by Tang Huyen

A person who is not at peace with himself may well charge in
to reify words, make them hard and real, and impale himself on
them, all unasked.

Julian is very perceptive and very shrewd. The first thing
he does when he engages somebody is to impose his
rules on the latter. If the latter accepts, knowingly or not,
the game is over, Julian will rule straight through. If the
latter does not accept, the contest then becomes one
of whose rules will prevail.

When Julian showed up on these boards in mid-November,
after an absence of five years and one month, Rob was
still in his relative prime, though he had declined
gradually over the last three years or so. Rob was still
bashing away with his energy. Julian engaged him, and
induced Rob to accept his rules, and Rob meekly complied
and faithfully played by Julian's rules. From then on,
regardless of appearance, Rob had lost.

Stumper was altogether different. He played by his rules
and would not accept anybody else's for himself. The
contest then became one of whose rules would prevail.
Stumper's massive reaction to Julian hinged on this
issue: Will Julian impose his rules on Stumper, or will
Stumper impose his rules on Julian? Of course there can
be a third course, where the two will accommodate each
other relatively, but again the contest is whose rules will
prevail more, to the relative detriment of the other's.
Both are aware of this issue and are consciously
negotiating with each other — without saying so out
loud — on that precise issue.

Rob had no chance in front of Julian, because Julian had
craftily succeeded in imposing his rules on Rob. Not a
word transpired of it, but that was how the contest was
played out. On top of that, Rob was and is a realist and
literalist, to whom thought and language were and are
opaque, whilst Julian was and is well aware of thought
and language as media and of how to use them. Rob was
and is a slave to thought and language, whilst Julian was
and is a master of thought and language — relatively
speaking, of course, but I am exaggerating for the sake
of clarity.

When Julian threw words at Rob, Rob took them
realistically and literally, and whatever Julian's intentions
were, Rob took them as hostile and harmed himself by
the hostility that he imputed to them. When Rob threw
words at Julian, Julian took them as fluff, and on top
of that shape-shifted so that Rob's words didn't hit
anything, surely not Julian. Julian was and is amazingly
free in that sense, namely that he has the ability to
change his shape at will and instantaneously. Rob was
stuck — reactive, stiff, static, obsessional. Julian led
the game; Rob followed. The contest was thoroughly
lopsided.

I watched Rob for some years. He came in fresh and
open, but gradually became stiff, rigid, reactive,
emotional, obsessional, and whether it was a cause or
merely the reflection of something else in him, he became
a faithful defender of two women. If the women were
criticised, he never failed to jump in to defend and
protect them. Julian criticised one of the women, and
Rob jumped in hard to defend her. So Julian got him
hooked, both on the rules (which are Julian's) and on
the defence of that woman. Rob stated explicitly that
salvation lay elsewhere than in battling Julian, but was
hooked by his multiple obsession. He couldn't stop
responding to Julian, couldn't see Julian's words and
moves as fluff, couldn't penetrate Julian's words and
moves but was mesmerised by them just as they remained
opaque to him. Deadly obsession.

Something momentous happened: in the last thirty days,
from mid-December to now, mid-January, Rob went into
meltdown and lost his energy. His bashing went on and
goes on, but there is no energy to back it up. There is
no oomph and pizzazz to his posts, whether in defence
or attack. He took on a plaintive tone, and acted as if
in a vertigo — his energy was draining from him,
inexorably, without him having any say on that. He is
now listless, dispirited, washed out, faded, talks with
a dead monotone and fights with cotton fists. His
fighting becomes what the Chinese call shadow boxing,
except that to him it is real and serious. The contest
becomes even more lopsided. Yet Rob can't stop. And
Julian is in full form.

As to the observation: "He's a tiger who's only gone
after those who exposed an opening" — Julian can't do
anything with somebody who is at peace with himself
and in reconciliation with himself. Such a person will
instantly perceive his intentions and laugh his teeth out
at them, if he perceives them as hostile. I am not saying
that Julian's intentions are hostile, but hypothetically,
somebody who is at peace with himself and in
reconciliation with himself will instantly perceive
Julian's intentions and laugh his teeth out at them —
if he perceives them as hostile.

But a person who is not at peace with himself and in
reconciliation with himself may well charge in to reify
Julian's words, make them hard and real, and impale
himself on them, all unasked. It may well be fated. This,
regardless of Julian's intentions, which can be innocent —
I am not saying that they are innocent, but that they can
well be innocent.

Colophon

Posted to talk.religion.buddhism on January 15, 2005, in response to a post by naked_ape observing that "he's a tiger who's only gone after those who exposed an opening." Author: Tang Huyen. Message-ID: <[email protected]>.

Tang Huyen uses a newsgroup triangle — Julian, Rob, and Stumper — as a live demonstration of Buddhist psychology. The philosophical core is the distinction between mastery of thought and language as a medium (Julian, who can "shape-shift" and take words as fluff) versus bondage to thought and language as opaque reality (Rob, who reifies every word and impales himself on it). This maps directly onto Tang Huyen's recurring theme: liberation as the cessation of reification, and suffering as self-generated through the act of making words real and hard. The observation that "a person at peace with himself cannot be touched" is the inverse of the same principle: reconciliation with oneself is the structural prerequisite for freedom from external manipulation, regardless of the manipulator's intentions.

Preserved from the Usenet archive for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.

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