To know

the masculine and yet

cleave to the feminine is to be the

womb for the world. Being the womb for

the world, never departing from the

eternal power of tao, you

become like an infant

once again:

 immortal. 

 

To know

the bright and yet

hold to the dull is to be

an example for the world. 

Being the example for the world, 

not deviating from the everlasting

power of tao, you return to

the infinite once again: 

limitless. 

 

To know

honor and yet keep

to humility is to be the valley

for the world. Being the valley for

the world, rich with the primal power

of tao, you return once again to simplicity, 

like uncarved wood. Allow tao to carve

you into a vessel for tao. Then you

can serve the world without

mutilating

it. 

 

from The Tao te Ching of Lao Tzu,

Chapter 28

 

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the lil’ bit late, immortally great dean potter

 

Walk on air

against your better

judgment.

 

Seamus Heaney

 

A day

so happy. Fog lifted

early, I worked in the garden.

Hummingbirds were stopping over

honeysuckle flowers. There was no thing

on earth I wanted to possess. I knew no one

worth my envying him. Whatever evil I had

suffered, I forgot. To think that once I was

the same man did not embarrass me.

In my body I felt no pain. When

straightening up, I saw the

blue sea and

sails.

 

Czeslaw Milosz

 

tina alabama

 

Frankly speaking,

you simply must manage

to keep concentrating even in the midst

of clamor and tumult, acting as though there were not

a single thing happening, penetrating all the way through from

the heights to the depths. You must become perfectly complete,

without any shapes or forms at all, without wasting effort,

yet not inhibited from acting. Whether you speak

or stay silent, whether you get up

or lie down, it is never

anyone else.

 

Yuanwu

 

now get funkier

 

The world is

full of half-enlightened masters.

Overly clever, too “sensitive” to live in the real

world, they surround themselves with selfish pleasures and

bestow their grandiose teachings upon the unwary. Prematurely

publicizing themselves, intent upon reaching some spiritual

climax, they constantly sacrifice the truth and deviate

from the Tao. What they really offer

the world is their own

confusion.

 

The true master

understands that enlightenment

is not the end, but the means. Realizing that

virtue is her goal, she accepts the long and

often arduous cultivation that is

necessary to attain

it.

 

She doesn’t

scheme to become a leader,

but quietly shoulders whatever

responsibilities fall to her. Unattached

to her accomplishments, taking credit for

nothing at all, she guides the whole world by

guiding the individuals who come to her. She

shares her divine energy with her students,

encouraging them, creating trials to

strengthen them, scolding them to

awaken them, directing the

streams of their lives

toward the infinite

ocean of the

Tao.

 

If you

aspire to this

sort of mastery, then

root yourself in the Tao.

Relinquish your negative habits

and attitudes. Strengthen your sincerity.

Live in the real world, and extend your virtue

to it without discrimination in the daily round.

Be the truest father or mother, the truest brother

or sister, the truest friend, and the truest disciple.

Humbly respect and serve your teacher, and

dedicate your entire being unwaveringly

to self-cultivation. Then you will surely

achieve self-mastery and be able

to help others in doing

the same.

 

from Hua hu Ching, Chapter 80

 

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Hua hu Ching, and Art of War for

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book.