Posts Tagged → happiness

serve as an example to others

focus

 

You serve

as an example to others by

sacrificing your ego and accepting 

the guidance of the Higher

Power.

 

The hexagram

Ting concerns the nourishment

and guidance one must have in order to fully

succeed. While the culture around us often encourages

us to “take charge” and make aggressive demands on life, the

I Ching offers far wiser counsel. Here we are encouraged

to give up the incessant demands of our ego —  

to deepen our humility and acceptance

and to listen carefully to the

instructions of the

Sage.

 

The image

of the caldron concerns

your inner thoughts: whatever you hold

in the “caldron” of your mind is your offering

to the Higher Power. The quality of assistance you can

receive from the universe is governed by the quality of your

offering. If you constantly indulge in the concerns of the ego —

fears, desires, strategies to control, harshness toward others —

you repel the Higher Power and block your own nourishment.

If, on the other hand, you consciously let go of your

resistance to life and hold quiet and correct

thoughts, you become receptive to the

Creative and your continual

nourishment is

assured.

 

Ting comes

to suggest that the wisest

thing that you can do now is to still

your ego and conscientiously enter into a 

conversation with the Sage. To influence others, or to

achieve a proper goal, follow the same path. By cultivating

humility and acceptance, purifying your inner thoughts,

and concentrating on that which is good and innocent

and true, you summon the power of the Creative

and meet with good fortune in

the outer world.

 

from The I Ching, or Book of Changes

Hexagram 50, Ting / The Caldron

 

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not inhibited from acting

brice portolano

 

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

zen letters

 

modest, acceptance, innocence

marry mind to breath and look within

 

The Higher Power

looks not only at our actions

but into our hearts to gauge our worthiness.

Through genuine inner modesty, acceptance,

and innocence you correct your own

errors and set an example

for others.

 

fifth changing line

from The I Ching, or Book of Changes

Hexagram 63 / Chi Chi (After Completion)

which you can find

right here

 

ebooks & apps of the Tao the Ching, I Ching,

Wei wu Wei Ching, Hua hu Ching, and

Art of War for iPad/Phone, Kindle,

Nook, or Android

 

You

can now buy

the I Ching as part of a

five-app bundle of Taoist classics 

for iPhone or iPad for less than

the cost of one hardcover

book.

brian browne walker taoist app bundle ios ipad iphone

 

opening doors and shutters

awakening to the tao

 
When the doors are open, the air passes through. When the shutters are open, the light shines in. If the doors are closed, there is no circulation between the inside and outside. If the shutters are closed, the energy of the light is kept outside.

What I realize as I observe this is the tao of great use of great potential.

People in the world today who practice taoism go into the twisted byways of sidetracks, some closing their eyes and gazing into emptiness, some staying inactive in isolated and quiet places, some deliberately sitting and thinking of the spirit.

They think they have the tao, but they have not realized that the tao is the tao of creative evolution of yin and yang of heaven and earth. This tao, this Way, fans out everywhere in the universe, but this does not multiply it; it is concentrated in one energy, but this does not make it less.

All beings in the universe, animate and inanimate, the myriads of different beings, all live and develop on the basis of this. Everything and everyone has it. It is just that while people are in the midst of the tao they are not conscious of the tao, as while fish are in water they are not conscious of the water.

If you want to practice this Way, you must do it in the creative evolution of yin and yang of heaven and earth, realize its experience in the midst of all things and all events, and practice and hold it in the presence of all people.

This is work that is alive, effervescent, free, liberated, gloriously enlightened, true, and great. Do you think it can be attained by people who shut the door and sit quietly with blank minds?

If you want to attain the Way by shutting the door and sitting quietly with a blank mind, that is like shutting the doors and shutters and hoping to see the sun. What “way” does that accomplish? It must be the way of dark rooms, I guess. 

Understanding Reality says, “Practice, mixing in with the ordinary people and integrating hyour illumination. When it is time to be round, be round; when it is time to be square, be square. As you appear and disappear, now reversing, now going along, no one can fathom you, since you make people unable to know what you are doing.”

It also says, “You should know that the great recluses live in the cities and towns; why stay still and alone deep in the mountains?”

Only when you mix with the ordinary people, integrating illumination, living in the cities and towns, are you activating great use of great potential. This is the real function of practicing ahd holding the Great Way.
 

Liu I-Ming

☯️