Chapter 22 - Obstacles

Yield and remain whole
Bend and remain straight
Be low and become filled
Be worn out and become renewed
Have little and receive
Have much and be confused
Therefore the sages hold to the one as an example for the world
Without flaunting themselves – and so are seen clearly
Without presuming themselves – and so are distinguished
Without praising themselves – and so have merit
Without boasting about themselves – and so are lasting

Because they do not contend, the world cannot contend with them
What the ancients called "the one who yields and remains whole"
Were they speaking empty words?
Sincerity becoming whole, and returning to oneself

What does this mean?

Life is not a sprint or a marathon.  If one were to equate life to any sort of contest, it is an obstacle course at night.  There are walls to climb over, ropes to swing on, mud to wade through and pools to swim through but because you can not see very far, there is no way to know what is next or where to go.  Everyone around you struggles with traversing the course and it's easy to follow along with everyone else's culture.

The culture you follow are the obstacles everyone say you should attempt.

If the goal is to get to the other side of a free-standing wall for example, are you going to climb over it and jump down, or are you going the easy way and walk around it?  What happens when you eventually reach that obstacle you cannot traverse no matter how much help you get?

Not all obstacles are physical.  Many times the things you can't bypass are those mental hangups everyone has.  If you think you know everything, you cannot let in more knowledge.  If you think you can not do it for whatever reason, you will not until you figure it how to think differently.  Imagine all of those disabled people who do amazing things with the right attitutde compared to those who are not disabled but cannot do it for any reason they think applies.

Virtue is like a map that reveals the obstacle course.  It not only shows you the shortcuts in our physical reality but also the shortcuts in our mental and emotional landscapes.

The part of the Tao is the path.  Tao is translated to mean "the way", after all.  It leads you to the goal.  It might be through an obstacle, it might be around it.

To continue with the analogy of the obstacle course, if you skip a few obstacles or even walk straight to the part of the course where you wanted to be, imagine how you would look to others.  They will be dirty, tired and maybe even injured to have gotten to the same place you are, but you will be fresh and ready to be there.

People who did not see you travel will be amazed and asked how you did it so effortlessly.

How can I use this?

Be sincere and honest with yourself regarding your goals.  Without virtue to light the way and the Tao to guide us, the destination seems distant and murky.  On the obstacle course of life, our current goal seems to be whatever is at the end of the obstacle we are currently on. We have a vague idea of what is ahead but we don't really know if it is what we even want until we finish.  It might be that the path you decide on takes you decades because your culture set out all of these steps for you.

This is why we need to simplify our goals and be honest with to ourselves.

Let us say that I loved writing stories as a child.  In Western culture, my friends and family might latch onto that and say, "Oh!  Your stuff is very good.  You should get published."

1. I feel good about our friends saying that and culture glorifies the best-selling author, so I try to pursue being an novelist.
2. Now with our new goal of getting published, I get told we have to get an agent that can submit my work to the publishers and make sure it gets read.
3. Then our with the new goal of getting an agent, I get told that agents only take people who get a degree in Writing and that it will help improve my skills as my style does not fit with what gets published.
4. To get that degree of Writing, I must spend four years or more at a large liberal arts college and sink hundreds of thousands of dollars into debt.
5. To help pay that debt, I need to take on a full-time middle-income career for a decade or more at something you never trained for and possibly hate.
6. To get that full-time job that can pay your debt, I need to build your resume and pad it with any exaggeration and half-truths and get experience working at the entry level positions.
7. To get the entry-level job, I need to start in high-school getting into the highly competitive AP classes and volunteer part time.
8. To get into the AP classes, I need to get perfect scores in your normal classes.
9. To get perfect scores in your normal classes assuming I don't thrive in formal education, I need to study all through middle grade and high school in subjects that I will most likely never use again.

I have so many steps that complicate our path to the goal of writing stories. I would sacrifice the time and wealth of a decade if I followed this path.  Nevermind that half-way through achieving this life-consuming goal I might change my mind.

There are reasons for some of those obstacles, but a one-size fits all approach our culture tends to have might not work for you.

Studying writing in school is a great way to improve, but one should not stop doing what fulfills themselves if they don't improve in such a structured setting.  Not improving here simply means that you might need a different way to learn or you need some basics like discipline or mindfulness.

Getting a career is a good idea to provide yourself with basic needs, but needs are their own goal.  To tie it in with a formal education and the weight of crippling life-long debt seems insane considering the percentage of successful authors to those who like literature.

Getting published is a great way to spend all of your time writing, but quitting when your first stories get rejected for whatever reason should not be why you quit.  You can always get better or find different publishers or even reach out to different audiences.  You should not even care if they get rejected as the goal is to write instead of getting published.  The reason to truly quit is if writing is no longer something that fulfills you.

It is all too much if you have plans like this.  Once you accumulate so many steps, it is easy to become confused and lost with exactly who you are and what drives you.  Through the Tao and virtue, we have an easier path.

Write with your full presence.  Write to get better.  Write for its own sake.

Write.  Write.  Write.

This applies to absolutely everything.  Creating art.  Improving your skills.  Learning more.  Once you cared for your needs, do things because it fulfills you to do them.  Do things because it is part of who you are.

The "doing" and the "being" come together as one inside you.

Chapter 21 - Faith

The appearance of great virtue
Follows only the Tao
The Tao, as a thing
Seems indistinct, seems unclear

So unclear, so indistinct
Within it there is image
So indistinct, so unclear
Within it there is substance
So deep, so profound
Within it there is essence

Its essence is supremely real
Within it there is faith
From ancient times to the present
Its name never departs
To observe the source of all things
How do I know the nature of the source?
With this

What does this mean?

Let us assume that we do want to have great virtue.  We would need to follow the Tao to obtain this.  The problem arises when the Tao is a paradox and a mystery.  It is like trying to follow a quiet sparrow through a dense fog.  The only clue you have is the slight flutter of wings. a branch that is still quivering from the bird taking off or if you are lucky, a feather left behind to know you are on the right path.  The evidence is slight and coincidental.

To follow the Tao, you can test that the Tao is there.  Faith is counter to the idea of the Tao as a philosophical concept.  However, you need faith to follow something you have no language to even define or comprehend as a human being.  That does not mean the Tao fails as something to help you.

Faith is necessary to have any sort of sanity.  To have true certainty with no faith, one would have to go to the source and experience it for ourselves.  With absolutely zero faith, you could say that China does not exist.  All of those items that say "Made in China" and the books and movies that take place there could be a giant ruse for some unknowable purpose.  This idea is pretty ridiculous but it points out the subjectivity with faith.

Faith is not some powerful spiritual force that dictates whether a diety loves you or not.  Hoping that everything is going to be alright does not mean that having hope is the reason why it is going to be alright.  Magical thinking through faith fuels justifications to keep doing what a culture or your own belief thinks you should.

Faith is simply how much you trust evidence presented to you for a specific claim.

We can see how great virtue impacts life.  That virtue follows the Tao.  We can see how opposites occur when one is motivated by ego and desire.  Knowing opposites follows the Tao.  We can see the problems of complicating our lives through intelligence and culture.  We know that these human constructs are counter to the Tao.

Do you have faith that the Tao exists because of this evidence and in spite of the Tao's muddled indescribable nature?

No?  That is OK.  Unlike faith in China existing, the Tao is everywhere so it is easy to verify.

How do I use this?

Action trumps faith.  Forgetting about virtue and the Tao, the most successful people are the ones who act to be at the right place at the right time and are motivated to do so.  It is not luck, faith or hope.  They have a destination and they know the map to it.  They adapt when they risk something happening and it doesn't.  In other words, they are not governed by confirmation bias.

The fallicy of confirmation bias is solely based on the human sense to make sense of the world:  If I do A and B happens, it is because of C.  Even if reason C is completely a coincidence.

* Since I flipped a coin 5 times and it was heads each time, it will probably be heads next time.
* Since I was carrying a rabbit's foot and I found $100, the rabbit's foot is lucky.
* Since it's cold outside, global warming must be a lie.

Those people who act outside of confirmation bias but a good understanding of how reality works are a step ahead.  Those people drop their expectations of the coin's power to come up heads again.  The sage does not carry a rabbit's foot, but they open their eyes instead.  There is wisdom to study weather deeply if you wonder why people are worried about climate change.

The sage takes in and respects the hypothesis of others, but always tests against reality.

Get rid of magical thinking.  The most difficult human obstacle is prayer and hope.

It is easy for the indoctrinated to say, "Since I have found faith in a spiritual force, everything has gone my way and I've gotten everything I've wanted.  The spirit and faith must be the power where it comes from."

It is easy to construct that it's not the motivation you looked to when you were in trouble that made your life better, but the spirit or diety you put your faith into.  If you stop getting what you want, it was not your fault, it was either the spirit did not want you to have it or you did not have enough faith.    When you get mired in this, you are not in control anymore.  You are a dust mote on the fractal winds of chance.

The Tao does not care about what you want or your desires.  The Tao does not acknowledge your idea of how the world should work.  The Tao merely is.

The amazing thing about it is by trying to make sense and follow the Tao, we naturally come across the virtues and thinking skills we need to cope and appreciate all of reality from which the Tao comes from.  The Tao does not give us a good life by following it, but it simplifies our realities and tempers our desire.  That is what makes our life better.  We can use the concepts to achieve goals in line with following the great virtues that follow the Tao.

Chapter 20 - Culture

Cease learning, no more worries
Respectful response and scornful response
How much is the difference?
Goodness and evil
How much do they differ?
What the people fear, I cannot be unafraid

So desolate! How limitless it is!
The people are excited
As if enjoying a great feast
As if climbing up to the terrace in spring
I alone am quiet and uninvolved
Like an infant not yet smiling
So weary, like having no place to return
The people all have surplus
While I alone seem lacking
I have the heart of a fool indeed – so ignorant!
Ordinary people are bright
I alone am muddled
Ordinary people are scrutinizing
I alone am obtuse
Such tranquility, like the ocean
Such high wind, as if without limits

The people all have goals
And I alone am stubborn and lowly
I alone am different from them
And value the nourishing mother

What does this mean?

When one talks about the concepts of good and evil, they are not 'natural' in the same observable way as honesty or compassion is.  Good and evil are learned as they are cultural concepts.  Look around the world and, depending on their culture and upbringing, you can see that one person's good can be another person's evil.  Our responses, whether they deserve respect or scorn, is as much as a construct as good and evil are.

The natural good, like honesty, humility and charity, are universal.  The important thing here is that you have to separate the virtuous "goodness" from the cultural "goodness" you've learned.  That is why I refer to virtue instead of good as I feel it better defines those natural qualities that describe a sage.  Keep "virtue" simple.

The Western culture you were born into is a construct that indoctrinated you into what "good" means.

Look at how everyone is told that they need to work hard, achieve something and have goals way past your needs; to thrive.  They need to pursuit happiness and the American dream.  They can judge others that are not like themselves, especially if they have different values or are at different levels of success.  People embedded in our culture are living for fun, as if all the work done is to celebrate a big party.  We all try to be experts and are proud enough to let you know that we are right all the time.

People explore this culture at varying lengths, and those who are on it seem to think that there is some sort of problem with the people too far in or not far enough.  I think that the problem isn't where you are in culture and the moderation you apply to it; it is the culture itself.

How do I use this?

Do not care about judgement that are not founded in natural truths.  The further outside of the culture you are, the more it makes you seem dumb, stubborn and simple.

I try to live simply and "naturally".  Sometimes that means it matches with what is acceptable according to my culture, but it also means that I live philosophically outside culture a majority of the time.

The perfect example is those "charitable" holidays like Christmas.  It is frustrating for others when I say I do not want anything for the holidays.  There is no comprehension that anyone would not want a gift.  Very often, people buy me things I do not want anyway because that is "what you do" for Christmas.  The thought is only appreciated because they were thinking of me, but it's tempered by the fact they did not listen and that I didn't want it in the first place.  Then they act surprised I do not treasure the thing and offended I do not use it.

It is like that with everything.

When I tell others I do not have goals, I get a lot of strange judgmental looks.  People look down on me because I am trying to have as few things as possible and do not care about a bigger house or smartphone.  When I talk about learning a new skill, people immediately suggest I seek out college or classes.

Get out of culture.  Why care what anyone in such a culture thinks about you when it's based solely on an artificial construct and not something real?  People have more stuff, more ways to communicate and more entertainment and yet have as many or even more problems back before we refined our culture into what it is today.

I refuse to have any sympathy for "first-world problems".  It is like feeling bad for a spoiled child that lost his toy, even though that child has hundreds more.  It is like someone who refuses to eat healthy because they do not like the taste.  Everything that is extra beyond food, water and shelter is something to be grateful about.

It seems that there is only a hollow entitlement for others that is truly outside of the Tao.

Chapter 19 - Intelligence

End sagacity; abandon knowledge
The people benefit a hundred times

End benevolence; abandon righteousness
The people return to piety and charity

End cunning; discard profit
Bandits and thieves no longer exist

These three things are superficial and insufficient
Thus this teaching has its place:
Show plainness; hold simplicity
Reduce selfishness; decrease desires

What does this mean?

If you are judging others simply on the knowledge presented, there is no empathy for other people's motivations.  Why people do things is much more important than how or when they did them and who they hurt.  A beggar stealing bread because he's hungry should not be treated the same as a greedy man that steals bread to keep his money.

Giving with the desire to be favored either in your current social culture or in the eyes of religion is not true charity or piety.  Helping others in need for its own sake is so much better than helping others to make yourself look good.  A priest giving help just to worshippers is simply not as good as a priest giving to the ones who need it most.

If you are being effective and intelligent solely for riches, then you leave so much less time to understand your true self.  Wisdom and contentment are more important than having more stuff.  We all hear the story of the CEO who has everything but isn't truly happy compared to a poor wise man who has only what he needs but is content.

With all of these, the underlying problems are complexity and desire.  Clear those two things out and  life will be so much better.

How do I use this?

Use KISS: Keep it simple, stupid.  Everyone has heard it, but do not take the "stupid" part of KISS lightly or as an insult.  If something is truly simple, it needs to sound dumb.  Think of it as a way to weed out the "devil in the details".  It requires a honesty with yourself and it also requires some critical thinking. You can use logic as a tool to simplify instead of add complexity.

Lets say you wanted to lose weight; a goal that gets mired in complexity and often unquestioned.  A low weight is a generally accepted as a sign of good health.

Really take a critical look at our food culture, though.  Today, we have all of these "point system" diets, cultures and philosophies that says what you should and shouldn't eat, and emotional hangups and social situations that pressure us into eating.  We even have a break down of the science into nutrients and calories so we can measure it to the tiniest detail.  None of these things pass the KISS rule.

The best thing I can think of that passes KISS in regards to losing weight is "eat less, do more".

For many people to do just this, it is not easy.  The goal requires mindfulness to know what you eat.  It needs discipline to eat less less than you normally do.  You have to have a knowledge of yourself to start a physical activity that you can do for it's own sake.  You have to shake off the cultural expectations and entitled ego that fuel the culture in the first place.  Wiith so many food and exercise options, the path of least resistance is to pick and fail at any "diet" that mask the true skills you need to lose weight and then blame the diet that failed.

Lets look at the honest part: why you want to lose weight.  Is it the culture pushing you to fit in?  Do you want to have more friends or a companion?  These reasons are just going to cause you suffering whether you succeed or not.  Do you really want to be accepted by a culture that judges on appearance over ideas, virtues and skills?

Now if you suffer from being less healthy, that is completely different.  That means saying honestly to yourself that if you get to a healthy weight for you, you stop.  If that means your optimal health does not fit what culture says you should be, you stop.  If that means that you are a different size than when you were a teenager, you stop.

It is the motive that is the most important thing.  A good life is about what you need, not what you want.

Chapter 18 - Absence

The great Tao fades away
There is benevolence and justice
Intelligence comes forth
There is great deception

The six relations are not harmonious
There is filial piety and kind affection
The country is in confused chaos
There are loyal ministers

What does this mean?

What happens when all of these humans on Earth with egos and desires are living without the Tao?  The idea here is the breakdown of virtue in the absence of the Tao.  We get benevolence, justice and intelligence.  Working for these principles and ideas seem to be a great goal.  However, they can be just as imbalancing because they bring about their opposites.

Here's another take on it.  Benevolence and justice generate human systems and like all "intelligent" human systems, they can be corrupted and twisted through that very intelligence.  Leaders attempt to control benevolence, judges control a village's justice, and teachers control the village's thoughts and culture, whether that be through a wise shaman or a learned professor.

People then force things that do not need to be forced.

If you leave it up to a single person in a small community, this is a dictatorship on a small scale no matter how nice the leader is.  They will impose whatever world views and desires onto the two virtues.  One person's benevolence or justice can become another person's suffering.

If you leave it up to a democracy, then benevolence and justice are all influenced by the emotions of the mob.  Righteousness sway much more over the actions of the community.  That punishes the cultural outcasts and sages away because they do not fit in.  Any major transgression is met hastily with pitchforks and torches instead of rationality.

Intelligence and logic can hide all of the flaws of these systems and make them seem better than they are.

Once you apply logical rules to a community, that logic can be twisted to fulfuill the ends of whoever is intellgient enough to do so.  For example, In the United States, there are brackets of income everyone fits in for tax purposes.  Once you are even a dollar over or under in your bracket for whatever reason, it can mean the difference of thousands of dollars.  The speed limit when driving is also an example.  Once you drive over the posted limit, you can pulled over and still have the same penalties against your record whether you are a mile over or twenty.

Today, the social, economic and legal systems of most countries are gigantic logical and supposedly intelligent structures.  That logic running all of civilization hides its cracks and flaws from everyone in it's complexity.

The real irony is that we constructed these largely unnecessary systems ourselves as a society.

I envision civilization as a large stone tower.  The tower is imperfect simply because humans built it.  The Tao is the cracks and space in the rock tower.  You can never completely seal it off perfectly, so that space erodes down the tower by letting in the winds of change and the water of time.

For a sage, it's bettter to flow with the water and wind that passes through than try to hold up those rocks that will eventually fall.

How can I use this?

Do not overthink virtue.  One day I wanted to practice being selfless and giving since I have never done it before.  I was going to a donut shop and had this grand plan to buy everyone a donut.  When I walked in, I started to overthink it: what kind of donut, what about a bagel, some people already ordered donuts and are just waiting.  As I was thinking about it, it became my turn to order, I got flustered and just bought my coffee and left.

This bothered me all day.  Why was it so hard for me to give?  I think my brain got in the way.  I vowed to try it again.

The next day, instead of trying to figure out exactly what to do, I made it simple and told the cashier to give the change on my gift card to the next person.  I didn't even look back at them to see who they were.  While I waited for them to make my coffee, the people who received it thanked me a ton, which I tried to be humble about and it.  It still felt really good.

So don't think and plan virtue.  Just be open to acting on it.

Do not apply complex cultural values to simple virtues.  You do not need a set of religious doctrine or social clubs to do the right thing.  In fact, many times a cultural institution can impede thought towards being humble and selfless.  If help goes to those who are more worthy when valued by a culture, it might not go to someone who needs it more.  If you believe that something judges us based on the rules of a religion in the afterlife, that prevents us from holding ourselves accountable today.

Chapter 17 - Leaders

The highest rulers, people do not know they have them
The next level, people love them and praise them
The next level, people fear them
The next level, people despise them
If the rulers' trust is insufficient
Have no trust in them

Proceeding calmly, valuing their words
Task accomplished, matter settled
The people all say, "We did it naturally"

What does this mean?

It is all too obvious and unfortunate that all of our politicians and true decision makers in this day and age file into the 'next levels' of love, fear and despise in various forms.  Definately very few of the deserve any sort of trust due to the opaqueness of most political systems, apathy of the common people and the influence of outside wealth.

Look at our democracy, where our lawmakers are constantly afraid of losing approval from those with wealth.  Instead of working towards what is right and being held to it, they are the slaves of that very favor from the elite.  They hide behind emotional pleas and cherry picked facts to hold up their actions that buckle under true analysis.  Then, to keep their job, politicians are forced to brag and tell everyone why they should be re-elected instead of letting their decisions speak for themselves.

It is hard today to truly lead in terms of community.  In the workplace and in your family at least, you have the opprotunity to lead.  In every place where you lead and are visible to others, you are in a position to break someone's trust.  Once that happens, no one will listen to you because no one can believe your motives.

The solution is to not be visible as a leader in a traditional sense.  Then no one can second guess your motives.

How can I use this?

Lead through action.  When you have an emergency wildfire or flood, waiting for the government leaders to tell people to save your house or even your town might be too late.  The true leader is that person who starts sandbagging around their house right away. or chopping down the trees before they burn.  With the right action, others would follow him because it is the right thing to do.

This applies to all sorts of things, and not just emergencies.  If you start exercising and eating right, you can inspire others to do be healthier.  If you clear out the clutter in your house, visitors will admire how nice it is and start their own projects.  If you study philosophy and become more mindful and present, people will want to learn from you why you seem so happy and optimistic even in awful circumstances.

In a best case scenario, they might even ask you how to do it and be ready to listen to you.  More likely they will just look it up on the internet.  At worst, they do nothing which is fine, simply because your life is better by being the change you want.

When the task is done or their life is better, they will probably think it was their idea in the first place.

Be skeptical but flexible.  Just because someone is popular or unpopular doesn't mean they are right or wrong.  Just because someone puts in a lot of hours and is proud of their work doesn't mean it is valuable.  Don't just believe what you are told because it sounds right and you heard it on TV or the internet.

Very few people are actually looking for enlightenment.  They have other agendas.

Most people want fame, power, family or some other desire.  These basic wants that drive our culture make me skeptical of their motives, especially because people don't see it as self-interest right away.  Even a motive like family and friends is simply a broader selfishness that include only the ones you like the best.

That's not to say you never deal with anyone.  That's not realistic.  However, you do have to understand and empathize with why people are motivated before you can understand what they will do and what they want.  Think about what sort of ego boost do people expect by helping you and what service do they expect in return.  Once you understand that, you know what you can ask of those around you when the time comes and figure out if its really worth the cost.

Who can you really trust?

You can always prove someone's trust simply by how open and selfless they can be.  Someone that owns up to their mistakes and takes responsibility is trustworthy.  Someone who is humble about achieving a goal is trustworthy.  Someone that is willing to say "I don't know" and willing to be wrong is trustworthy.  Of course, the best way to encourage it is to be

These are the same things as trying to live with the Tao in mind: a willingness to be honest, vulernable and selfless.

Chapter 16 - Tranquil

Attain the ultimate emptiness
Hold on to the truest tranquility
The myriad things are all active
I therefore watch their return

Everything flourishes; each returns to its root
Returning to the root is called tranquility
Tranquility is called returning to one's nature
Returning to one's nature is called constancy
Knowing constancy is called clarity

Not knowing constancy, one recklessly causes trouble
Knowing constancy is acceptance
Acceptance is impartiality
Impartiality is sovereign
Sovereign is Heaven
Heaven is Tao
Tao is eternal
The self is no more, without danger

What does this mean?

The ultimate emptiness and the truest tranquility is embracing the natural laws of entropy, and in a way, death.  Everything in life breaks down and comes to rest at some point.  The emptiness before conception and after death is the root one returns to.  It is as much of the Tao as the moving parts in between.  It's another way of saying that nothing lasts forever.

As human beings, we have a bias in thinking the opposite.  We only experience the point between our first memory and our last, so its hard to grasp that there is anything else.  All we know is being alive.  That 'existance bias' is built into our very being.  Part of our biological drive over eons of evolution that we want to live as long as possible, if only to pass along our genetics to the next generation.  In a way, even that idea is a way for life to keep going past an individual's demise.

Death is that scary unescapable mystery, and as such, we try to deny or ignore death.

On a personal level, a lot of us pursue health not to be better, but to prevent ourselves from dying.  We invest heavily in self-defense in both our homes and ourselves to prevent our lives being taken.  We spend a lot of money for the illusion of youth in the form of "beauty" products.

By not acknowledging your own death, you remove any sense of urgency in your life.  People are procrastinating their dreams away due to relatively minor obsticles.  People spend the little time they have left on the easy, unfufilling things.  People simply do not take care of their bodies just because they do not think they will die from no excerise and bad food.  Think about those in your life you take for granted simply because you expect them to be in your life forever.

In our families, we stick grief and loss under a bad emotion to avoid.  We don't talk about recently dead or dying family members.  Elders are usually put into their own 'assisted living' away from everyone else during their last days.  We shield our kids from death at all levels, and there is no one around to show the children how grieving and dying should be done because we are too busy trying not to.

In popular culture, we become desensitized to death through meaningless violence and murder on our entertainment.    The national news ramps up a few criminal deaths for ratings but quickly loses interest in important events like war or preventable disease are taking thousands lives every day.  We rarely see in the mainstream news that honors someone that is gravely ill, but only after they die like it was a big surprise it happened at all.  Nowhere is mentioned the entire ecosystems we plunder and destroy to uphold the Western culture.

One day, the Bhudda asked one of his disciples how much he thinks about death.  The disciple answered that he thinks about death a lot.  The Bhudda replied that he was not thinking about death nearly enough.  He said the disciple must think about it with every breath.

It is obvious that culturally that we also do not think about death enough.  Just like the rule of opposites, you cannot have a circle of life without knowing death.

The Tao knows and accepts death, entropy and the eventual stillness of all things.  There can be no true tranquility in movement.  The sage expects and understands the temporary nature of reality and watches as all things return to this peaceful state.  Through this, the sage can embrace and appreciate the gratefulness and beauty of everything in every moment.

How do we use it?

Live and deal with anticipatory grief for everyone.  Everything is temporary in life.  No one lives forever.  Everyone in your life is on hospice whether they know it or not and no matter how healthy they are.  I believe that we should treat everyone as such.

In much the same way, managing your grief is the same as making the kinds of emotional decisions in line with the Tao.  Honesty, gratefulness, acceptance, humility and urgency are all things that are recommended for us to use when dealing with dying patients in hospice.  These same things also bring us closer to the Tao and should be doing anyway with everyone.

In a way, you can compare the coping with this grief to eating like you had diabetes before you get the disease.  Come to find out, people who eat like diabetics have dramatically improved health anyway.  The diet itself is very much like the paleo and low-carb diets out there.

One must think if our culture is wrong about food, it could be wrong in how we think about others.

Perform this breathing exercise.  Get comfortable, close your eyes and focus on your breathing.  However, instead of thinking of your breath starting on the inhale, think of each breath starting at the exhale.  Normally our focused breathing patterns are "inhale, pause, exhale".  Instead, when starting with the pause, it should go "pause, exhale, inhale".

Keep in mind that the emptiness of your lungs is the start of the breath.  It feels completely different than breathing unconciously.  The pause is kind of a fragment of the Tao: the point between breathing in and breathing out is the state from which all breath begins.

The song does not end when the last note is played.  The song ends when the silence is broken after the last note.