No More Perplexity

At thirty one stands; at forty one is no longer perplexed. This is Confucius’s famous saying, and Shakyamuni likewise attained enlightenment at thirty-nine. A person generally must reach around forty to arrive at the state of no longer being perplexed; on this point, age is a threshold hard to cross. My understanding of “no longer perplexed” is mental maturity. Before that, one is perplexed—mentally immature, or in Buddhist terms, in a state of avidyá (unawareness). In the state of perplexity or unawareness, there are still many truths one cannot fathom, and one handles problems with varying degrees of bias.

Easterners like to use “attaining the Way” to describe a person’s mental maturity; this phrase is imprecise and most easily causes disagreement. I personally prefer to call this state mental maturity. Mental maturity has certain outward and inward manifestations; when a person’s behavior becomes increasingly objective and tolerant, and his heart increasingly serene and calm, one can basically say he has reached mental maturity.

Mental maturity relates to both a person’s knowledge and life experience. The knowledge one learns and the life experiences one goes through can train one’s capacity to judge oneself, life, and the outside world. No longer being perplexed, fundamentally, means already possessing the ability—or wisdom—to distinguish right from wrong in life.

Theoretical knowledge is not a necessary condition for mental maturity, and neither is talent, but a person who thinks diligently does find it easier than most to reach mental maturity. Nor does everyone who lives to forty reach mental maturity; many people, even if they live to a hundred, may not reach it. A few, before forty, are mature beyond their years.

The following factors I personally believe greatly help mental maturity.

First is the ability to reflect. To move from unawareness to no-perplexity, we must not only see this world clearly but, more importantly, see ourselves clearly. The stronger a person’s reflective ability, the faster he sees himself. The ancients said, “See the worthy and think of equaling him; see the unworthy and examine yourself inwardly.” “Examine yourself inwardly” is reflection. We have many wrong behavioral and mental habits; Buddhism calls them various “karmic obstructions.” We ourselves are unaware of them, yet we often see others’ problems as clearly as daylight. If, on seeing a problem in others, a person immediately “examines himself inwardly” to see whether he has the same problem, and if so, corrects it, then over time his own problems will become fewer and fewer.

For an arrogant person, reflection is very difficult; so sometimes intelligence and talent are actually an obstacle to mental maturity. A person of extraordinary talent and wide learning easily forms an arrogant, self-important psychology and all kinds of self-righteous prejudices, which Buddhism calls “mana” (conceit) and “drsti” (ego-views). Once arrogance and prejudice form, one feels oneself terrific and finds it hard to listen to others’ opinions or consider their feelings. Often those who look excellent in every way are the most disliked in a crowd, because they are so confident that they have moved into arrogance and conceit.

Failure is good for everyone, because failure shows us that we are not as wise and powerful as we think. Many people have a sudden awakening after failure, for no other reason than that failure made them begin to reflect.

Second is the spirit of practice. Many people think that once they understand a truth, they have mastered it. This is wrong. Einstein said, “Theoretically, theory and practice are one; practically, they are not.” Theoretical knowledge is not reliable or stable; only practice produces genuine knowledge. A person’s erudition is not particularly impressive; only the unity of knowledge and action is truly admirable. All around us there are too many giants of language and dwarfs of action—often including ourselves.

Throughout history, the thinkers who have had the greatest impact on the world all pursued the unity of knowledge and action. Knowledge, if it cannot be put into practice, degenerates into empty talk. The reason a person must reach forty before he is no longer perplexed is precisely that by forty he has had enough life practice to verify some of life’s truths, and his mind reaches maturity.

The Chan emphasis on “where words come to an end” is actually quite easy to understand: when practice has reached its mark, the truth is clear in the heart without being spoken. Such a state of unity of knowledge and action, or unity of awakening and practice, cannot be understood in any other way than through personal experience. If we apply what we learn, putting every bit of it into practice, then we can test in practice whether what we have learned is right or wrong; more importantly, practice makes us both convinced of and deeply impressed by what we have learned. It is like a doctor who learns pharmacology and then uses drugs to heal; curing the patient is better than reading any instruction manual.

Third is the habit of long-term learning and thinking. The outer world and our own hearts are both complex, each having more than one side—bright, dark, and gray. We may think some view right at one time, but when we encounter new situations, we find that following it does not turn out well. Then we become confused and at a loss. Only continuous learning and thinking can change this state.

This pluralistic world and our complex human hearts hold many things that sometimes look contradictory. If our cognition is one-dimensional and monistic, we easily become a bigoted person. Under the influence of such bigoted ideas and views, we often make mistakes “righteously indignant,” believing we represent justice while actually doing injustice, all without knowing it. Many interpersonal disputes arise from this.

Fourth is the spirit of seeking truth. The ultimate truth of the universe may be beyond human grasp due to intellectual limitations—or not yet grasped—but if we lack a spirit of truth-seeking, we easily fall into some mental trap and become a person of prejudiced belief. Believers in science, Christians, Buddhists, Muslims, and adherents of all sorts of other ideas all think they hold the ultimate truth and that their understanding is supreme. From ancient times to today, humanity has quarreled endlessly over this.

From the perspective of the long arc of history, as time passes and human civilization develops, the cognitive shortcomings of various ideas, doctrines, theorems, or religious teachings will all reveal themselves. Some biased believers, to defend their faith, even use all kinds of sophistry to make their case; to onlookers their arguments are full of holes, but these biased believers are themselves deeply convinced. This is the mark of lacking a spirit of truth-seeking; they only believe their own faith, lacking the spirit of “I love my teacher, but I love truth more.” Such a person can hardly reach mental maturity.

If a person can long reflect, practice, learn, and explore truth-seeking, then at some stage of life he will easily integrate and thoroughly master the various knowledge he has learned and the various life experiences he has had, reaching the state Confucius described as “my Way is threaded through one thing,” and becoming a mentally mature person.

After a person reaches mental maturity, seeing the world is an entirely different experience. What accompanies mental maturity is peace of mind and measured conduct. All this is because his heart is no longer perplexed and his head clear enough. At this point, the various ideas and views are to him like the eight words from the Yuanjue Jing (Perfect Enlightenment Sutra): “neither apart nor identical; neither bound nor released.” I personally think this state can be called “no longer perplexed.”