Living with Quality pt. 1

I've been pondering this blog for a while, not exactly sure how to capture all of what I've been thinking succinctly. Plus, I wanted to finish the book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (ZAMM) which has influenced so much of this train of thought. The topic for today relates to the very core of who we are and how we operate, it could be considered a personal religion, a belief.

I'm going to start with a brief summary of the philosophy behind it and you will have to forgive me because I can barely grasp it myself. Due to society and the early philosophers we subscribe to, we are raised to believe that everything can fall into two categories: subjective and objective. Objective being the physical attributes of any one thing, subjective being creations of the mind, the way that we witness things. The problem with this scientific approach, is that it doesn't make room for things like gravity. Its not objective right? There is nothing physically there. Point to it. Is it subjective then? Merely a creation of our minds, which did not exist before we thought of it? No, it clearly existed before it was named. So what is it? Another example is "quality" or this idea of "good."

The problem is the dualistic way in which we've been taught our entire lives to think, its either on or off, yes or no, object or subject. Where does that leave the spirit? Almost everyone can agree that we exist in some way other than our physical form. The author of ZAMM suggest that there is a overruling category which he's termed Quality and Quality supersedes these ideas of Object and Subject because it suggest that things have an "essence" (for lack of a better word) to them which is above their physical traits and exists before we "invent it" which thought. It is important to note that because Quality exist above subject/object we can't define it, because doing so would make it subjective.
In ZAMM he breaks Subject/Object down into other more touchable ideas, like the perceived difference between science and art, or the technical and the aesthetic. This is where this idea of living the philosophy ties in: We are all familiar with the idea of Left Brain, Right Brain people (dualistic again right?), he titles them as "Classic" and "Romantic" brain types that people have fallen into. Classic people tend to understand technology, while romantic people fair better in creative endeavors. The author suggest that these dualist mindsets are dangerous to our stability. Classical thinkers cannot live a purely technical life without removing humanity, Romantic thinkers cannot live in modern society because of their inability to use technology naturally. He notes that even something as technical as motorcycle maintenance has an art to it (the nature of problem solving is educated guesses which are not scientific seeing as they are guesses), and that to perform optimally both in motorcycle maintenance and life, we need to break down the walls that have been build between technology and art and realize that even science requires educated guesses - which are an art and not logical at all.

I fear I can truly not do these ideas justice nor am I connecting the dots very well at all so I will skip ahead...

The moral to the story (one of the many) is this way of living which does not require categorizing. Rather it asks that a sense of "oneness" be establish, an idea I'd like to rephrase as living with a subtle consciousness, the idea being that once we've establish that we are not so separate from the things around us and we therefore begin the consider the effect of every action in the greater picture we can live more wholly. Rather than fighting against your motorcycle to repair it, approach it with a sense of calm and control. Live with purpose and the more you can allow quality to show through your work the more holistic and satisfying the work will become for you as well. You've felt the difference between completely a project you honestly applied yourself to and done your best on, and turning in something "that will do" but doesn't have any of you in it. What happens if you take the idea and apply it globally to your life? What ramifications would it have for you, just in terms of the way that you felt if rather than riding your bike just to get somewhere, you were actually there on your bike rather than simply waiting to get where you are going? Think of all you would see! Also, I wonder how much anxiety we could lose if we lived this way? The difference doing what you are doing now and doing it well. From that would seem to exude a marvelous sense of calm because we are the masters of ourselves.

Sorry for the ramblings once again, I appreciate your reading and I would even more appreciate your thoughts as this is a thought process that I am trying to develop.

Love you all.

~Zac