De. Tach. Ment.

Detachement is a sufficient condition for LSAT success: If you are Detached from the LSAT, your score will break into the 99th percentile.

Sufficient                      Necessary

Detachment------------>172+

It is a sufficient and necessary condition for Peace of Mind: If you have Peace of Mind, you are Detached; and vice versa.

Sufficient                      Necessary

PoM--------------------->Detachment

Detachment------------>PoM

Here, we will ignore the Merriam-Webster definition and focus more on the Buddhist meaning (please forgive this link; I normally avoid referencing something so poorly defined...it'll have to do for now).

Detachment is a place where caring happens beyond sentimentality. It’s not apathetic or uninterested; and in no way does it resemble callousness. In thinking about how Detachment’s application might look, it may seem to be a cold, idle thing, but it is actually rife with empathy and action.

If the student can toe the subtle line between caring and attaching, s/he will be able to study LSAT skills with a single mindedness found more often in buddhas and saints.

So, how does a student go about getting some Detachment?

I don’t’ know.

Really. I don’t.

I’m writing about Detachment the way Jules Verne wrote about visiting the moon. I can imagine it, and it’s possible—I even have some vague idea about what mechanics might be involved—but as far as making it happen, I haven’t the foggiest.

Since I have no idea how an LSAT student can add Detachment to his/her arsenal of LSAT skills, I opt for examining a small group of people that have a pretty good handle on Detachment.

(Well done if you caught that fallacy; a person cannot have a “handle on” Detachment. One having a “handle on” a thing is a form of attaching oneself to that thing—attaching oneself to Detachment is like feeling a frictionless object…or having Batman ever beat Superman in a fight outside of the Batman-biased authors' books. Enough.)

Where were we? Ah, yes. Senseis, Roshis, and the caricature of the wise old woman or man:

Detachment, rather than being a goal, or something one gets, is really more of a byproduct. A byproduct of aging gracefully; a byproduct of counting inhalations and exhalations with consistency; a byproduct of putting on socks in the morning without internally sweating about what the upcoming workday holds. But how does such a byproduct come out of socks and breathing? 

Once more, I haven’t a damn clue. But then again, I don’t know how a byproduct of drinking is uninhibited honesty. Yet whenever a friend and I go out "for some drinks," drinking, with uninterrupted regularity, takes a backseat to soul-coughing.

So it is with Detachment. If the goal is to sit quietly, come what may, then a byproduct, for whatever reason, is some level of Detachment. If the goal is to study the LSAT for the sake of mastery, then the sentimentality of achieving 172+ fades and is replaced with an intense care for learning how to predict correct answers before seeing the choices. 

And finally, Peace of Mind and the far more coveted 172+ are byproducts of the byproduct Detachment. There are other ways to get a 172, but I have yet to see, hear, experience, or read of another way to attain Peace of Mind.