I. Definition
nihilism: 1 a : a viewpoint that traditional values and beliefs are unfounded and that existence is senseless and useless b : a doctrine that denies any objective ground of truth and especially of moral truths
zen: Buddhist doctrine that enlightenment can be attained through direct intuitive insight
Nihilism believes there is no truth.
Zen is a truth that cannot be expressed; only experienced.
In other words, Nihilism is the gun and Zen is the bullet.
Your mind is the trigger.
II. The Credo
1) Life has no meaning
2) All meanings equal zero
3) Therefore, everything you do is the most important thing you will ever do
III. The Rules
Here are the rules.
I write the book. The words are mine. The truths expressed here are only truths to me. And the truth changes, day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute, second by second.
At the same time, the person I am changes with the truth. That means, what is true on one page, may not be true on another. Minute by minute. Second by second.
I do not know where I am going. No one does. Not even as I type these words. Who I am at any moment can change. From page to page, from paragraph to paragraph, from sentence to sentence, from word to word.
Any second now.
You cannot read truth. You cannot watch it. You cannot observe it. You must experience it for yourself. There is no other way.
The gun is now in your hands.
The bullet is in the chamber.
Your finger is on the trigger.
IV. Self Hurt
Ours is a culture obsessed with comfort and distraction. We seek comfort to ease our physical ills and distraction to ease our mental ones.
We get up in the morning to the sound of an alarm or the sound of music. Instantly, we turn on the TV or the radio. We watch the TV as we drink our morning coffee. We listen to the radio as we shower. We listen to the radio as we drive to work. We listen to the radio as we work. We listen to the radio on the way to lunch. We listen to the radio on the way home. We watch TV as we make dinner. We watch TV as we eat dinner. We watch TV after dinner. We watch TV as we get ready for bed. We watch TV as we fall asleep.
We are never alone. We are always with the TV and the radio.
Why?
What happens when you turn them off?
You start to think. Think about your worthless, pathetic, boring life.
Why in the world would you ever want to think about your worthless, pathetic, boring life?
V. The Hoax
I am wearing a yellow shirt.
No, I’m not. The shirt I wear reflects the color yellow back to me. Color exists only in my own senses. Dogs cannot see color because their eyes cannot see it.
I want you to come with me to the world of Minus Seven. On this world, the inhabitants do not have people-eyes, they have dog-eyes. For these people, the term “color” does not exist. It never existed. It will never exist. The concept of creating color TV screens will never occur to them. They will never know a Ted Turner who colorizes black-and-white movies because there is no color.
That is the great tragedy of Minus Seven. They will never know color.
Not the color of a rose, not the color of a Coke bottle, not the color of a happy blueberry iBook, not the color of my yellow shirt.
Moreso, no Minusian scientist can ever “discover” color.
Work that one through your brain. “Discovering color.” And you thought color always existed, didn’t you? You took it for granted. Never once considered that it couldn’t exist. Never once considered having to explain color to someone who was born blind?
How can he? How can he discover something that never existed? What’s more, what purpose does color serve? They can’t see it! They can’t even create goggles that allow them to see color because they’re eyes would just interpret the color as shades of gray. In order for them to see color, the Minusians would have to rip out their eyes and put in new mechanical eyes.
And you get giddy thinking about a pacemaker.
And in order for the Minusians to even consider making those goggles, they have to first come up with the concept that color even exists outside their own limited spectrum.
And that is where we come to the point.
People do not consider that anything exists outside their own experience.
Watch a plane crash on television.
That’ll never happen to me.
Watch starving children on television.
That’ll never happen to me.
Watch a man and woman gunned down for their wallet and purse.
That’ll never happen to me.
We have been brainwashed into accepting a complacent experience. We do not consider anything that occurs outside our front door. Instead, we watch Jerry Springer and Oprah and Jenny Jones and Sally and we know that everything on that show will never happen to us.
The woman who sits on her couch all day long watching television who also complains there’s not enough hours in the day to get anything done because the television has devoured any drive to succeed or evolve out of her brain and body.
Nothing in the world happens to us until it happens to us. And then, it’s too late. We are trained to wait for experience, instead of walking out our front door and snatching experience from the jaws of a hungry world.
We are colorblind.
But there’s a surgery that allows us to fix that.
All you have to do is pull the trigger.