Especially when it comes to the self-help model, those seeking enlightenment exhibit a broad insatiability that, at least theoretically, should not exist if the books are doing what they all promise to do. Yet the self-help pantheon is full of authors who are read concurrently, and even recommend one another to the reader. If one author’s “Guide to Happiness and Fulfillment” actually works, then the reader should have no use for subsequent releases like The Companion to Happiness, Happiness 101 and, of course, The Zen of Happiness and Fulfillment. Doubtless, the true seeker of self mastery will eventually notice this contradiction, but only after a substantial investment of time and money.
The quest for self-knowledge and effectiveness is not a bootless one, however. And many current self-help gurus have got a thing or two right (taking, as they do, stab after stab after stab). Their flaw has merely been to look in the wrong place for a model.
Consider:
Who feels “in the zone” all the time?
Who never hesitates or doubts himself?
Who always know what to do next?
For whom is every day a “good” day?
Answer: A zombie.
In charting the path to self-knowledge, too many authors have made the error of the pathetic fallacy. That is to say, they have assumed that the outside of something must reflect what the inside is like. That people’s bodies reflect their souls. That a dirty, rotten, but nonetheless animated, corpse has nothing to tell the world about a vibrant inner-life.
Yet counterexamples abound.
Physically ugly people often have very beautiful souls and are wonderful on the inside. Beautiful and handsome people can prove to be morally ugly and spiritually spoiled. Zombies, who frequently induce vomiting on sight (or smell), are the most important creatures of all when you need a spiritual guide.
Other self-help authors often encourage their readers to adopt physical fitness regimes under the misguided notion that they will “feel good about themselves when they feel good about their bodies.” Zombies have bodies that are decomposing and broken, yet nobody feels better than a zombie.
Other gurus suggest you “make time for yourself” so you don’t get “burned out” by life. Zombies see that when you know what you want, its relentless pursuit is not a burden but a pleasure of incredible magnitude.
The same authors urge their readers to “find a balance” between “work, home, finances, and love.” Zombies are so well balanced that they don’t even understand the idea of being imbalanced by their pursuits.
In every avenue in which it is possible to do so, zombies have demonstrated the actuality of a self-help reader’s dream. They don’t hesitate, and they feel in the zone all the time. They don’t worry. They don’t tire. They don’t get intimidated. They always know what to do.
But, let’s be frank ... they look like hell. (It isn’t intentional, but it’s there.)
In our superficial society, it is apparent that even the top minds in self-help have winced at the idea that anything that looked so bad could be so good.
Dressing up (or down) as a zombie will not make you like a zombie on the inside. However, becoming like a zombie internally may lead to the adoption of some exterior zombie-traits. This should not concern or alarm you. After all, it is some of our best minds who most frequently fall short in the appearance department. One has only to remember Einstein’s general disheveledness, Godel’s inability to match shirt with tie, or Edmund Husserl’s penchant for going days without a bath, to understand that great thinking goes along with zombie-like tendencies.
As the zombie lessons of this book sink in and become more and more second nature to you, don’t be alarmed if you see slight external changes taking place. As you concentrate on life’s important aspects, vanities like makeup, hairspray, and deodorant are likely to slip your mind. Your unerring focus on your prize may override entirely your eye’s reflex to blink, giving you a zombie’s thousand-yard stare. Your greatly economized zombie-speech may result in crust around your mouth from lack of use.
These are badges of honor, to be worn accordingly.
Getting in the zombie-zone is one thing. Making it your default setting is another. By this point, you’re probably “on” most of the time. Still, there can be situations and circumstances that occasionally jar you right out of zombie mode.
Your exercise this week will involve keeping a record of things that threw you, and making notes about how to deal with them going forward.
A dieter may inexplicably fail week after week, until one day he notices that his regular Sunday stroll takes him past a cake shop. Charting a new route for his weekend saunter will likely save his waistline.
In that connection, the things that throw you out of the zombie zone, and leave you doing and saying things that aren’t very zombie-like at all, can usually be successfully countered once they are isolated. It may feel that you are sometimes just randomly moved to less-than-zombie-like behavior. However, a week of observant monitoring usually allows you to identify a cause. Steps can then be taken towards correction.
Whenever you feel yourself falling out of the zombie zone this week, stop and write it down. Note the situation, what showed that you had been jarred, and what the factors might have been. It may not happen each day. Conversely, it may happen frequently, in which case you should write down the most memorable instances.
By the end of the week, your list should look something like this:
Example One
Situation: It’s crowded today on the bus. I’m minding my own business in the back like a zombie. This one woman next to me has all these packages under her arm, a handbag, and is carrying a baby to boot. The driver takes a corner a little too fast, and suddenly she loses her balance and starts going over.
Manifestation: Before I know what I’m doing, I reach over and help. Her packages go everywhere, but she stays upright and the kid’s okay. At the next stop, I help her pick up the packages. Then I sit back down. Would a zombie do this? It doesn’t feel right.
Possible cause: Child in peril?
Example Two
Situation: Driving from work to my daughter’s recital today, this jerk rear ends me. Not too hard, but I didn’t see it coming and was totally shocked. I don’t feel like a zombie anymore. It’s like the collision has knocked it out of me.
Manifestation: I get out and we swap insurance. The damage isn’t bad, and the guy says he’s sorry and everything, but still, I can’t shake the feeling that I should have attacked the guy and eaten his brains.
Possible cause: Auto collision?
Example Three
Situation: Music critic in the local paper gives my band’s CD a bad review. Any press is good press, but I honestly thought he would like it, and I can’t decide how a zombie should respond. Do I track him down and eat his brain? Then again, zombies treat everyone the same, and if some guy at a show says we suck, I’d crack his skull open and eat his brains for sure.
Manifestation: I just ignore it and don’t say anything, but at practice I can tell that the guys have read it. We practiced like usual and everything, but they are pretty bummed.
Possible cause: Negative attention?
Now that you have compiled your own instances of going out of the zombie zone, see if the possible causes you identity are similar to the ones in the above examples. Notably, they all involve the unexpected. Each situation involves a surprise. Likely, none of the subjects have experienced these situations since beginning their zombification process.
Another thing I hope you’ll have in common with the people in these examples is that, despite their concerns, they have all passed the test and responded in a zombie-appropriate way. (You don’t always have to be feeling like a zombie to keep acting like one. If you feel you’ve been thrown out of your zone, trust your training to take over.)
Our bus-riding zombie acolyte doubts himself because he was helpful. Yet if he’s a naturally helpful person, and his goal is helping people when he can, t
hen this is one hundred percent consistent with being like a zombie. After the incident is concluded and the woman’s things are restored, he lets it go and goes back to being an energy-conserving zombie. Looks pretty good to me.
Our automobile commuter feels he’s done something wrong because his response is banal and pedestrian. He inspects the damage, swaps insurance, and receives an apology. This seems uninspired, but his goal is to get to his daughter’s recital. Continuing on after the accident would likely cause him to get flagged down, or possibly reported for leaving the scene. Though the subject considers violence a more appropriate zombie response, it would only have distracted him from his ultimate goal. A way forward may be banal and uninteresting, but if it’s also the most expeditious way, then it’s what a zombie would take.
Our rock musician also stays true to his zombihood by staying on target. A zombie who’s hot on the chase doesn’t get distracted if someone writes “zombies suck” on a wall somewhere. He doesn’t disengage the current target and go off to eat the brain of the graffiti artist. Our rocker doesn’t get distracted from his dream of topping the charts just because one reviewer didn’t like his work. He doesn’t even miss a practice. Very like a zombie.
Granted, you may have some re-reading in store if your examples involve you screaming and crying like a small child. (Whatever the situation, zombies don’t do that.) But a slight apparent diversion from your “zone” should not be cause for undue alarm.
So when in doubt, let your training up to this point take over and guide you. Trust yourself to react in a zombie-appropriate way to a situation, and chances are, you will!
Remember to stay on target.
12
The Zen of Zombie
How will you know when you’ve attained full zombihood? Will there be a signal from above like a thunderclap, or will the final change be a small one—barely perceptible even to yourself?
The answer to that question is different for each person. Yet as the exercises and lessons in this book become more and more like second nature, you will begin to come into your own as a zombie. Just as all zombies are not exactly alike, so too will disciples of the zombie find that they do not resemble one another point for point. Being a zombie is something you have to make your own. In this final week, you job is to let the zombie training take over.
Throughout history, prophets and seers have attempted to describe the experience of finally attaining nirvana or a zen-state. Their wording is often confusing though, and can run the gamut from the inane to the overly poetic. You read these accounts and you run into wording like:
“I had the realization that I was the actuality of all things, and that all things were the actuality of my reality.”
-or-
“I felt a oneness with the creator-god that flowed through me and was outside of me and yet a part of me at the same time.”
-or-
“The divine current of heavenly knowledge held me down and penetrated me repeatedly. From behind.”
Prophets of the traditional routes to a state of zen usually speak in confusing poetic generalities like this because they have to. Their deliverables of “self-knowledge,” “existential awareness,” and “divine enlightenment” are highly suspect, and usually don’t live up to people’s expectations. (Note: If you have to ask “Did I just experience enlightenment? Was that it?” then get a new guru honey, because ... Guess what? You didn’t.) Or else they are presented as riddles, which, for our purposes, we may dispense with entirely. (Could a zombie eat a brain so tasty that he himself could not finish it?)
Zombie Tip:
When does a boy become a man? When he has to.
But when does a man become a zombie? Upon the successful completion of this book, of course.
Zombie-zen, thankfully, is much more specific in its manifestations, and very easy to notice when you’ve attained it. Descriptions usually run more along the lines of:
“I found myself in a never-ending nightmarish afterlife of shreiking skinless gibberings for the goo inside of people’s heads.”
While, again, every zombie is at least a little different from other zombies, certain constants run through all who have attained zombie-zen:
Your enemies tremble in fear when you approach
You never tremble in fear
Those who oppose you understand that the only form of “negotiation” you’ll entertain is a fight to the death.
You only speak when absolutely necessary and when it furthers your goals
You treat all people equally
You don’t hold grudges or keep vendettas (which is not to say you can’t be violent generally ... in fact, it is encouraged)
You keep your cool in all situations, and make the best of all situations
You don’t have a big ego or need to be credited for your accomplishments
You are an agent of peace in the world (except when you’re, you know, attacking somebody)
Like a zombie, you stay focused and always know exactly what to do
The attainment of zombie-zen may hit you all at once, or it may be gradual. You could be walking (like a zombie) down the street one day and think to yourself, “Hey, I just noticed that everything on that checklist is true about me!” But your zombie journey does not end with the completion of this book. Rather, it begins. The end of your time as a human is a new beginning of your life as a zombie. No one can tell you what kind of zombie you’re going to be. You have to find that out for yourself.
Becoming a zombie is a unique experience that you’ll be certain to enjoy. You’ll notice improvements in all aspects of your life. Your gait may be a little choppier. Your clothing a little more tattered. Your speech slurred as a drunk’s, certainly. But you’ll also be happier, more effective, and more at peace than you’ve ever been before.
Zombie-zen is that inarticulable, mysterious sum-total of all that you have attained up to this point. And like so many transcendent experiences, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. (Especially if those “parts” are parts of people you’re having for lunch.
Zombie-zen is all about pushing your own thoughts and impulses aside and letting the zombie inside take control. (How do you know if he’s in control? Are you running amok like a berzerker cannibal barbarian out of control? Then, yeah, he’s probably holding the reins.)
Zombie-zen is a way of being, but it’s also a “be” of weighing. That is to say, you should always “be weighing” the impact of your actions as they relate to a zombie’s goals. Are you getting what you really want in a given situation? Weigh it carefully, and when the answer indicates otherwise, adjust your position accordingly.
Attaining zombie-zen calms the nagging questions and doubts in your mind. Did you ever hear the expression “peace of mind?” That’s what they’re talking about. Peace and quiet from your own pesky insecurities and concerns. When you’ve attained zombie-zen, you won’t worry about things or wonder what to do. Gone will be the nights of lying awake in bed, tossing and turning endlessly over such trivialities as:
Did I take the garbage out?
-or-
Does that bonus mean I have to file quarterly taxes—and how do I file quarterly taxes?
-or-
Might it be morally questionable to eat another man’s brain only to sate my own selfish hunger?
These concerns will pass like the insignificant gadflies they are once you attain zombie-zen.
Like the monks of old, enlightened zombies live a spartan life, but one that is nonetheless deeply rewarding. When you attain zombie-zen, you’ll no longer focus on trying to eat specific brains. Rather, you’ll slow down and focus your attention on the greater “big brain” that is the very essence of life itself. (That much said, you will continue to eat specific brains, especially if you’re a zombie.)
They say that when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. But if an actual, “living” zombie were to appear right in front of you, you wouldn’t be here right now read
ing this. You would be eaten. Thus, we must make some adjustments, and make do as we must.
Zombies do not teach us to attain their zen-like state through direct one-on-one instruction. Likewise, they do not (directly) author self-help books, open meditation clinics, or sell tickets to enthusiastic motivational lectures to be held at one of the hotels out by the airport. Instead, they teach us by example. A zombie’s actions are his lessons (when the student has become properly attuned to seeing them).
Zen Of Zombie (Zen of Zombie Series) Page 16