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A risk taker, but not a foolish risk taker. The jun zi knows the score.
Proactive, but not aggressive.
And counterbalancing the risk taking, there's the certainty that comes at some point as well.
And counterbalancing the proactive capacity is the profound ability of the jun zi to ACCEPT.
Dynamic balance, based on an understanding of how things work combined with the divine guidance/inspiration that comes when you're in a state of balance.
The jun zi balances toughness and generosity.
The jun zi balances intellect, emotion and physicality. Action and non-action.
From where I'm looking, it's the dynamic balance of the jun zi that's key.
“Through anxiousness and fear sets in order and examines”, what an interesting appearance of contradiction from the expressionless and detached sage, so often depicted as this person we are allegedly working to become. This isn’t a person who hides in the background, secure in their innocence and rightness through merely holding their tongue. This is a risk taker and a proactive youth.
While I was reading LiSe text , I had the image of a stone. Detached from a big rock, an unshaped piece of rock , rolling passing through mountains, lakes, river , hit by thunder, warmed by fire day by day takes a shape.
Like the pieces of broken glass bottles we found in the sea which after a long time look like little gems
This is where we disagree on a certain point, at least I think so. For example, you say not a foolish risk taker, and yet Kan/water/29 involves foolish risks, as well as even the possibilities of obsessions and habits - what some readily refer to as "issues".
This pristine Buddha-like image we have of the Junzi is something I just do not find in the Yijing. An individualist Zen monk, perhaps.
While discussing this subject today, LiSe and I asked the Yi, what is the Junzi? 50.3,4 - 4. We both laughed and agreed, that it's a beautiful answer. This Junzi, tripping, spilling the cauldron, making mistakes, impeding his "normal" way of living for that of a sincerely seeking fool. This is the Junzi I find.
One of the things I like about this is that it potentially puts everyone in touch with their Junzi, not just the elitist few who are full of themselves and condescend to those who are perceived to be lesser informed.
I do agree with you about the balancing points, however. The Junzi isn't a wildman who fell off the deep end, but neither is he this quiet saint, he's so often portrayed as.
Dobro, my experience is that meditation is great for staying on track if you found one. Even if it is only a beginning. But for 'searching' for it, walking meditation is more effective. Every time you encounter something disturbing, you stay free from it.
About the age/experience of junzi, Hilary’s comment makes the most sense to me, that he starts out young and matures over time. But I also think there is the idea that in maturing he never loses the flexible nature of his youth. He is still willing and able to change for the better, not set fast in his ways, as most people become as they grow old. In this sense he grows ageless.
How different this is from the common way: starting out unknowing, learning through school and experience, determining “the truth”, becoming set in cement in his limited understanding, no longer able to move and grow beyond those rigid rules, he’s made for himself years ago. Thus his junzi died an early death, and now he lives on as an old man.
Stagnant water vs flowing water ?
Something can be trite common sense, but knowing it at the right moment is what turns it into wisdom. The Yi is not just saying things, it is answering. To a specific question, at a specific moment.Lindsay: Is this stuff wisdom or just trite common sense? Do we really need the Yijing to tell us such things?
And Maria: Maybe Yi’s purpose is not only to provide us information, knowledge but also to help us make the connections in our mind and transform a raw data into something meaningful. I don’t know really. A huge tangled ball of thread to me.
We can take our definition of human being from the philosophers
or we can see that human is as human does. I'll follow the latter,
and continue to see even the best of us as able to uses lots of improvement.
That the Junzi is no longer learning is an inferior thing to say.
So no- the Yi isn't telling us how to be human. It's suggesting ways
to be better than that.
A 'Jun' is a ruler, not someone learning I think. Jun Zi is a term of respect. ...
And finally I don't think Chinese are particularly interested in someone who is learning.
the Japanese mama-san and Spanish mamacita. Centuries later it became more exclusively a term of respect.
You might want to retract your statements, but that's what you said.
I think Junzi started out as an affectionate diminutive, like the Japanese mama-san and Spanish mamacita. Centuries later it became more exclusively a term of respect.
Then the folks who named Laozi made a little reflexive play on words, picking Lao to bring out the paradox of "old child" "and "venerable elder." IOW, I think Laozi's name was a gag, and yet another poke at the Confucians.
the junzi was never a religious figure, but an ethical hero.
It is true some uses of junzi in the Zhouyi portion of the text probably predate Confucius himself, but there isn't much doubt the later Daxiang's junzi and the Confucian moral hero are one and the same ideal person.
Clarity,
Office 17622,
PO Box 6945,
London.
W1A 6US
United Kingdom
Phone/ Voicemail:
+44 (0)20 3287 3053 (UK)
+1 (561) 459-4758 (US).