Revd Chris McDermott, Lead Chaplain for the University of Sussex
There is in Buddhism this phenomenon called ‘Don’t Know Mind’. It is less about being ignorant of something and more of the art of cultivating an attitude of toward life and even those things and people with which we are most familiar. It assumes a humility in the face of whatever presents itself – even when we think we are experts in that thing or know that person inside out. It recognises that even the most familiar object and phenomenon may yet surprise us by yielding an aspect we had not expected or been aware of – however thorough we thought we knew it. It is the art of a gentle agnosticism toward everything we encounter.
It informs debates. It is the complete opposite of an approach that is content to silence the other person or refuse to hear an opponent because we pre-judge them and assume we already know it all and have nothing to learn from their point of view. It fosters wonder. It anticipates the possibility that what we thought we knew thoroughly, we barely knew in part or at all. It opens us to a fresh experience of the world – and ourselves and what we have the capacity to do and be. It nurtures an ontology of perpetual curiosity.
‘What is this?’ is a question Song Buddhists (i.e., the Korean version of Zen) are sometime encouraged to continually ask themselves as they sit in meditation. Perhaps we would do well to carry around with us in our mental equipment an implicit ‘what is this?’ when faced with the new and with the familiar.
With that, we are at the start of 2022. Our expectations of the new year may, in the end, turn to disappointments; our anxieties about what may lay ahead may not materialise at all and, possibly, what we find will pleasantly surprise us. If we are disappointed when hopes fail to materialise or face unexpected challenges, ‘don’t know mind’ might well ask: ‘what is this?’ What opportunity does this disappointment yield? What new learning? What possibilities now open up for me? It does not anticipate the end of the show – though some ends are rather bitter pills – or the irrevocable conclusion to our hopes for some kind of happiness. ‘I don’t know mind’ simply does not pre-judge the future or ourselves because some hoped-for end fails to materialise.
Easier said than done, I suspect. Though some attitudes seem to emerge naturally for some people or be a part of their natural disposition, we often are required to nurture habits of mind and ways of being that to not come easily to some of us. The excessive optimism of some may require the developing the habit of realistic thinking in some cases: those of a more gloomy mindset may need to cultivate habits that dispose them to adopt a more positive estimation of the world.
But whether faced by disappointments or the realisation of one’s hopes and plans over the new year ahead, a healthy dollop of gentle agnosticism and ‘Don’t Know Mind’ will go some distance and sustaining an equanimity of spirit that will see us through the fleeting changes and chances of 2022.