Walking With Laozi: Chapter 1

December 29, 2009 · Posted in Essays 71 views

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Introduction: This is the first installment in a series inspired by my understanding of the Daodejing (Tao Te Ching). I don’t have the ability to read the original text in its original language, but I have 25+ different translations as well as having read books that do go into character by character discussions.

I am certainly not the first person to write a series based on their perceptions of this Taoist text, nor do I claim my insights to be radically different than any that have occurred before me. My goal is to simply share the wisdom I have found here and present it in a manner that is enjoyable to read.

A suitable shade tree is ahead so my friend and I take a break from our walk and have a seat beneath it.

“Laozi, what exactly is Tao?”

My friend looks at me. He’s a middle aged man, his face dark and weathered from the sun. Despite this, his eyes seem to shine, even here in the shade.

“Let me first say that no matter how much I try to explain Tao to you, I can never fully describe it.”

“Yes, I’ve heard that. Why, though? Are you saying that language is too limited?”

“It is not language that is limited, but rather, ourselves. Because of our nature, who we are, we have limits to what we can perceive. ”

“What sort of limits?”

“Well, take science for example. Science is a process for understanding all things. Various languages, words and even systems such as mathematics are used to describe both what is seen and what is expected to be seen. Yet all of these can only describe what we have observed or what we can logically speculate based on our previous observations.”

“But how does this prevent you from explaining to me what Tao is?”

“Imagine if all of humanity could only see in shades of gray. Imagine that our eyes physically could not see colors. Nobody has ever seen colors, and there are no words for colors. We would have names for the various shades of gray. In fact, those would be our colors. The visible light spectrum would be broken up into the various shades of gray by our scientists. In one way, we have no less understanding of light. But in another, because of our very physical being, our perception of light will be quite different.”

“I see. Some things we do not know because we do not have the ability to become aware of them.”

“Yes. But we can imagine them.”

“So what do you imagine Tao is?”

Laozi closed his eyes and exhaled fully. His shoulders relaxed and he slid his hips forward as he lazily rested his upper back against the tree.

“Tao is everything. It is all things and it is also the emptiness in the absence of all things. It is all that we can know and all that we cannot know.”

He looked very peaceful as he spoke. I closed my eyes and tried really hard to imagine what he was imagining. After a moment, Laozi opened one eye and peered over at me, sensing my focused concentration.

“Do not try to imagine Tao. When you desire to see, you will create what you want to see. Only when you let go of that desire, will you truly be able to observe.”

“You just said I could imagine it!”

“What you observe when you are free from desire is different from what you create when you want to see, yet they come from the same source. You know you can create, so now just observe.”

I did as he suggested and my breath relaxed as well. My mind began to wander, not focusing too long on anything. Eventually I did settle on the darkness which happened to be the back of my eyelids.

“Now, what do you see?” asked Laozi.

I smiled and said, “Darkness.”

“Darkness, and within darkness is potential. Part of Tao is beyond experience, the darkness, the obscure. Part of Tao is also what you do experience, knowledge, awareness. They are different, yet the same. This is the mystery and the beginning to understanding.”

I listened to his words and imagined them floating off into the darkness, being consumed as if they’d been sucked into a black hole. I want to know so much, but in order to know more, I need to think less? I could feel a frown forming on my face. Right after that I felt the poke of a walking stick in my side.

Laozi was once again on his feet, “It is time to walk.”

Tags: daodejing, Laozi, Tao