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One Who Is Not Busy

Once when Yunyan was sweeping the ground, Daowu said, “Busy, busy!”
Yunyan said, “You should know that there’s someone who isn’t busy.”
“If that’s the case, there’s a second moon.”
Yunyan held up his broom and asked, “Which moon is this?”
Daowu remained silent and left.

—Book of Serenity Case 21

When I watch myself doing what I know is not in my best interests, who is watching and who is being watched? Is it the same me as the one who is unskillfully doing whatever he is doing? Or are they different? The opening lines of the Heart Sutra come to mind, 

Form is emptiness, Emptiness is form. Form is exactly emptiness, Emptiness exactly form. The same is true of feeling and perception. The same is true of memory and consciousness. 

The one watching is exactly the one being watched, the one being watched is exactly the one watching. That doesn’t make sense, but then neither does life. How do we respond to that?

When Yunyan responds to Daowu’s comment about being busy by saying, “You should know that there is one who is not busy,” it sounds as if Yunyan is chiding Daowu for not appreciating that there is one who is not busy—he should know better. In the course of their relationship, starting with practicing together with Baizhang, leaving Baizhang together, then going to practice together with Nanquan, and then leaving Nanquan together to go practice with Yaoshan; it is Daowu who again and again (and again) proves himself to be the one who knows better.

For his part, Daowu seems to be checking his friend’s understanding about the relationship between the one who is busy and the one who is not, between the one who is watching and the one who is watched. Yunyan seems to be saying that form and emptiness are separate from each other, the one who is busy and the one who is not busy are not the same. The me who is watching me is not the same me who is being watched. Responding to this, Daowu tells Yunyan that if he thinks they are different then that is the same as thinking there is a second moon.

Are they the same? Are they different? Answering either way leave you hanging on one or the other of the horns of the dilemma. Yunyan cuts through the dilemma, thrusting his broom into the air and asking, “Which moon is this?” Tossing the ball back into Daowu’s court. In response Daowu was silent and then leaves. His way of cutting through the dilemma that Yunyan presented to him.

Form and emptiness, our phenomenal self and our true self, are the same and different, not two, not one. Responding to that paradox is the integration of our practice into our life.

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—David