Moving Freely Between the Mundane World and Beyond It
One moment we are in the world; the next moment we are beyond it. Or, while in the world we behave as though beyond it, and while beyond it we behave as though still in the world. One can always move in and out with ease. When it is time to be in the world, one is in the world; when it is time to be beyond it, one is beyond it. A person who reaches such a state may live this life without betraying it and without being entangled by afflictions. Yet not everyone can steer the mind into such a marvelous condition.
A life of pure reason is deficient, for our life has an end, and we are born not to want it that way. This creates room for art and religion; art and religion offer an imaginative space for the infinite extension of life—an infinite life can exist only in the imagination. The imagination makes up for the shortcomings of reason and provides us with much spiritual solace.
A life that is overly emotional is likewise deficient. The real world is a rational world, and every problem of survival must be dealt with rationally. Handling survival problems in an emotional way often makes a complete mess of things.
Thus the ideal state is one in which both our reason and our emotion are full and rich: we can rationally solve the various difficulties of life, and we also have ample imagination with which to gallop through an infinite spiritual world.
Personally, I believe that the "mortal world of dust" spoken of by the ancient Chinese corresponds to a rational and realistic world, while the so-called "Peach Blossom Spring" is a spiritual world brought to fullness by imagination. The "Peach Blossom Spring" has, since ancient times, been a transcendent spiritual home deeply yearned for by the Chinese people—a spiritual world conjured up out of nothing so that we may rise above the trivial and painful worries of real life.
A person should live in two worlds. The real world is one no one can escape. Our birth, aging, illness, and death, our eating and drinking and excreting, are all real—and often tedious. Merely thinking of all kinds of troubles and endless tasks, and of the inevitability of death, can plunge us into inevitable dejection. Religion or art, created by human imagination, can delight us in such moments; that spiritual world we conjure up can make us forget the afflictions of life and the sufferings of the body.
We should carve out some time in our busy lives for our inner world. Even if we can spare only a few minutes to a few dozen minutes each day, it will greatly benefit our body and mind. The spiritual world is an aesthetic world. In such a beautiful, imagined world, a person can release the various displeasures and pressures encountered in life. Staying always in the human world only makes us feel suffocated. Occasionally withdrawing from the human world and wandering in one's own Peach Blossom Spring allows the inner wounds to be repaired in time. Then, when we walk out of our own Peach Blossom Spring and re-enter the human world, we are once again full of vitality.
Someone accustomed to continually switching between the world and beyond it will also be more detached at moments of parting and death. In the countryside I have seen elderly people who often go to temples or ancestral halls to burn incense; their attitude toward life and death is more serene. They believe there is another world after death and that there will be a next life. So the health and wealth they fail to obtain in this life do not make them anxious, for in their view there is still much to be accomplished in the life to come. An atheist who frequently alternates between reason and imagination can likewise face life and death with equanimity, because their inner world is also rich and they believe their spiritual life will continue.
Moderately doing seemingly worthless things—being alone, sitting quietly, spacing out, or meditating—can lengthen our life, soothe our emotions, and make each day feel longer. This is not to say these things give us more than twenty-four hours in a day; rather, they make us feel that each day is long rather than rushed, because they slow the rhythm of our lives. When a person is no longer impatient about everything, the years feel quiet and beautiful.
If a person has undergone long-term spiritual training, it becomes easy to choose "entering the world" or "leaving the world" at any moment according to the circumstances—when detachment is needed, one is detached on the spot; when engagement is needed, one is engaged on the spot. We cannot find a beyond-the-world completely separate from the human world; the beyond lies only within the brain that we can control.
Whether living in the world of dust or in the wilderness, the essence is the same: we cannot escape birth, aging, illness, and death, eating and excreting, nor the fate of living alongside others. Only when our brain has a valve with which we can shut off unpleasant emotions at any time can we move freely between the world and beyond it. The happiness of detachment can be trained; the way to train it is to spend time often dwelling in one's own spiritual home, rather than living only in the real world.