Way of the Peaceful Warrior (23 page)

I leaped up to the bar and drove my legs upward. From a hand stand I began swinging. The only sound in the gym was that of my hands, revolving around the bar, releasing, vaulting, catching, kipping, twisting.
 

Only movement, nothing else. No oceans, no world, no stars. Only the high bar and one mindless performer and soon, even they dissolved into a unity of motion.
 

Adding a move I'd never done in competition before, I continued  on, reaching past my limit. Around and around I swung, faster and faster, getting ready for the dismount, a piked double flyaway.
 

I whipped around the bar, preparing to release and go flying into space, floating and twirling in the hands of a fate that I'd chosen for myself. I kicked and snapped my legs, spun 'round once, then twice, and kicked open, stretching my body for the landing. The moment of truth had arrived.
 

I made a perfect landing that echoed through the arena. Silence then pandemonium broke loose. We were champions!
 

My coach appeared out of nowhere, grabbing my hand and shaking it wildly, refusing to let go in his rapture. My teammates, jumping and screaming, surrounded and hugged me; a few of them had tears in their eyes. Then I heard the applause thundering in the distance, growing louder. We could hardly contain our excitement during the awards ceremony. We celebrated all night, recounting the meet until morning.
 

Then it was over. A long awaited goal was accomplished. Only then did I realize that the applause, the scores and victories were not the same anymore. I had changed so much; my search for victory had finally ended.
 

It was early spring. My college career was drawing to a close. What would follow, I knew not.
 

I felt numb as I said farewell to my team in Arizona and boarded a jet, heading back to Berkeley, and Socrates--and Linda. I looked aimlessly at the clouds below, drained of ambition. All these years I had been sustained by an illusion--happiness through victory--and now that illusion was burned to ashes. I was no happier, no more fulfilled, for all my achievements.
 

Finally I saw through the clouds. I saw that I had never learned how to enjoy life, only how to achieve. All my life I had been busy seeking happiness, but never finding or sustaining it.
 

I put my head back on the pillow as the jet started its descent. My eyes misted with tears. I had come to a dead end; I didn't know where to turn.
 

Carrying my suitcase, I went straight to Linda's apartment. Between kisses I told her about the championship, but said nothing of my recent depressing insights.
 

Linda then told me about a personal decision she had made, drawing me, for the moment, out of my own concerns. “Danny, I'm dropping out of school. I've thought about it a lot, of course. I'll get a job, but I don't want to go back home and live. Do you have any ideas?”
 

Immediately I thought of the friends I had stayed with after the motorcycle accident. “Linda, I could call Charlotte and Lou in Santa Monica. They're wonderful--you remember I told you about them--and I bet they'd love to have you stay with them.”
 

“Oh, that would be wonderful! I could help around the house and get a job to help with groceries.”
 

A five-minute phone call later, Linda had a future. I only wished it would be that simple for me.
 

Remembering Socrates, I abruptly told a very puzzled Linda that I had to go somewhere.
 

“After midnight?”
 

“Yes. I have…some unusual friends who stay up most of the night. I really have to go.” Another kiss, and I was gone. Still carrying my suitcase, I stepped into the office. “Moving in?” Soc joked.
 

“I don't know what I'm doing, Socrates.”
 

“Well, you apparently knew what you were doing at the Championships. I read a news report. Congratulations. You must be very happy.”
 

“You know very well what I'm feeling, Soc.”
 

“I certainly do,” he said lightly as he walked into the garage to resurrect an old VW transmission. “You're making progress--right on schedule.”
 

“Delighted to hear it,” I answered without enthusiasm. “But on schedule to where?”
 

“To the gate! To real pleasure, to freedom, to enjoyment, to unreasonable happiness! To the one and only goal you've ever had.
 

And to begin, it's time to awaken your senses once again.”
 

I paused, digesting what he had said. “Again?” I asked.
 

“Oh, yes. You once were bathed in brightness, and found pleasure in the simplest things.”
 

“Not recently, I'd venture.”
 

“No, not recently,” he answered, taking my head in his hands, sending me back to my infancy.
 

My eyes open wide, staring intently at shapes and colors beneath my hands as I crawl on the tiled floor. I touch a rug and it touches me back. Everything is bright and alive.
 

I grasp a spoon in one tiny hand and bang it against a cup. The clinking noise delights my ears. I yell with power! Then I look up to see a skirt, billowing above me. I'm lifted up, and make cooing sounds. Bathed in my mother's scent, my body relaxes into hers, and I'm filled with bliss.
 

Some time later. Cool air touches my face as I crawl in a garden. Colorful flowers tower around me, and I'm surrounded by new smells. I tear one and bite it; my mouth is filled with a bitter message. I spit it out.
 

My mother comes. I hold out my hand to show her a wiggly black thing that tickles my hand. She reaches down and knocks it away. “Nasty spider!” she says. Then she holds a soft thing to my face; it talks to my nose. “Rose,” she says, then makes the same noise again. “Rose.” I look up at her, then around me, and drift again into the world of scented colors.
 

I'm looking at Soc's ancient desk, down at the yellow rag. I shake my head. All of it seems hazy; there's no brightness to it. “Socrates, I feel half asleep, like I need to douse myself with cold water and wake up. Are you sure that last journey didn't do some damage?”
 

“No, Dan, the damage was done over the years, in ways you'll soon see.”
 

“That place---it was my grandfather's garden, I think. I member it; it was like the Garden of Eden.”
 

“That is entirely accurate, Dan. It was the Garden of Eden.
 

“I wish I could go back,” I sighed. “It was so bright, so clear, so enjoyable.”
 

“Before you leave tonight, Dan,” he said filling his mug from the dispenser, “would you like some more tea?”
 

“No, thanks, Soc. My tank is full for tonight.”
 

“Okay then, I'll meet you tomorrow morning at the Botanical Gardens. It's time we went on a nature hike.”
 

I left, already looking forward to it. I awoke after a few hours sleep, refreshed and excited. Maybe today, maybe tomorrow, I'd discover the secret of enjoyment.
 

I jogged up into Strawberry Canyon, and was waiting for Soc at the entrance to the Gardens. When he arrived we walked through green acres of every kind of imaginable tree, bush, plant, and flower.
 

We entered a giant greenhouse. The air was warm and humid, contrasting with the cool morning air outside. Soc pointed to the tropical foliage that towered over us. “As a child, all this would appear before your eyes and ears and touch as if for the first time. But now you've learned names and categories for everything. “That's good, that's bad, that's a table, that's a chair, that's a car, a house, a flower, dog, cat, chicken, man, woman, sunset.”
 

Socrates waved his an in a sweeping gesture, taking in the palms high above our heads that nearly touched the plexiglass canopy of the geodesic dome. “You now see everything through a veil of associations about things, projected over a direct, simple awareness. You've 'seen it all before'; it's like watching a movie for the twentieth time. You see only memories of things, so you become bored. Boredom, you see, is fundamental non-awareness of life; boredom is awareness, trapped in the mind. You'll have to lose your mind before you can come to your senses.”
 

The next night Socrates was already putting the kettle on when I stepped into the office, carefully removed my shoes, and put them on the mat beneath the couch. With his back still turned, he said, “How about a little contest? You do a stunt, then I'll do a stunt, and we'll see who wins.”
 

“Well, okay, if you really want to.” I didn't want to embarrass him, so I just did a one-arm handstand on the desk for a few seconds, then stood on it and did a back somersault off, landing lightly on the carpet,
 

Socrates shook his head, apparently demoralized. “I thought it might be a close contest, but I can see that it's not going to be.”
 

“I'm sorry, Soc, but after all, you aren't getting any younger, and I am pretty good at this stuff.”
 

“What I meant to say,” he grinned, “is that you don't stand a chance.”
 

“What?”
 

“Here goes,” he said. I watched him as he slowly turned around and walked deliberately into the bathroom. I moved toward the front door in case he came running out with a sword again. But he only emerged with his mug. He filled it with water, smiled at me, held the water up as if to toast me, and drank it slowly. “Well?” I said. “That's it.”
 

“That's what? You didn't do a damn thing.”
 

“Ah, but I did. You just don't have the eyes to appreciate my feat. I was feeling a slight toxicity in my kidneys; in a few days, it might have begun to affect my entire body. So before any symptoms could arise, I located the problem and flushed out my kidneys.”
 

I had to laugh. “SOC, you're the greatest, most silver-tongued con man I've ever met. Admit defeat--you're bluffing.”
 

“I am completely serious. What I've just described did, in fact, take place. It requires sensitivity to internal energies and the voluntary control of a few subtle mechanisms.”
 

“You, on the other hand,” he said, rubbing salt in the wound, “are only vaguely aware of what's going on inside that bag of skin. Like a balance beam performer just learning a handstand, you're not yet sensitive enough to detect when you're out of balance, and you can still 'fall' ill.”
 

“The thing is, Soc, I've developed a very sensitive balance in gymnastics. One has to, you see, to do some of the advanced...”
 

“Nonsense. You've only developed a gross level of awareness; sufficient to perform some elementary movement patterns, but nothing to write home about.”
 

“You sure take the romance out of a triple somersault, Soc.” “There is no romance in it; it's a stunt that requires some ordinary qualities. When you can feel the flow of energies in your body and do a minor tune-up--then you'll have your 'romance'. So keep practicing, Dan. Refine your senses a little more each day; stretch them, as you would in the gym. Finally, your awareness will pierce deeply into your body and into the world. Then you'll think about life less and feel it more. Then you'll enjoy even the simplest things in life---no longer addicted to achievement or expensive entertainments. Next time,” he laughed, “perhaps we can have a real competition.”
 

I warmed up the tea water again. We sat quietly for a while, then went into the garage, where I helped Soc pull an engine from a VW and take apart another ailing transmission.
 

We went out to service a huge black limousine. When we returned later to the office, I asked Soc whether he thought rich people are any happier than “poor stiffs like us.”
 

His response, as usual, shocked me. “I am not poor, Dan, I'm extremely wealthy. And as a matter of fact, you must become rich to be happy.” He smiled at my
dumbfounded expression, picked up a pen from his desk, and wrote on a clean white sheet of paper:
 

“If you have enough money to satisfy your desires, Dan, you are rich. But there are two ways to be rich: You can earn, inherit, borrow, beg, or steal enough money to meet expensive desires; or, you can cultivate a simple lifestyle of few desires; that way you always have more than enough money.
 

“Only the warrior has the insight and discipline to make use of that second way. Full attention to every moment is my desire and my pleasure. Attention costs no money; your only investment is training. That's another advantage of being a warrior, Dan.”
 

I felt content, listening to the spell he wove. There were no complications, no pressing searches, no desperate enterprises that had to be done. Socrates showed me the treasure trove of wealth within the body.
 

Socrates must have noticed me daydreaming, because suddenly he grabbed me under the arms, picked me up, and threw me straight up into the air, so high, my head almost hit the ceiling!
 

When I came down, he slowed my descent, setting me back down on my feet.
 

“I just want to make sure I have your attention for this next part. What time is it?”
 

Shaken by my brief flight, I responded, “Um, it's right on the garage clock--:.”
 

“Wrong! The time always was, is, and always will be now! Now is the time; the time is now. Is it clear?” “Well, yeah, it's clear.”
 

“Where are we?”
 

“We're in the gas station office--say, didn't we play this game a long time ago?”