hexagram 23 po ☯️ splitting apart
Cogitation,
making judgements,
following patterns, firing arrows,
engaging in endless ideation and emotional
behavior — all these are to be abandoned
and transcended on the
Way.
Be still.
Do non doing.
A clear and open
state of freedom
will appear.
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like streams flowing into the sea
Nothing
under heaven is as
soft and yielding as water.
Yet for attacking the hard and
strong, nothing can
compare with
it.
The weak
overcomes the strong.
The soft overcomes the hard.
Everyone knows this, but none
have the ability to
practice it.
Therefore
the sage says: one who
accepts the dung of the nation
becomes the master of soil and sustenance.
One who deals with the evils of the
nation becomes king under
heaven.
True words seem paradoxical.
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Deluded a buddha is a being
Enlightened a being is a buddha
A foolish buddha is a being
A wise being is a buddha
A biased buddha is a being
An unbiased being is a buddha
As long as your mind is biased
The buddha dwells in a being
The moment you wake up unbiased
A being becomes a buddha
Your buddha is the real one
If you didn’t have the buddha-mind
Where would you go to find a buddha?
By even speaking a phrase to you,
I have already doused you with dirty water.
It would be even worse for me to put a twinkle in my eye
and raise my eyebrow to you, or rap on the meditation seat
or hold up a whisk, or demand, “What is this?”
As for shouting and hitting, it’s obvious
that this is just a pile of bones
on level ground.
There are also the type
who don’t know good from bad and
ask questions about Buddha and Dharma and Zen
and the Tao. They ask to be helped, they beg to be received,
they seek knowledge and sayings and theories relating to
the Buddhist teaching and to transcending the world
and to accommodating the world. This is washing
dirt in mud and washing mud in dirt —
when will they ever manage
to clear it away?
Forget the words and
embody the meaning.
The proper response
to conflict, whether it lies within or
without us, is disengagement.
Whenever we allow ourselves to be drawn off balance, away from the strength of quiet integrity, we are in conflict. It matters not whether the confrontation is between competing values in one’s own mind or with another person: it is the inner departure from clarity and equanimity that leaves us with feelings of despair and vulnerability. The only remedy is to disengage from the problem and return to quiet contemplation of what is correct.
Conflict provokes strong feelings of doubt, fear, anxiety, and impatience to resolve the situation. If you act under the influence of these inferior emotions, you will severely complicate the misfortune. By following the prescription of the Sage and returning to a position of neutrality, acceptance, and detachment, you are able to meet opposing forces halfway: not recoiling in anger and condemnation, not pressing forward for some unnatural change in things, but waiting calmly in the center until the Higher Power provides the correct solution.
The I Ching teaches us that all conflict is, in the end, inner conflict. When you see it beginning, you are obliged not to pursue it, for this only compounds your own misfortune. If you cannot regain your equanimity on your own, then seek the assistance of a just and impartial person in resolving the difficulty. The only way to live free of conflict is to hold steadfastly to proper principles in all things. Through balance, patience, and devotion to inner truth we rise above every challenge.
from The I Ching, or Book of Changes
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