The Fundamental Nature of Power

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As we were looking for a new home some years ago, we instantly became enamored of this established neighborhood with ample space between houses and an abundance of huge and beautiful trees. Sure, there’d be lots of leaves to rake, but the previous owners sweetened the deal with a monstrously powerful leaf blower they’d no longer need. We were sold!

I didn’t actually use the big machine that first autumn. Leaves were already falling by the time I arrived, and I think I recall having some difficulty getting it started. Perhaps a little bit of my Zen sensibility about raking leaves the old fashioned way still held sway as well. Raking is good work—meditative and therapeutic! But the leaves just kept falling and falling and falling, and the list of other things in need of doing just kept growing.


The Big Machine

Now, if we were deeper in the woods, we’d likely eschew lawn maintenance altogether. We’d let the leaves pile up to become nesting places for animals and rich detritus for mushrooms and Mayapples to grow in. We do indeed have such swaths, and we’re expanding them. But in between are areas of lawn still in need of tending. Alas, our neighborhood has certain aesthetic standards to uphold which were part of what we tacitly signed up for when we moved in.

I’ve now used that big machine a number of times—enough to learn at the most basic level the pros and cons of wielding such power. Perhaps it would be instructive at this point to take a step back and reflect on some of them. First, though, let’s remind ourselves of the scientific definition of power. In physics, power is a measure of work done per unit of time. The big machine can clear the lawn of leaves perhaps twenty times faster than I can with just a rake. Thus, it is twenty times more powerful, and I become more powerful when I wield it.

I realize now that I want to wield power when I have a task to do that is otherwise time-consuming, tedious, or unenjoyable. I want a tidy lawn (kind of), but I don’t want to spend every weekend keeping it that way. I want to go to a nearby town for a nice meal, but I don’t want to spend the day walking there and back. I want clean dishes after a dinner party, but I don’t want to spend hours doing them by hand. I want what I want when I want it. And power allows me to have more of what I want.

But wielding power is inherently dangerous and potentially violent even. When using the big machine, I need to take care not to blast the car’s paint job with twigs and gravel. I need to take care not to peel back from the earth the many carpets of moss in our yard or obliterate any tender plants that might be in the vicinity.

How and why we wield power says a lot about us, I think. Do we do so carefully or indiscriminately? Do we do so only reluctantly, or do we relish it? Do we use power to accomplish things we would accomplish anyway without wielding it, or does our wielding of power allow us to attain something we wouldn’t attain otherwise?

For example, our large, pristine lawns are not in accord with nature. That’s precisely why they require so much work to create and maintain. Why then do we feel compelled to do things that are not in accord with the natural order of things? And if we do want a large, pristine lawn, why don’t we also want what it requires—the work? Why are our desires so out of sync with how we want to spend our time?

The natural order of things is revered amongst Taoists. The Way is spoken of as we in the West might speak of God. This respect for natural order was subsumed within Mahayana Buddhism as it flowed out of India and spread through China, Korea, and Japan. Can you imagine a young Zen monk suggesting to the master that the monastery buy one of those big leaf blowing machines for use out in the garden so that they can have more time for meditation and other “more important” activities? Can you imagine the state of the Zen rock and moss gardens after such power has been unleashed on them?


Komyoji Rock Garden

I’ll have more to say about spirituality, power, and peace as this reflection continues. Likely subjects will be Zen masters and heads of state, politics and oppression, gender roles and sexuality. And, from a very Buddhist perspective, I’ll be speaking of this thing we call the self that always seems to want more and more and wants it precisely when it wants it.


Power, Practice, and Peace logo

This post is in the Power, Practice, and Peace series.

Find a running list of all posts in this series by clicking here.


Images

The Big Machine courtesy of the author

Komyoji Rock Garden courtesy of Urashimataro, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Komyoji_Rock_Garden.jpg

Power, Practice, and Peace logo courtesy of the author

 

Copyright 2020, 2024 by Mark Robert Frank


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