WU WEI

“What are you doing up there? It’s awfully quiet.”

“I’m doing nuthin’.”

“It is way too quiet for you to be doing nothing.

Don’t make me come up there.”

As old memory enters, I hear a mentor’s words rolling around in me. “Relax. You’ve done your work. You are moving forward. From within. I say again, relax and enjoy your steps.”

I teach and live leadership development: learning to let go, hold hands with Being: let Being do the heavy lifting. My mind tells me that I may as well be taking a pass at an Olympic gold medal as to drop completely into the zone. Some part of me, a marathon runner, sees the next goal post up ahead. She cannot stop running. Must have been all those Wheaties I ate as a kid.

Saturday arrives with my declaration for rest. “Ah, nice to kick back.” Seconds later in the shower the saboteur enters: “Be nice to get your desk cleaned.” “ George and Linda seem like they hit a rough patch. Call them, eh?” I turn up the hot water. “Today, relaxing; no agenda,” I tell my Wheatie’s fan.” If a mind could pout, mine certainly would have.

Nowhere to go. “Ah, but the project,” the yelping voice protests. “Ah, we’re not doing that today.” “Huh?” And so it goes.

Surrender comes: Wu Wei. “Go to the pond,” the no voice says. And so I do. A sigh from body, groan from mind.

Once there, I notice the quietness of water, the lilt of fountain spray, Canadian geese resting. Calla lilies in cozy harbor. My neck releases taut muscles. My legs move slowly in steady stride. Camera hangs loosely. I walk to the water’s edge and to the calla lilies. Casually, I lift my camera.

Wu Wei is the wisdom of non-action or non-doing. Laozi tells us that when we are in harmony with the Tao, we conduct ourselves in natural and uncomplicated ways. I like that.

The geese slowly paddle near my favorite bench. We hang out together, in stillness. I remember hanging out. Just sitting, resting. No reading. No nuthin’.

Quiet for a while. Then mind blurts out: “Do you think the camera will bother the Mallard ducks?” “Will that couple make the geese swim away?” No longer engaged by its chatter, I let my thoughts drift in and out, as if clouds wandering by.

“When mind moves away from noticing breath,” Vipassana meditation teachers say, “gently bring it back.” “When your mind wanders away from a passage prayer line,” passage meditation teachers say, “quietly bring it back to that line.”

Geese continue to groom as I tell my mind: “Slow down, slow down, slow down.” As ducks take to flight, I let my camera join them in play and gratitude.

I watch ripples of water, ducks swimming, their smooth landings from flight, a thing of grace. When thoughts enter, I gently return to the water, just noticing. It calms my spirit.

Camera down, mind quiet, I lie down and just “be”. Doing nuthin’. The geese now cease grooming, stare into the water, not moving, as when I arrived.

“By jove, I think she’s got it,” warm breeze seems to say. Geese and I are present, in tranquility. Doing nuthin’.