More thoughts on the Tao

In reading the Tao today, I had certain thoughts come to me that I did not want to escape through common daily activities and it occurred to me to write them down, as it often does…..And I asked myself, why?  Why am I writing all of this down?  Although it’s rare of me to review my journaling and be surprised at the person who is writing these thoughts down at the time they were being written, it does not occur to me review my journals often enough to call it a habit. Regardless, I feel a need to write down all of these little insights, in hopes that someone will get some use from them someday. I’m sure that most writers feel this way sometimes, carefully addressing their imaginary public, hoping that someone will be able to benefit from their honest, but sometimes inane, ponderings. If that weren’t the case, we wouldn’t have things like books, newspapers, magazines and, as luck would have it, bloggs and the Tao.

My reading of the Tao has become a habit of sorts.  I come home and sit next to my bedroom window and contemplate what the words mean to me specifically. I’m not brash enough to believe that I would understand anyone else’s meaning on anything, regardless of the content, as I accept as true that most communication is largely intuitive. In other words, I don’t expect to be able to really understand anything the first time because all things that are communicated to me are sent through what I like to call the “Thea” filter. I see all things through the lens of my own experience of them; therefore, before I truly understand something I need to understand the context of how it is presented. That being the case, I can assure you that I have only a most BASIC understanding of the Tao. I say this to placate my sense of self deprecation, but also to be more aware of my openness to new ideas and widening the lens of my experience. I invite you to open up your understanding of these words with me.

This is the verse I felt the need to share with you:

25.
There was Something undefined and yet complete in itself,
Born before Heaven and Earth.
Silent and boundless,
Standing alone without change,
Yet pervading all without fail,
It may be regarded as the Mother of the world.
I do not know its name’
I style it “Tao”;
And, in the absence of a better word, call it “The Great”.

To be great is to go on,
To go on is to be far,
To be far is to return.

Hence, “Tao is great,
Heaven is great,
Earth is great,
King is great.”
Thus, the king is one of the great four in the Universe.

Man follows the ways of the Earth.
The Earth follows the ways of Heaven,
Heaven follows the ways of the Tao,
Tao follows its own ways.

Three times I read this. Three times it confused me and thrilled my mind, made me seek out all of my ideas and concepts of God, all of my needs and desires for things that make me feel “good”, my fear of all things that are painful and “bad”; all of my thoughts bent on the why of things, the why of wanting to leave my words for someone or something to see and hear, the URGE to transmit all of my experience and knowledge to some other – WHAT IS THAT?!?! Tao. Just Tao. It is the great wanting to be great, to know itself fully and completely to want to see through all other lenses as clearly as my own, to want to polish the lens of my own experience to see through all that I’ve used to cloud that lens, all of my emotional torments and pleasures. And the pursuit of all this is hopelessly flawed, as there is no one being that I will ever physically point to and say – see, they are all knowing….. Unless I finally admit that those who know are like me and they don’t know, they are just aware that they’re not going to know and ok with the not knowing. Beyond our little minds, there is so much more that grows and thinks and sees beyond ourselves, and that which is also call Tao, God, All, Allah, Whatever…..knows and remembers all because we are part of that which is called Tao and we remember and are remembered by others.

I know, I’m rambling. But, at least I will look back on this entry, when I’m feeling like communicating with myself, and say…..well, I guess I’ll have to find out what I’ll say later, because I can’t think that far ahead. But it’ll be interesting.

Namaste
Thea