KAKU SE YO: Wake Up!
NEN OKOREBA SUNAWACHI KAKU SE YO
NEN desire, thought, wish, idea, mental image, something in the mind
OKOREBA if it arises
SUNAWACHI just, immediately, instantly
KAKU SU to wake up, to become conscious
YO [imperative]
“If an idea arises, just wake up!”
What NEN means changes according to context. So each person has to come to their own understanding, out of their own practice. I can’t tell you definitively what NEN means. I can try to convey to you what it means to me.
My understanding is that, in this instruction, NEN expresses the end-gaining impulse, that is the unconscious impulse to gain an end unconsciously -- i.e. to do or think something unconsciously -- failing in the process to prevent bad habits like fixing the head on the spine and narrowing the back.
To sit in lotus trying to sit in the right posture is end-gaining. To sit in lotus worrying about solving some problem is end-gaining. To sit in lotus with some unconscious expectation of reward is end-gaining. To sit in lotus with any kind of attitude of grim determination (my speciality) is end-gaining.
What, then, is the meaning of KAKU SU? What does it mean to become conscious, to wake up?
That is the central question addressed by FM Alexander, for example in his book Constructive Conscious Control of the Individual.
I was incredibly fortunate to have a series of lessons from FM Alexander’s niece, the late Marjory Barlow. In 2002, Marjory’s book, An Examined Life, in conversation with Trevor Allan Davies, was published.
On page 43, Trevor asks:
FM talked about conscious guidance and control as a plane to be reached rather than a method of reaching it. What is your understanding of this plane of conscious guidance and control?
Marjory replies:
“There is a process [inhibition and direction = the ‘means-whereby’] which fosters a heightened condition of consciousness. An unconscious person cannot make themselves more conscious by controlling themselves with their unconsciousness.
With the Alexander Technique we allow a growth of consciousness by inhibiting and directing. By following these indirect means, we arrive at a place where we find ourselves using increasingly conscious guidance and control.
We discover consciousness by inhibiting unconscious behaviour. It arises in the gap. It’s something that is there waiting, not something we create. And the nature of consciousness becomes very clear. Consciousness is certainly not something that you do.”
The frontispiece of Marjory’s book contains a quotation from her teaching:
“My goal, and my only one, is to help you adjust your inner tempo, so that you do not lose pace with time.”
Under that, in my copy of the book, I jotted down the following notes:
-- to be PRESENT.
-- to hear the birdsong outside Marjory’s window.
And under that, dated 20 Sep. 2004, I have written something that spontaneously emerged in my own Alexander teaching practice:
(In a lesson with Dale, discussing ‘being present’)
Don’t end-gain to be present.
Be present to your end-gaining!
And under that I wrote the four Chinese characters explained above, read as
NEN OKOREBA SUNAWACHI KAKU SE YO.
When the desire to gain an end arises into consciousness, just come back to the means-whereby.
The Buddha’s teaching and Alexander’s teaching are not the same thing. I am not trying to identify chalk and cheese.
The Buddha’s teaching is to sit in the full lotus posture. In the first instance, it doesn’t matter how you sit. First, just bodily sit.
But if you want to go beyond that, if you want to understand what Master Dogen meant by becoming conscious, by waking up, by mental sitting, you may find, as I have found, that FM Alexander’s teaching is absolutely invaluable.
The background to my jottings was this:
Several years ago during a lesson up in Marjory’s old 3rd-floor flat in Hampstead, I accidentally woke up and heard the birds singing outside with a clarity that I had never experienced before.
It happened as an indirect result of working to the means-whereby principle -- i.e. saying NO to (inhibiting) the desire to gain the end of moving a leg, while consciously directing my neck not to stiffen, my head not to pull into my body, my back not to arch and narrow, and all my joints not to fix.
Neither Marjory nor I expected me suddenly to hear the birds singing. Nobody said anything about listening to the birdsong. But the birdsong suddenly penetrated my ears, and for the first time in my life I could hear it.
Now I can’t recapture that experience by trying to recapture it. If I sit there with the intention of having my ears penetrated by birdsong, that is just end-gaining. The best I can do is, when I notice that I am end-gaining, to stop end-gaining. It was nothing other than the stopping of end-gaining that caused me to wake up in my lesson with Marjory. WE DISCOVER CONSCIOUSNESS BY INHIBITING UNCONSCIOUS BEHAVIOUR. IT IS NOT SOMETHING WE DO.
That understanding expressed itself to my Alexander student Dale, like this:
“Don’t end-gain to be present.
Be present to your end-gaining.”
That was Marjory’s wisdom accidentally expressing itself through me. Hearing it, on 20 Sep. 2004, I was surprised by my own words, and wrote them down in a place where I wouldn’t forget them.
I think Master Dogen, when he came back from China, was saying the same thing. Don’t end-gain to wake up to reality. Wake up to your end-gaining.
NEN desire, thought, wish, idea, mental image, something in the mind
OKOREBA if it arises
SUNAWACHI just, immediately, instantly
KAKU SU to wake up, to become conscious
YO [imperative]
“If an idea arises, just wake up!”
What NEN means changes according to context. So each person has to come to their own understanding, out of their own practice. I can’t tell you definitively what NEN means. I can try to convey to you what it means to me.
My understanding is that, in this instruction, NEN expresses the end-gaining impulse, that is the unconscious impulse to gain an end unconsciously -- i.e. to do or think something unconsciously -- failing in the process to prevent bad habits like fixing the head on the spine and narrowing the back.
To sit in lotus trying to sit in the right posture is end-gaining. To sit in lotus worrying about solving some problem is end-gaining. To sit in lotus with some unconscious expectation of reward is end-gaining. To sit in lotus with any kind of attitude of grim determination (my speciality) is end-gaining.
What, then, is the meaning of KAKU SU? What does it mean to become conscious, to wake up?
That is the central question addressed by FM Alexander, for example in his book Constructive Conscious Control of the Individual.
I was incredibly fortunate to have a series of lessons from FM Alexander’s niece, the late Marjory Barlow. In 2002, Marjory’s book, An Examined Life, in conversation with Trevor Allan Davies, was published.
On page 43, Trevor asks:
FM talked about conscious guidance and control as a plane to be reached rather than a method of reaching it. What is your understanding of this plane of conscious guidance and control?
Marjory replies:
“There is a process [inhibition and direction = the ‘means-whereby’] which fosters a heightened condition of consciousness. An unconscious person cannot make themselves more conscious by controlling themselves with their unconsciousness.
With the Alexander Technique we allow a growth of consciousness by inhibiting and directing. By following these indirect means, we arrive at a place where we find ourselves using increasingly conscious guidance and control.
We discover consciousness by inhibiting unconscious behaviour. It arises in the gap. It’s something that is there waiting, not something we create. And the nature of consciousness becomes very clear. Consciousness is certainly not something that you do.”
The frontispiece of Marjory’s book contains a quotation from her teaching:
“My goal, and my only one, is to help you adjust your inner tempo, so that you do not lose pace with time.”
Under that, in my copy of the book, I jotted down the following notes:
-- to be PRESENT.
-- to hear the birdsong outside Marjory’s window.
And under that, dated 20 Sep. 2004, I have written something that spontaneously emerged in my own Alexander teaching practice:
(In a lesson with Dale, discussing ‘being present’)
Don’t end-gain to be present.
Be present to your end-gaining!
And under that I wrote the four Chinese characters explained above, read as
NEN OKOREBA SUNAWACHI KAKU SE YO.
When the desire to gain an end arises into consciousness, just come back to the means-whereby.
The Buddha’s teaching and Alexander’s teaching are not the same thing. I am not trying to identify chalk and cheese.
The Buddha’s teaching is to sit in the full lotus posture. In the first instance, it doesn’t matter how you sit. First, just bodily sit.
But if you want to go beyond that, if you want to understand what Master Dogen meant by becoming conscious, by waking up, by mental sitting, you may find, as I have found, that FM Alexander’s teaching is absolutely invaluable.
The background to my jottings was this:
Several years ago during a lesson up in Marjory’s old 3rd-floor flat in Hampstead, I accidentally woke up and heard the birds singing outside with a clarity that I had never experienced before.
It happened as an indirect result of working to the means-whereby principle -- i.e. saying NO to (inhibiting) the desire to gain the end of moving a leg, while consciously directing my neck not to stiffen, my head not to pull into my body, my back not to arch and narrow, and all my joints not to fix.
Neither Marjory nor I expected me suddenly to hear the birds singing. Nobody said anything about listening to the birdsong. But the birdsong suddenly penetrated my ears, and for the first time in my life I could hear it.
Now I can’t recapture that experience by trying to recapture it. If I sit there with the intention of having my ears penetrated by birdsong, that is just end-gaining. The best I can do is, when I notice that I am end-gaining, to stop end-gaining. It was nothing other than the stopping of end-gaining that caused me to wake up in my lesson with Marjory. WE DISCOVER CONSCIOUSNESS BY INHIBITING UNCONSCIOUS BEHAVIOUR. IT IS NOT SOMETHING WE DO.
That understanding expressed itself to my Alexander student Dale, like this:
“Don’t end-gain to be present.
Be present to your end-gaining.”
That was Marjory’s wisdom accidentally expressing itself through me. Hearing it, on 20 Sep. 2004, I was surprised by my own words, and wrote them down in a place where I wouldn’t forget them.
I think Master Dogen, when he came back from China, was saying the same thing. Don’t end-gain to wake up to reality. Wake up to your end-gaining.
posted by Mike Cross at 7:59 PM
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