and Rumi’s poetry, are reminders of experience,
larger and deeper ways we readers and listeners might live.
The words describe a taste of grandeur and love, and as they keep
telling us, you cannot do that: it’s impossible to describe such
wonders. The great winetasters may come as close as one
can get. But try to tell me, really, about a pistachio,
or something you have never tasted. Say what
you want, eventually we have
to taste to know.
commentary on The Drowned Book
The sage has no set mind.
She adopts the concerns
of others as her own.
She is good to the good.
She is also good to the bad.
This is real goodness.
She trusts the trustworthy.
She also trusts the untrustworthy.
This is real trust.
The sage takes the minds
of the worldly and spins them around.
People drop their ideas and agendas,
and she guides them like
beloved children.
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Don’t rely on
others to direct your
conduct. Be determined in
holding to the good
at every turn.
third changing line
from The I Ching, or Book of Changes
☯️
Keep yourself simple,
good, guileless, dignified, unpretentious,
devoted to justice, pious, kind, affectionate to others,
and resolute in carrying out your proper tasks. Strive to be and
remain the kind of person philosophy would have you be.
Revere the gods and keep men safe. Life is short.
There’s only one crop to be reaped from your
time on earth, and that is a reverential
disposition and socially
useful actions.
the most authentic master I ever encountered
Something in prolonged contact with rouge eventually becomes red, something in prolonged contact with soot eventually becomes black. What I realize as I observe this is the tao of habituation to good and bad.
When you live with good people, what you always hear are good words and what you always see are good actions. Hearing and seeing good words and actions over a long period of time plants good seeds in your mind, so that you spontanteously become accustomed to goodness.
When you live with bad people, what you always hear are bad words and what you always see are bad actions. Hearing and seeing bad words and bad actions over a long period of time plants bad seeds in your mind, so that you naturally become accustomed to badness.
Good and bad people are said to be so by nature, but most become so through habit. Therefore wise people choose their associates carefully.
A truly
good person doesn’t
dwell on her goodness.
Thus she can be good.
A person of false goodness
never forgets her goodness.
Thus her goodness is
always false.
A truly
good person does nothing,
yet nothing remains undone.
A person of false goodness is forever
doing, yet everything remains
forever undone.
Those who
are interested in service
act without motive. Those who are
interested in righteousness act with
motives of all sorts. Those who are
interested in propriety act, and
receiving no response, they
roll up their sleeves
and use force.
When
Tao is lost,
goodness appears.
When goodness is lost,
philanthropy appears.
When philanthropy is lost,
justice appears.
When justice is lost,
only etiquette
is left.
Etiquette
is the faintest husk
of real loyalty and faith,
and it is the beginning of confusion.
Knowledge of the future is only
a blossom of Tao; to become
preoccupied with it
is folly.
Thus the
sage sets her sights
on the substance and not the
surface, on the fruit and not the
flower. Leaving the one,
she gains the
other.
from The Tao te Ching of Lao Tzu,
ebooks & apps of the Tao the Ching, I Ching,
Hua hu Ching, and Art of War for
You
can now buy
Tao te Ching as part of a
five-app bundle of Taoist classics
for iPhone or iPad for less than
the cost of one hardcover
book.