This chapter starts with a description of a small country with few people. They live simply and in harmony with nature. (This chapter could have been the model for the back to the land movement of my younger years. Reading it brought back wonderful memories of living in a shack in the mountains of Montana!) …
When rulers tax too much People starve When rulers interfere too much People rebel When rulers demand too much People give up One who lives in harmony with life Enjoys true wealth I have taken great liberty with the Chinese text in my translation here. However, when I contemplate the Chinese characters, this is …
Summer is the season of pure yang energy. Its element is fire. Its organ is the heart. Yang energy is active, hot, rising, powerful. When someone is wildly successful, driving forward, dominating the competition, unstoppable, we might say, “Wow, she’s on fire!” Our western culture highly values yang energy. Idle hands do the devil’s work, …
Solstice calls the lightThrough the darknessThrough the coldEach day a few steps closerEach day a little brighterThe earth warms to her touchAnd stirs in winter’s stillnessBuds quiver on bare branchesWhispering welcomeWelcome home
Each momentIs a doorwayAn open door into the infiniteAn invitation to enter The mystery of eternityTime — an endless hall of doorsEach momentWe walk through … or we don’tEither way there is another doorUntil we leave time altogetherAnd see all doors as oneDisappearing as soon as we step throughInto the place we never left
Love like the sunDispelling all darknessToasting comfy the deepest chillLove like the rainShowering all without reservationSlaking thirst and washing cleanLove like the windFree and fierceShaking loose what no longer servesLove like the starsTwinkling bright to delight the eyeTo unerringly guide the lostLove like the earthFecund forgivingBlessing with abundanceLove like the flowersHappy to be aliveOffering beauty …
I want to understand— To understand whatWhat is the meaning of this suffering— Suffering has no meaning here. It does not existWhere is here— HomeI want to come home— You never leftThen why does it seem so far away— Because you have hidden yourself from loveHow do I find love— You can’t find love because you …
When I moved to Portland, my son was just shy of his fourth birthday. It was a sudden move, necessary for many reasons. We arrived without much advance planning, and we were both disoriented and reeling. I rented a room in an extended stay hotel, and started to get my bearings. My son has autism, …
All prayers are the same prayer“I want to go home”All prayers receive the same answer“You never left”
There is a lot packed into this short chapter, which makes clear that we need not look anywhere outside ourselves for the answers we seek. In fact, we need not look at all. Without going out the door, one knows everything under heavenWithout looking out the window, one sees heaven’s TaoThe further away one goes, …
At nightWhen darkness makes the edges softAnd thins the veilThe boy weptI miss home, he criedWe are home, his parents soothedNo, my home before, now sobbingHis parents stroked his back, perplexedYou mean our old house?No, not that one, the one before!There was no otherYou were born in that houseNo! he wailed. The one BEFORE!His parents …
Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls. ~Psalm 42:7 For the last six weeks, my usually busy schedule has been emptied. I suspended my martial arts classes, my piano lessons, my Chinese tutor. I made a choice to devote my mornings to a writing project. (Mornings, I’ve discovered, are really the only …
One of my favorite movies of all time is King of Hearts, a 1960s film starring Alan Bates and a young Genevieve Bujold. The story takes place in a French village during WWI. The inhabitants flee the town, leaving behind the inmates of an asylum with the gate open. They filter out into the empty …
This poem by Rumi has come as a guest into my “home” recently. A series of events over last fall and the beginning of this year have left me at various times elated, terrified, energized, devastated, regretful, confused, excited, upset, exhausted, stunned, content, happy, and lost. This poem knocked on my door and offered me …
This is a beautiful little chapter about the relationship between Tao and the ten thousand things. (The “ten thousand things” is a poetic name for the manifested universe.) It begins with another water image for Tao. As we have already seen, water is the most often used metaphor for the nature of Tao. Great Tao …
Hold my handDon’t let me get lostLead me through the darknessCarry me when I get tiredKeep me safeLet me sleep in your armsTill the warm light of homeBathes my fuzzy eyesAnd smiles me awake
The theme of this chapter is returning to our natural state. Tao is the undifferentiated source of the manifested universe. Tao manifests in the universe as Te. Remember that Te is loosely translated as virtue but does not mean virtue in the sense of morality, but rather in the sense of an inner harmony or …
In this very momentIs a doorwayBeyond that doorwayIs where we really areAnd always have beenFrom there our spirit calls us to come homeWalk through the doorWhat you leave behind is only a dreamDo not fear to leave itIf you only knew what awaits youYou would leap laughing through the portalAnd never look back
Divided into two parts, this chapter first attempts to describe the indescribable Tao, and then moves to a description of humanity’s place in the grand scheme of the universe. There is something mysteriously undifferentiatedExisting before the beginning of heaven and earthSilent and formless, unimaginableAlone unchanging This opening passage reminds me of Genesis 1:2: Now the …
I once went to see Todd, an energy healer (whose quote about “the way of no way” appears above with the blog title). During this appointment, Todd started thumping on my chest. At first the thumps were gentle, but gradually Todd increased the intensity until my whole body became a drum. The thumping became so …
