BOOK CLUB: Zen & The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Part III (Patreon)

[Pictured: Hyalite Peaks, south of Bozeman, Montana]

This is a discussion thread to post quotes and feelings and thoughts on the third part of Zen & The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

This portion of the book is the longest of the four. If you haven't finished it, no worries! Come here when you're done to participate. I'll still be reading and responding. 

What's more, these threads will be open in perpetuity! They can function as a checkmarks in a pilgrimage for any Patrons to embark on at any time. If you're starting late, or a slow reader, or don't have the time to keep up with this pace, just tune into the thread when you get to that part. It's ok, we will still be here! 

Now, for quotations and quandaries and quarrels and Quality.

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"Quality is a characteristic of thought and statement that is recognized by a nonthinking process. Because definitions are a product of rigid, formal thinking, quality cannot be defined... But even though Quality cannot be defined, you know what Quality is!"  (p. 209)

"Squareness may be succinctly and yet thoroughly defined as an inability to see quality before it's been intellectually defined" (p. 222)

Why should Quality be just what you like? Why should "what you like'' be "just"? What did  "just'' MEAN in this case? When separated out like this for independent examination it became apparent that "just" in this case really didn't mean a damn thing. It was a purely pejorative term, whose logical contribution to the sentence was nil. Now, with that word removed, the sentence became "Quality is what you like," and its meaning was entirely changed. It had become an innocuous truism. (p. 237)

Romantic Quality was the present, the here and now of things. Classic Quality was always concerned with more than just the present. The relation of the present to the past and future was always considered. (p. 254)

"What I mean (and everybody else means) by the word quality cannot be broken down into subjects and predicates. This is not because Quality is so mysterious but because Quality is so simple, immediate and direct." (p. 256)

When you live in the shadow of insanity, the appearance of another mind that thinks and talks as yours does is something close to a blessed event. (p. 267)

The preselection of facts is not based on subjective, capricious "whatever you like" but on Quality, which is reality itself... It is NOT capricious, it is the force that opposes capriciousness" (p. 275)

"...care and Quality are internal and external aspects of the same thing. A person who sees Quality and feels it as he work sis a person who cares. A person who cares about what he sees and does is a person who's bound to have some characteristics of Quality." (p. 283)

Quality is the Buddha. Quality is scientific reality. Quality is the goal of Art. (p. 284)

"That's what caring really is, a feeling of identification with what one's doing. When one has this feeling then he also sees the inverse side of caring, Quality itself." (p. 305)

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I keep pulling thesis quotes for clarity and posterity but I also very much enjoy the character development through this portion, as well as the critiques of Phaedrus's galaxy braining by the narrator.

First of all I should say that I don't know whether Phædrus' claim that Quality is the Tao is true... he may not have completely understood what Quality was. Or, more likely, he may not have understood the Tao. He certainly was no sage. And there's plenty of advice for sages in that book he would have done well to heed. (p. 263)

Now, whenever you're at this checkpoint, whoever you are:

Express your Objective Thoughts and Subjective Feelings down below, both essential components of reality!