Zen and the Art of Travis Rambling

Now most people would look down on a college student on summer vacation returning to his high school to sit in on classes, flirt with girls, and have intellectual discussions. But not me. I learned some things yesterday, and if it's the price I must pay for expanding my mind, I'd gladly be called a loser.

I woke up early, running on two hours of sleep and more caffeine than the healthy amount that should be taken. Drove in to the school with Job, who was moderately pissed at me for not washing the dishes the night before. At school, I saw some old friends and socialized a bit, but quickly had to dodge some administrative figures and make my way to the classroom of Hank Burns' Advanced Placement English course. I never took AP English my senior year, even though it was accredited as the class to take your senior year. I, instead and not by choice, took a lower-level course which actually had a reading list I really was excited for. Unfortunately, my classmates were zombies who never heard of "class discussion" or the "art of discourse." I ended up meeting Hank Burns and befriending him to the point where I would eat lunch with him and some students from his class, dubbed "AP Lunch." I ended up reading all the AP English books and discussing them with Hank during lunch and I impressed him enough to have him invite me to sit in on some AP English classes.

I hated the classes. The "discussion" consisted of people sharing thoughts, others shooting those thoughts down and berrating them, then only to pitch their own opinionated ideas and have others disagree. It was more disagreement than discourse and it made me uncomfortable.

But now, being the ultra-cool graduate I am, I can return to school and sit in on an AP class of kids who are not exactly my peers but still intelligent people, and actually talk, debate and learn something. This is what I've done over the past vacations I've had and this is what I did yesterday.

The class had just read Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse. I haven't read this book, so I stole it after the class was over. I won't detail everything that took place within the two class periods I sat through, then the three lunch periods following, but I'll summarize what I took with me from them:

The concept of Self can be divided into two basic parts: A and B, I'll call them for now.
A is your rational thought process, the part of you that thinks, monitors, evaluates, calculates, understands, worries, critiques, etc. It's your Mind. Frued's Super-Ego. Knowledge. The example used in class was when you are playing a sport, it's the tiny voice in your head that tells you to focus, concentrate, not to mess up, and will in most cases make you mess up.
B is what you feel and experience. It's your senses, your emotions, your basic instincts, your gut feelings. It's the Body. Frued's Id. Wisdom. It's the part of you that knows basic pleasures and understands what you morally feel is right and wrong. The example in class was the person playing the sport not needing to think about it and just doing it well, naturally.
Ofcourse not everyone plays sports, but it applies to most things we do, like math, dancing, writing, driving, even lovemaking. A and B are both in your head and sometimes one's in control and sometimes the other is. Then there are those moments when everything just gells and you understand. Your mind subconsciously figures out what needs to be figured out, and is clear and your body does what you need to do to and it's practically instinctual. You make the perfect pitch, you solve the difficult equation, you find exactly the right words to write, or say. You understand.

This is: C. The combination of A and B. The Moment of Zen, according to Buddhists.
I termed things using Freud's super-ego and id, which does make sense but not in the context of one person using C to do something, but more in the context of one person thinks and lives is his Ego (C) being his balance of A and B. We're always in a state of C, but it's based on degrees determined by the balance of A and B. When you're spending too much time thinking, and muddling yourself with confusion, you're a bit too A. When you're spending too much time doing, and making rash decisions without considering consequences, you're a bit too B. You need to reach the C, the Middle Path, both Yin and Yang.

You could label A and B in any context you'd like, be it philosophy, psychology, religion, or even the left and right sides of our brains. Wherever I look, I can see two seperate sides to most things, and the middle which is difficult to reach. I'm not pretending to be Buddhist or anything of that sort, just taking it all into consideration and thinking it through.

In today's society, in America's culture, we are all too A-based. We are all pressured to focus on the preparation of the next step of our lives. Be it our careers, our education, etc. We all constantly have something to worry about in our future, and there's no time to relax and be happy. Ofcourse, it's part of our nature to worry, to be A, so it's not like we're ever going to find true happiness, or absolute certainty in anything. These days though, everything's too extroverted, and there's not enough introversion.

Okay, nevermind. I stopped making sense to me. I need more B in my life and less A though, to help me find C. Hopefully, this book can help.