I can be a difficult person to live with, I can also be a very warm and comforting presence. What decides the way I am unfortunately ends up being outside forces to often.
Is the house a mess, I am a mess. Was I unable to sleep, I am restless and irritable. Has the day yielded little in the way of growth or financial gain, I am loss, I am stunted.
This is what it is and I see it as the place from which I must begin. The Tao Te Ching, chapter 28 says,
Know the masculine, but hold to the feminine.
Be the watercourse of the world,
Being the watercourse of the world
The eternal virtue does not depart.
Return to the state of the infant.
TTC- chp. 28 (Lin)
I spend a life time asserting my will, my dominance of situations, yet still find that things are out of my control. Keeping to the feminine means allowing with love and grace, there is a time to assert, but live in allowing.
I bring myself to this place of unease when I do not stay to the feminine or become like an infant. Becoming like an infant would mean being with out senses that have a knowledge of the way things should be.
Be able to see things, experience things for the first time, every time, to remain in the “eternal virtue.” That is what it means to be the watercourse for the world. Be unchanged by the circumstances but hold to your course even when bent, and taken from.
Know the white, hold to the black
Be the standard of the world
Being the standard of the world
The eternal virtue does not deviate
Return to the state of the boundless
TTC- chp.28 (Lin)
Knowing the white again refers to a forceful imposing thing, but remaining in the black again shows us to keep to the silence and peaceful nature of essence.
When I react to this world continuously in the affirmative, always pushing, always trying to manipulate I remove the boundless nature of things and create form. I create the distinct physicality of my reality. As Wayne Dyer said, “anytime force is used no matter how small a counter force arises,”
Which means that if my reality seems to be at odds with me, it is not my realities fault or responsibility to change, it is mine. To remain in the eternal virtue I must again return to the essence, or potential of the now.
Everyday the teachings of the Tao Te Ching have shown up in my life and more often than not have been overwhelming clear as to my part in what I must do to live in more clear alignment.
This chapter tells us to be the Valley of the world, to know honor but stick to humility. Coming from this low place we are open to all things and all ways. Remaining humble enough to see the gifts that surround me everyday can be a challenge, but when I get it, man is it freeing, and absolutely astounding to feel the peace that accompanies this human aspect.
Return to the state of plain wood
Plain wood splits, then becomes tools
The sages utilize them
And then become leaders
TTC- chp.28 (Lin)
If I can allow all the pretense and ego of how I suppose life to be. If I can remove my will and manipulation for the how I expect things to turn out, I can make myself like “plain wood” and truly serve wherever needed. I can allow my self to be offered in service to all by not carving myself up with my own desires. This is how the Sages lived, and in so doing were the greatest leaders.
A leader must put them selves at the feet of those they wish to lead and serve them with a heart like the valley.
I pray to be this type of person, allowing all of my wants and desires to fall away. Even the desire to desire not desiring. Thanks for that Alan Watts.
I am the calm amongst the raging storm. I am the abundance in the wasteland. I am the peace in the madness. I am unmoved but constantly in motion. I am the essence of the dark, the allowing grace of the feminine, I am the senseless wonderment of an infant, and I am the unlimited potential of plain wood.
With out silence there would be no music, the space between rhythm and harmony is created by nothing at all. I am the infinite space of all creation. The bellows between Heaven and Earth.
I am, I am.
Happy day,
Seeking Purpose Today 