Wisdom is not knowing but being. The Christian mystics instructed seekers to enter the Cloud of Unknowing with a trusting heart. The wise heart is not one that understands everything - it is the heart that can tolerate the truth of not knowing. Wisdom comes alive in the presence of the mystery, when the heart is open, sensitive, wholly receptive. Out of this simple presence, empathy, love, responsiveness, all good things are born.
A Hindu teacher describes how, as he grew older, he came to trust not in knowledge but in love.
I have let go of the need to know so much. What we can know is so small - the holiness around is so large. Now I trust in simplicity and love.
My teacher Ajahn Chah would often respond to people's questions, plans, and ideas with a smile and say, "Mai Neh." The phrase means, " It is uncertain, isn't it?" He understood the wisdom of uncertainty, the truth of change, and was comfortable in their midst.
A Sufi master told me:
The most surprising thing about the process of spiritual opening is how unexpected it become. I had studied the sacred texts for years, but I never knew what as coming next. Powerful experiences would come; new possibilities beyond my knowing and beliefs would sweep over me. I learned that experience is never know we think it will be. Understanding this is real wisdom.
The truth is, we don't know. Not the Pope, not the Chief Rebbe of Jerusalem, not even your mother can know what will happen tomorrow. And neither can we. We just don't know.
Korean Zen Master Seung Sahn trains his students to dwell in what he calls "don't know mind." He will demand of them: Who are you? Where is your mind? What is consciousness? Where did you come from? each time the students will say, "I don't know." "Now deep this don't know mind!" he will say. Rest in it, trust it. As with the Cloud of Unknowing or the "unlearning" of the Tao, wisdom grows by opening to the truth of not knowing.
- Jack Kornfield, After the Ecstasy, the Laundry:
How the Heart Grows Wise on the Spiritual Path
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