I watched the movie Dreamer last night. It’s about the story of a horse trainer Ben Crane and his horse “Sonia” – short for Soñador (Spanish for “dreamer”). A story of entangled broken dreams for greatness both of men and horses, it’s very “hollywoodian” in its effort to turn the tables around: how the innocence and impudence of Ben's daughter Cale Crane played by my favorite Dakota Fanning, wins over the cunning and corruption of men. As I continued to reflect on the message of the film today, I found something from my old notes which deepens its effect on me. This is from Zen and Motorcycle Maintenance (the modern version of the horse?) by R. Pirsig, a book I read ages ago.
“Any effort that has self-glorification as its final endpoint is bound to end in disaster…. When you try to climb a mountain to prove how big you are, you almost never make it. And even if you do, it’s a hollow victory. In order to sustain the victory you have to prove yourself again and again in some other way, and again and again and again, driven forever to fill a false image, haunted by the fear that the image is not true and someone will find out. That’s never the way.
Phaedrus wrote a letter from India about a pilgrimage to holy Mount Kaila, the source of the Ganges and the abode of Shiva, high in the Himalayas, in the company of a holy man and his adherents. He never reached the mountain. After the third day, he gave up exhausted and the pilgrimage went on without him. He said he had the physical strength but that physical strength was not enough. He had the intellectual motivation but that wasn’t enough either. He didn’t think he had been arrogant but thought that he was undertaking the pilgrimage to broaden his experience, to gain understanding for himself. He was trying to use the mountain for his own purposes. And the pilgrimage too. He regarded himself as the fixed entity, not the pilgrimage or the mountain, and thus wasn’t ready for it. He speculated that the other pilgrims, the ones who reached the mountain, probably sensed the holiness of the mountain so intensely that each footstep was an act of devotion, an act of submission to this holiness. The holiness of the mountain infused into their own spirits, enabled them to endure far more than anything he, with his greater physical strength, could take.”
This is somehow the same message as the one gleaned from the movie mentioned above. Only when Ben Crane allowed his love (the holy mountain?) for his daughter Cale take-over that he was able to free himself from egoistic pursuits and face the Breeder’s Championship with fun and freedom! With success as a plus!!!
“Any effort that has self-glorification as its final endpoint is bound to end in disaster…. When you try to climb a mountain to prove how big you are, you almost never make it. And even if you do, it’s a hollow victory. In order to sustain the victory you have to prove yourself again and again in some other way, and again and again and again, driven forever to fill a false image, haunted by the fear that the image is not true and someone will find out. That’s never the way.
Phaedrus wrote a letter from India about a pilgrimage to holy Mount Kaila, the source of the Ganges and the abode of Shiva, high in the Himalayas, in the company of a holy man and his adherents. He never reached the mountain. After the third day, he gave up exhausted and the pilgrimage went on without him. He said he had the physical strength but that physical strength was not enough. He had the intellectual motivation but that wasn’t enough either. He didn’t think he had been arrogant but thought that he was undertaking the pilgrimage to broaden his experience, to gain understanding for himself. He was trying to use the mountain for his own purposes. And the pilgrimage too. He regarded himself as the fixed entity, not the pilgrimage or the mountain, and thus wasn’t ready for it. He speculated that the other pilgrims, the ones who reached the mountain, probably sensed the holiness of the mountain so intensely that each footstep was an act of devotion, an act of submission to this holiness. The holiness of the mountain infused into their own spirits, enabled them to endure far more than anything he, with his greater physical strength, could take.”
This is somehow the same message as the one gleaned from the movie mentioned above. Only when Ben Crane allowed his love (the holy mountain?) for his daughter Cale take-over that he was able to free himself from egoistic pursuits and face the Breeder’s Championship with fun and freedom! With success as a plus!!!
