Even though it’s midsummer here in Boulder, Colorado – with temperatures ranging from 80-100 Fahrenheit, so not a snowman in sight -- somewhere on the planet (the North Pole, perhaps?) this metaphoric exploration will be of more immediate relevance … and the rest of us, I trust, can simply use our imaginations ...

Building A Snowman

Imagine, then, a gently snowy day: a slow infinity of crystalline flakes descending from an overcast sky, gathering, swirling and drifting.


Several hours later, when there’s a foot or so on the ground, you decide to go out and enjoy this winter wonderland in a more directly interactive way. So you don your goose-down jacket, lace up your boots, pull on your warm wool cap, and head outside.

Finding the snow just wet enough to be perfectly packable, you think: I’ll build a snowman! So you pack together, between your hands, a small snowball, then roll it along the ground until it becomes large enough to be used as the snowman’s hips and legs. Another small snowball, rolled, becomes the snowman’s medium-sized trunk. And then, finally, stacked on the very top, a smallish rolled snowball becomes the snowman’s head. Voila!

Satisfied, you sit down to enjoy your creation. It’s still snowing, so after a while smallish snowdrifts begin to accumulate on your snowman’s head and shoulders. You wonder: should I brush them off, or just see what new shape emerges, as the sky continues to snow? Feeling a bit chilly, and in the mood for some hot chocolate, you decide on the latter, and head inside.

Who's Doing What?

At this point (while sipping your hot chocolate and gazing, with fondness, out the window at your recent snow-sculpture) you might wonder:

Did you as a human bodymind create the storm whose clouds produced the snow? And you'd probably answer: Not in any obvious way.

Did you as a human bodymind control the pattern and rate with which the snowflakes fell? Not in any obvious way.

Did you as a human bodymind control the shape and size of the snowman you created out of the snowflakes that fell in your yard? This would seem to be the case.

Did you as a human bodymind have a choice re: whether or not to brush off the newly-fallen snow, from the snowman’s shoulders? This, also, would seem to be the case.

Cultivating A Bodymind

The appearance of thoughts (both words and internal images) within the field of our awareness is similar, in a way, to the appearance of snowflakes in our yard during a winter storm: they just flutter in, from who knows where. Clearly we – as a human bodymind -- do not, as an act of egoic volition, choose all of these thoughts. After all, if we were able to choose them all, we would probably choose to have only tender, happy and inspiring thoughts – but this is not how it is. Instead, there within the mix of tender, happy and inspiring thoughts are fearful, angry, depressed, confused and just downright silly thoughts. You can verify this for yourself. Is it not the case that your mind seems, as it were, to “have a mind of its own”?!

The good news is that: (1) we don’t have to experience full volitional control over our thoughts (something which clearly is impossible), in order to fully appreciate them all; and (2) in the same way that we can shape at least certain of the snowflakes into a snowman, we can sculpt, shape and creatively influence our thinking processes, in certain ways. In other words: while we as a bodymind we do not control all of our thoughts, we have at least apparent control over some of them – and this can be a source of great joy and freedom: it's part of the play of a human bodymind! 

Consider, also, your human bodymind itself as being a bit like a snowman: a joint creation of sky and clouds and a spark of creativity. Moment by moment, crystalline flakes are falling – and moment by moment we have a hand in shaping them in this way or that. At least to some extent, we can indeed cultivate our human body and mind, in much the same way that we can create a snowman out of the snow that has fallen in our yard.

We also have a hand in cultivating the bodies and minds of so-called "others." A mother breast-feeds her newborn. You share a new idea with a friend, over tea. A massage therapist "sculpts" the bodies of his/her clients. A kind word to the grocery-store clerk brightens his/her mind.

The Sun Of Awareness

As Pure Awareness, the Mind of Tao – the sky’s luminous emptiness – we are, most essentially, the unlimited source of it all. As a bodymind, our range of apparent influence is limited, but not completely inexistent.

In the dance of the ten-thousand-things, subjective mind and objective world arise interdependently, from the womb of the Tao. Part of this play is the appearance of volitional action. Another part of the play is the flow of wuwei: non-volitional action.

Eventually – when the clouds disperse, the sun comes out, and the temperature rises – the snowman melts. This bodymind, also, will eventually dissolve, within the sun of awareness. (And moment by moment an infinity of mini-dissolutions and resurrections are happening!) But while it’s appearing, it’s kind of fun to affix a carrot as a nose, buttons as eyes, and small gemstones as the lips and teeth of a playful smile.

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