Nothing Happens Next

One of the earliest of Zen-themed cartoons is still one of the funniest and most poignant. It was drawn by Gahan Wilson in the 1970s. It shows the wizened Master and his disciple sitting side by side on their cushions. The pupil looks somewhat bewildered, and the Master is obviously responding to his question. The caption reads, “Nothing happens next. This is it.” Thirty years after I first read those words—in the New Yorker, or was it Playboy?—they still make me smile.

The humor of the student’s situation springs from the disjunction between his expectations and the reality of his situation. We can guess, for instance, that the disciple has been told merely to sit up straight and still. He is perplexed because he is expecting further instructions. He is expecting to be given more to do.

Moreover, he probably supposes that, when he begins to “meditate,” things will be different. Something will happen in the way of transformation for the better. Instead, he finds himself smack dab in the middle of his ordinary experience, with nothing to distract him but his thoughts. For many of us, when we are sitting still voluntarily for the first time, we become suddenly aware of the sheer volume and intensity of “inner” events, and it seems to us as if we are going mad. Or else we are gripped by an almost irresistible urge to flee, and our restlessness provokes the defensive reaction of profound boredom. “Surely,” we think, “they can’t expect us to just sit here like this, with no objective and nothing to occupy us!” We wonder why anyone would waste her time in such a way. Our situation begins to look like a kind of joke in itself.

Something always happens next, of course, but it is not necessarily what we want. Beginners are vexed because, so long as we follow the simple rules of zazen, we can’t control what happens next. We can’t even control our own thoughts! That is the first, terrible lesson.