The State of Zero

Ho'oponopono

Hawaiian historians documented a belief that illness was caused by breaking spiritual laws and atonement was needed for this transgression. A Kahuna, healing priest, would assist by praying for forgiveness from the gods or from the person injured. Ho'oponopono is such a tradition. 

It is a Hawaiian word where no’o makes a noun into a verb, like “to”, and pono meaning “goodness, uprightness, morality, moral qualities, correct or proper procedure, excellence, well-being, prosperity”.  So Ho'oponopono is "to put to rights; to put in order or shape, correct, revise, adjust, amend, regulate, arrange, rectify”.  It is an ancient Hawaiian practice of reconciliation and forgiveness.

Others have written that hoʻoponopono is all about getting to the State of Zero, where there are zero limits, no memories no identity.  To reach this state, you must repeat this mantra over and over again, "I love you. I'm sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you." 

This praying or meditation is about taking responsibility for everyone's actions, not only your own. If one takes full responsibility for all actions, feelings, events, thoughts all around them, the focus of the problem would not be lie outside with their external reality, it would be within themselves.  Thus by healing yourself, you can heal others. We often hear, “to change our reality, we would have to change ourselves.” Getting to the zero state is that goal. This is forgiveness on the grandest scale.

So what makes the zero state so important? The etymology of zero comes from French zéro or from Venetian zero, which goes to the Italian zefiro from Arabic صفر, ṣafira and symbolizes "it was empty", ṣifr = "zero", "nothing".   "How can nothing, as symbolized by zero, be something?"

Emptiness

Zero is the pivotal point around which many things circulate.   It is the empty set.  It is the state of all possibility. The Dalai Lama says you must realize the emptiness of inherent existence before you may go on to higher levels; those of the subtlest form, innate mind of clear light where all "energy and mental processes are withdrawn or dissolved", so that all that what appears to the mind is "pure emptiness". Emptiness is “the creative Void”. It is the state of complete receptivity and perfect enlightenment, the merging of the
"ego with its own essence", which Buddhists call the "clear light".  

Taoism says this state of emptiness creates stillness and placidity that is the "mirror of the universe".  In the Tao Te Ching, emptiness is related to the "Tao, the Great Principle, the Creator and Sustainer of everything in the universe".  This still mind is that of the sage and it becomes the “mirror of heaven and earth, the glass of all things” and the "pure mind"; heaven on earth.

Through forgiveness and the state of zero, you can reach the empty set of all possibility and create heaven on earth, enlightenment, nirvana. Isn’t that what the Passion Play, the story of Easter, is all about?  Clearing the slate clean of past wrong doing; atonement, resurrection; “that He was buried; that He rose to life again on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures” and generated a world of all possibility?

Moving into the Light

"The boss drives people; the leader coaches them. 

The boss depends on authority; the leader on good will. 

The boss inspires fear; the leader inspires enthusiasm. 

The boss says I; The leader says WE. 

The boss fixes the blame for the breakdown; the leader fixes the breakdown. 

The boss says, GO; the leader says Lets GO! "

 - H. Gordon Selfridge

Enthusiasm, passion, is the sixth rule for The Art of the Possible. It’s about spreading that spark of possibility to others through your own passion. It’s also called enrollment, and is core to the concept of generating possibility. One of my mentors always told me to, “help others find their project in your project” and I’ve always worked toward that advice. The active ingredient in the formula for creating better possibilities is the fire of passion BUT the best way to extinguish that flame is with fear.

So what do you do if you find yourself entrenched in a culture that breeds fear?

How do you practice enrollment where people will see you as a willing participant for whatever ideation arises without feeling like they are being pressured into seeing things your way, or fighting with them to do what you want them to do? A company's worst enemy is not always the competition. Most of the time it's the fear that lives within its own walls. When leadership is not transparent and peoples’ basic needs are being threatened, fear, anxiety, impatience, and agitation are the behaviors that ensue. Basic psychology tells us that fear is a vicious cycle that starts with worrying thoughts, then moves to anxious feelings, then to fearful emotions and back to worry and so on. How can passion survive in the midst of this storm?

It can’t.  The cycle of fear has to be broken first. The feelings of anxiety and fear are inevitable consequences and nothing can change those, but the one thing you can control is… the worrying thoughts that create those feelings.  

Thich Hnat Hanh says to lean into the pointy edge of the sword.  You have to move through the pain and the fear to get to the other side.  When you ‘feel the fear’ but take action, you then find that fear and anxiety will vanish. You start with the one thing you can control; your thoughts – worry. 

There is a simple assessment tool that you can use which my coach teaches.  It’s the human emotions-needs assessment.  Worry or anxiety is often coupled with other basic emotions.  Mindfulness will help you identify those emotions and once you’ve done that you must align that with the basic list of human needs that are not being met. 

You then can advocate for your needs as part of your journey through painful emotion.  You can also reframe your thoughts. Once you reframe your thoughts about a particular situation, you will experience more realistic emotions about it.  And, if you discover that the source of worry or anxiety doesn’t lie within your sphere of influence or really isn’t relevant then you can work to eliminate them.  Dr. Joe Dispenza, from Create Your Day, tells people to simply focus your awareness on that fearful thought and say, “change.”   But, find a positive word that works for you.  That word acts a reference point for awareness and allows you to redirect your focus. This again is another example of mindfulness and about being in the now. In the Now, there are no unpleasant feelings.

This act of self-love or self-generosity breaks the fear cycle and enables you to create a spark. With this spark, you will generate enrollment or passion. The first step is to present yourself as a willing participant in a greater vision.  Making a passionate offer comes next, followed by the belief that other people are just as excited about the possibility as you are and embrace the first follower as an equal. Derek Sivers talks about ‘Starting a Movement’ in his three minute TED Talk which I mentioned in my last blog.  It is included here:

… First, of course you know, a leader needs the guts to stand out and be ridiculed. But what he’s doing is so easy to follow. So here’s his first follower with a crucial role; he’s going to show everyone else how to follow. Now, notice that the leader embraces him as an equal. So, now it’s not about the leader anymore; it’s about them, plural. Now, there he is calling to his friends. Now, if you notice that the first follower is actually an underestimated form of leadership in itself. It takes guts to stand out like that. The first follower is what transforms a lone nut into a leader.

…And here comes a second follower. Now it’s not a lone nut, it’s not two nuts — three is a crowd, and a crowd is news. So a movement must be public. It’s important to show, not just to the leader, but the followers, because you find that new followers emulate the followers, not the leader.

Now, here come two more people, and immediately after, three more people.
Now we’ve got momentum. This is the tipping point. Now we’ve got a movement.  So, notice that, as more people join in, it’s less risky. So those that were sitting on the fence before, now have no reason not to. They won’t stand out, they won’t be ridiculed, but they will be part of the in-crowd if they hurry. So, over the next minute, you’ll see all of those that prefer to stick with the crowd because eventually they would be ridiculed for not joining in. And that’s how you make a movement.

But let’s recap some lessons from this. So first, if you are the type, like the shirtless dancing guy that is standing alone, remember the importance of nurturing your first few followers as equals so it’s clearly about the movement, not you. Okay, but we might have missed the real lesson here. The biggest lesson, if you noticed — did you catch it? — is that leadership is over-glorified. That, yes, it was the shirtless guy who was first, and he’ll get all the credit, but it was really the first follower that transformed the lone nut into a leader. 

So, as we’re told that we should all be leaders, that would be really ineffective. If you really care about starting a movement, have the courage to follow and show others how to follow. And when you find a lone nut doing something great, have the guts to be the first one to stand up and join in.”

By aligning your interests with those of others under a grander umbrella vision, you will enroll other people into your passion and generate that spark and momentum, you can capture the power of possibility and create stronger relationships along the way.  There’s a song by Peter Gabriel that I like to quote that summarizes this entire blog into five simple lines:

 

Universe of Possibility

Fourteen Black Paintings

From the pain come the dream
From the dream come the vision
From the vision come the people
From the people come the power
From this power come the change