“The emperor of the South Sea was called Shu, the emperor of the North Sea was called Hu, and the emperor of the center was called Hundun (渾沌). Shu and Hu happened to meet in the land of Hundun, and since Hundun treated them very generously, Shu and Hu discussed how to repay Hundun’s kindness. They said that everyone has seven openings for seeing, hearing, eating, and breathing, but Hundun alone has none, so they would try boring the openings. They bored one opening each day, and after seven days Hundun died.”
In the last chapter of the Inner Chapters of Zhuangzi, “Fit for Emperors and Kings,” there is this short story about Hundun. The line that Hundun died when they bored openings into him is usually interpreted as a warning not to define chaos according to the frame (framework) of our own thinking. Perhaps it also means to leave chaos as it is.
Chaos (Hundun) can be encountered in many areas: business, organizational management, human relationships, development architecture, and so on. Unlike Zhuangzi’s thinking, we can’t leave chaos alone, for various reasons. To understand the chaos we can’t understand, many disciplines and methodologies were born, and through them we solve various problems. Many of the methodologies developed today are abstracted in several layers, which makes it feel as if chaos can be solved easily.
People with a certain amount of experience each carry their own framework in their hearts. That elaborate frame, usually built from the person’s rich experience and trial and error, may have worked well on previous problems, but it may not be valid for other problems. The previous chaos and the new chaos were different. But a person who believes their framework is perfect makes the mistake of killing the chaos.
A ready-made framework simplifies difficult work. So it looks like it can be solved easily, but it may be the wrong way. Since there isn’t only one framework or methodology, we should not cling to one, but learn several approaches and perspectives and be able to accept other people’s opinions. And when we discover a new chaos, we should analyze and break it down from various angles and work through it empirically.
As in Zhuangzi’s story, not being able to see, hear, eat, or breathe may not be the real problem of chaos. Even if it takes a little more time and effort, let’s try to understand the chaos by discussing and verifying various approaches. Then I think we can someday solve the real problem that the chaos was holding.
