I left my house Saturday morning at 9:00 and ventured out into the world of overpriced coffee and two tailed mermaids. Sitting at Starbucks, It took me a sold ten minutes to clear my mind. Every time I tried to reach a point of zen, my thoughts would run back to something that I did earlier on in the day, how people would react to my silence, and even what I was going to eat for dinner. When I came to understand what it really meant to clear one's mind, it was shocking that I as hard as I tried, I couldn't do it. There was always a song playing on a loop in my brain or a round of images circling through my head. Sitting at a table close to the door, I was cast a mixture of glances from onlookers, ranging from confused to annoyed. While people milled in and out, I just sat there looking around with no phone, no drink, no headphones, nothing out on the table. The people sitting in the cafe looked over their shoulders at me, waiting for a sign of whether I was waiting for someone, playing on my phone under the table, just doing something. People were perplexed and put off at the sight of someone who wasn't being constantly stimulated by some form of technology. I felt as though I stuck out like a sore thumb.
When a "normal" person sits by themselves somewhere in silence, they are usually fidgeting with something. I believe that society sees people who don't feel the need to always be staring at a screen to be out of place and weird. What about people makes them feel so uncomfortable by themselves that they feel the need to always look absorbed in something tangible? Why can't we just be absorbed in thought? I think if zen was promoted more in society, the world would come to see that being in your own bubble of thoughtlessness is restorative and not to be considered odd just because society has deemed it so.
People quote the Art of War all the time. So if Sun Tzu had changed his topic, would the world today be so disturbed and uncomfortable at the sight for doing nothing? Or would it be considered a norm?
