MEDITATIONS: ZHUANGZI, CHAPTER SIXTEEN, PART ONE

Repairing the Inborn Nature, part I

We modern men need nothing so much as to repair our inborn natures. Truly, we great, great grandchildren of the European Enlightenment are utterly cut-off from our instincts. We imagine ourselves to be disembodied wills imprisoned in flesh, limited by time, and oppressed by society, exposure, and privation. We are possessed, if you will, by the hyper-rational ghost of Descartes and Cartesian Dualism—a kind of arrogance wearing the skinsuit of skepticism.

The result of this separation from the instincts has been and continues to become more and more observable, dare we say, “obvious.” All forms of mental illness abound. Young adults cast off rudderless into a vast black ocean without the navigational or cartographic wisdom which their ancestors once relied on. Depression, anxiety, dysmorphia, resentment, decadence—these are all the symptoms of sick human animals, human animals made sick because of poor hygiene—that is, because of an abandonment of necessary instinctive attitudes and practices.

But what are those most natural attitudes and practices which we have forsaken? What is it which must be done to bring humanity back from its path of slow self-destruction?

Before we attempt to answer these questions, the Zhuangzi has something to say about how not to go about it:

There are some who try to repair their inborn nature by recourse to conventional learning, thinking this can return it to its initial state. There are some who try to unseat their desires by recourse to conventional thinking, believing this will bring them clarity. Such people may be called truly benighted. (Zhuangzi 131)

Ironic, isn’t it, that precisely what we are engaging in here is not the answer. No amount of intellectual study or abstract contemplation will close the chasm between us and our instincts. In fact, Zhuang Zhao’s stand-in outer-chapters-contributor suggests that believing such is the height of ignorance. And he’s right. Think about it this way: no one has ever mastered a skill purely through studying it. To become great at anything, one must apply himself to the activity itself. He must actually mold his attitude and behavior to the action, over and over; and though study may help along in this process, it is never sufficient on its own.

Then what is sufficient? According to the Zhuangzi:

The ancients who practiced the Course used their tranquility as nutriment for their conscious understanding. Conscious understanding did arise for them, but it was not employed in the service of any deliberate doings. Thus they can be said also to have used their conscious understanding as nutriment for their tranquility. When conscious understanding and tranquility can come together and nourish one another in this way, a harmonious coherence of the two emerges from the inborn. Inherent virtuosity is just this harmony, and the Course is just this coherence. (Zhuangzi 131)

That which is sufficient is a synthesis of conscious understanding and instinctive wisdom. In Jungian terms: a coming together of the ego-consciousness and the collective-unconscious to form a more individuated Self.

“The ancients . . . used their tranquility as nutriment for their conscious understanding.” In other words, they were tranquil—at peace with themselves—and were able, from this place of peace to better utilize their conscious understanding of the world. And how could it be another way? It couldn’t, because, by definition, the man who is willing to accept truths about himself (even and especially uncomfortable truths) will have more and more accurate data with which to consciously contemplate and understand the world.

“Conscious understanding did arise for them, but it was not employed in the service of any deliberate doings,” means that these ancients—likely archetypally primitive, preconscious men on the dawning of consciousness as we know it—subordinated their egos to their instincts. That itself requires explanation, for it is easily misunderstood. It means that these ancient people’s values were their instinctive values, not values artificially constructed by exposure to society and culture. Instinctive values are inherited; they are evolved; therefore, they are shaped by the Source of the Tao—this is what brings them in accordance with the Great Course.

And all that is merely groundwork to say: there is nothing contrary about using conscious understanding so long as the values which orient that understanding are instinctive and not contrived by the ego-consciousness of oneself or others. “Thus they can be said also to have used their conscious understanding as nutriment for their tranquility.”

This subordination of external values to internal values produces a harmonious coherence with the Source of the Way—that is to say with reality itself. Behind all the mystical-sounding language, that is really all that we are discussing, how one lives in accordance with how reality actually is. “Why,” you might ask, “what is the goal?” The answer: to bring out our potential virtues, what the Zhuangzi calls our intrinsic virtuosities, our skills, talents, and abilities which—through their manifestation—allow us to see being itself as good. Or as Nietzsche might put it, those noble qualities of the higher human animal by which he comes to love his fate.

His fate. His individual fate—but we will discuss that aspect more in Meditations: “Repairing the Inborn Nature” part II.

Zhuangzi. Zhuangzi; The Complete Writings, translated by Brook Ziporyn, Hackett Publishing Company Inc., 2020