Essays From The Master

Every Komuso learns the verse of the mantra which states: “Stealth our discipline; illusion our way of life” and one of the main symbols of the Silent Way is a mask i.e. no face at all. Let it be known that you use the Silent Way and most will think you are lying, a fool or telling a joke, few if any will take you for any threat and usually mock you. The insult toward the way and thus to one’s self serves as a wet stone to sharpen one’s self control, one’s power, against; it is the discipline of mockery. If one is taken as a joke and thus seen as no threat then one is given an edge in combat and is less suspect after an event. To be mocked, in addition to be being a discipline, can also be an armor because one’s reality is unknown and thus the target is not dealing with one’s self but rather the false mockery of you. This understanding is a part of both the discipline of disguise and that of social control, this understanding is also the means to see through disguise and break free of social controls. If one is unknown one can move freely, if one can move freely, if one can move freely one can learn. If one can learn one can apply what one knows, if one can apply one’s knowledge to result then one has power. If one has both knowledge and power one has the means to define what is true for one’s self and thus what is real for one’s self and this leads to an awareness of reality in a transpersonal sense as to what is and is not genuine.

The understanding of mockery is why it is said by some that the fool is the twin of the wise, because people do not really deal with people but rather their perceptions of those persons. Being mocked is a distraction that one can learn to use both in combat and to avoid combat if one is adept enough not to respond to it. If one is perceived as being false any planning against one’s self will likewise be false because it is based on a false profile. If on the other hand one is seen as a greater threat than one is a foe may be slow to attack out of fear or the planning may be so great that one can slip through the cracks. If there is doubt as to whether or not one is real, whether or not one is a threat or not, in that space of uncertainty one has an advantage i.e. being the unknown. To be the unknown is to have the power to be or to appear as one needs to or as one wills, provided one takes the needed steps. To make a sanctuary of being an illusion gives one discipline which leads to armor which leads to calm which leads to more control through both what one does and what one chooses not to do. Even the least person has some influence on transpersonal reality but control only over one’s self via what one does and how one responds to all else that occurs. Even the greatest person can be overcome by misperception and ill planning i.e. by not putting all one’s strengths forward. The blade that is seen can distract, the blade that is not seen cannot be defended against. The adept can do one, the other but is better to use a union of both of these concepts.

The bully attacks those that seem weak because the bully is weak, faced with confidence the bully will seek easier prey. Those the bully cannot define the bully will mock to be able to place the unknown in a context, a context that one can learn to turn against the bully. Many ask, based on the Prince; is it better to be feared or loved, to be the lion or the unicorn? The Silent Way asks, via the Komuso, if it is better to known and feared or loved of its better to be an unknown, something that one cannot be planed for. To make use of this understanding demands honest self-knowledge as to who and what one is, what one is willing to do and under what terms one is willing to do what and for whom. The Komuso, as a shadow, is not simply the tiger of the martial or the cobra of stealth but rather the dragon and no two souls know the dragon in the same way. One cannot prepare to face a myth because myths are told in many ways and one cannot know which one is facing or how it is understood.