and whose owner was in a foul mood, fuming.
“What took you so long? I can’t wait around here all night, damn it!”
Socrates looked at him with nothing less than loving compassion. “Let’s see if we can’t help you, sir, and make this only a minor inconvenience.” He had the man drive into the garage, where he put a pressure cap on the radiator and found the leak. Within a few minutes he’d welded the hole shut but told the man that he would still need a new radiator in the near future. “Everything dies and changes, even radiators,” he winked at me.
As the man drove away, the truth of Soc’s words sank in. He really was completely happy! Nothing seemed to affect his happy mood. In all the time I’d known him, he had acted angry, sad, gentle, tough, humorous, and even concerned. But always, a kind of peace and happiness had shone in his eyes, even when they brimmed with tears.
I thought about Socrates as I walked home, my shadow growing and shrinking with each streetlight I passed. I kicked a stone into the darkness as I neared my apartment, walking softly down the driveway to the back, where my little converted garage waited under the branches of a walnut tree.
It was only a few hours away from dawn. I lay in bed but couldn’t sleep, wondering whether I could discover his secret. It seemed even more important right now than jumping up onto rooftops.
Then I remembered the card he had given me. Quickly, I got out of bed and turned on the light. Reaching into my wallet, I extracted it. My heart started to beat rapidly. Socrates had said that if I ever really needed him, to hold the card in both hands and just call. Well, I was going to test him.
I stood for a moment, trembling; my knees were starting to shake. I took the softly glowing card in both hands and called, “Socrates, come in Socrates. Dan calling.” I felt like a complete fool, standing there at 4:55 A.M., holding a glowing card, talking to the air. Nothing happened. I tossed it carelessly onto the dresser in disgust. That’s when the light went out.
“What?” I yelled as I spun around trying to sense if he was there. In classic movie style, I took a step backward, tripped over my chair, bounced off the edge of the bed, and sprawled to the floor.
The light went back on. If someone had been within earshot, that person might have assumed I was a student having trouble with ancient Greek studies. Why else would I be yelling at 5:02 in the morning, “Damn it, Socrates!”
I’d never know whether the blackout had been a coincidence or not. Socrates had only said that he would come; he hadn’t said in what form. I sheepishly picked up the card and started to slip it back into my wallet, when I noticed it had changed. Underneath the last lines, “Paradox, Humor, and Change,” appeared two words in bold print: “Emergencies Only!”
Laughing, I fell asleep in no time at all.
Summer workouts had begun. It was good to see old familiar faces. Herb was growing a beard; Rick and Sid were cultivating their dark summer tans and looked slimmer and stronger than ever.
I wanted so much to share my life and the lessons I’d been learning with my teammates, but I didn’t know where to begin. Then I remembered Soc’s business card. Before warm-up began, I called Rick over. “Hey, I want to show you something.” Once he saw that glowing card and Soc’s “specialties,” I knew he’d want to know more about it; maybe they all would.
After a dramatic pause, I pulled the card out and flipped it over to him. “Pretty strange, huh?”
Rick looked down at the card, turned it over, then looked back up at me, his face as blank as the card.
“Is this a joke? I don’t get it, Dan.”
I looked at the card, then turned it over. “Uh,” I grunted, stuffing the piece of paper back into my wallet, “Wrong card. Never mind. Let’s warm up.” I sighed. Great — this would be sure to strengthen my reputation as the team eccentric.
What a cheap trick, I thought. Disappearing ink.
That night, I pulled the card out and threw it down on the desk. “I wish you’d quit the practical jokes, Socrates. I’m tired of looking like an idiot.”
He looked at me sympathetically. “Oh? Have you been looking like an idiot again?”
“Socrates, come on. I’m asking you — will you please stop it?”
“Stop what?”
“The gag with the disappear — “ Out of the corner of my eye I caught a soft glow from the vicinity of the desk:
Warrior, Inc.
Socrates, Prop.
Specializing in:
Paradox, Humor,
and Change.
Emergencies Only!
“I don’t get it,” I murmured. “Does this card change?”
“Everything changes,” he replied.
“Yes, I know, but does it disappear and appear again?”
“Everything disappears and appears again.”
“Socrates, when I showed it to Rick, there was nothing there.”
“It’s the House Rules,” he shrugged, smiling.
“You’re not being particularly helpful; I want to know how... ”
“Let it go,” he said. “Let it go.”
Summer passed quickly, with intensive workouts and late nights with Socrates. We spent half the time practicing meditation and the other half working in the garage or just relaxing over tea. At times like these I would ask about Joy; I longed to see her again. Socrates would tell me nothing.
With vacation’s end imminent, my mind drifted back to the coming classes. I had decided to fly down to L.A. for a week’s visit with my parents. I would put my Valiant in garage storage here, and buy a motorcycle while down in L.A., then drive it up the coast.
I was walking down Telegraph Avenue to do some shopping and had just come out of the pharmacy with toothpaste when a scrawny teenager came up to me, so close I could smell stale alcohol and sweat. “Spare some change, can’t you?” he asked, not looking at me.
