Who Are You?

41. 누구냐 너

41. “Who Are You?”

“Close your eyes and look.” This was the instruction that Ven. Chwasan gave as guided seated meditation.

“Huh?”

“That means open the eye of your mind,” he said with a patient stare.

When I sit up straight and close my eyes, I can more clearly experience the sounds, smells, textures, tastes, and thoughts that visit “me.”

“I” am currently sitting at Gregory’s Coffee on 7th Street in Manhattan, taking a sip of coffee and closing my eyes. “I” am stimulated by all the conversations that are taking place around me, the sound of music, the scent of coffee, the cool breeze from the air conditioner, and the bitter Americano swirling on my tongue.

I’m also observing the thoughts that ceaselessly visit my mind. There is the “I” who sees, the “I” who hears, the “I” who smells, the “I” who tastes, the “I” who touches, and the “I” who thinks.

I told Lee that he should keep track of the number of times he feels anger rising up inside of him and write in detail about those feelings. As it happened, he ended up taking a business trip around that time and he said he achieved some peace of mind simply from being far away from the people who were causing him such grief.

But upon his return, the war started again.

“Why play the ghost leg game if you’re just going to take my money? Those bastards.”

“Just seeing his face makes me sick.”

“I wish someone would put a zipper on that guy’s mouth.”

“Don’t tell me you’re working when you’re just messing around, you so-and-so.”

“Why does that so-and-so keep notifying me of decisions without consulting me in advance?”

“So that dimwit goes on vacation and that’s it?”

And so on and so forth. Lee didn’t hesitate to bare all sides of himself as he spilled out these excretions of the mind with a mixture of anger and invective.

However, now he was able to look at his feelings the moment he experienced anger rather than helplessly allowing himself to be dragged around by it. Not only that, but since he had gained the freedom to write it all down, he had taken the first step in the practice of checking the mind—whether he realized it or not.

But perhaps he found writing down every instance to have been a hassle, because I didn’t hear anything more about it. So I provided him with an incantation that he could use easily and immediately instead: “Who are you?”

In the movie Oldboy, the main character Oh Dae-su is someone who simply lives his life for today. One rainy day, he is kidnapped and locked up in a room just over 20 square meters (215 ft2) in area.

He spends the next 15 years of his life being tormented without knowing why, given only fried dumplings to eat. In his first telephone conversation with the man who put him in such a terrible state, Oh grunts, “Who are you?”

So, every time Lee felt anger rising up, he was to bellow at it as if he were a gatekeeper guarding a castle. When he noticed his anger and shouted, “Who are you?” that flimsy anger would instantly pop like a bubble.

But there was also the danger that the anger Lee felt would come back stronger if the painful memories were reawakened when he saw the people he despised or heard their mocking words. He needed one more trick to avoid being caught up in it. So I told him that he needed to try to hang his mind within the elixir field.

How would it affect his anger as he focused on his elixir field, asked the question “Who are you?” and kept a diary of his feelings? I was interested to find out.