MEDITATIONS: TAO TE CHING CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

authentic knowledge is intuitive knowledge
authentic knowledge is directly experienced

it is easy to enter the tao source and way of life
through higher intuition

all you have to do is
enter a sacred precinct
pick up you life and bodymind
adjust it to the moment in space and time
play and create in the moment
be happy and content with whatever occurs

revel with your creation
rest with your creation
rejoice with your creation

when timeworn ritual feels new
you will see exactly where you are going
and be able to walk the magnificent path
in freedom measures
slowly and deliberately

it is easy to get sidetracked and lost in the wilderness
it happens all the time
but
the worst thing you can do
is worry too much about it

smile
correct the course
bring yourself back to the great road and walk
slowly and deliberately

nothing else will solve the problem of getting lost

imposed order and rigid ritual are too clean
and won’t produce anything of substance or beauty

magic coats with secret symbols can not nullify
anger, violence, or confusion
at the center of a lost man

an authentic life can not be stolen
false spirit is not the tao way of life

when order is imposed and ritual defiled
when anger, violence, and confusion are purposefully disguised
when you feed the stomach but not the soul
when you boast, brag, and push yourself on the world

you get further and further away from the tao source and way of life
indeed
you are its enemy

—Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching; An authentic Taoist translation. translated by John Bright-Fey

In today’s Meditations, let us walk the road less traveled. Much and more has already be said of authenticity and insight, so this time we will discuss what comes after: adaptation, and ultimately maintenance—adaptations made over time. Therefore, we will begin in the center of our poem:

when timeworn ritual feels new
you will see exactly where you are going
and be able to walk the magnificent path
in freedom measures
slowly and deliberately (Lao-tzu)

Timeworn rituals are those trappings and traditions which we have inherited from the culture built be our recent ancestors. They are means of understanding, celebrating, and of making meaning—but they so often seem old, tired, and trite to us now. One might say our traditional practices have lost their magic—their animating spirit originally imparted to them upon their founding. They are hollow husks of what they once were. Think of the commercialization of most holidays or the performative relationship most people have with religion. If left this way, many of these traditions will crumble and die, and those that don’t won’t be kept alive, but made into hated, lifeless institutions—prisons of culture, in effect.

However, it is possible to revivify tradition. It is possible to make those timeworn rituals feel new. Through openness via assent and acceptance, the crumbling husks can be brought back to new life. They can once again function as guiding structures and reliable maps by which to navigate the world. Interestingly, this presents a kind of paradox like those so often stumbled upon when studying Zen Buddhism:

In order to walk along the Road freely, one must encumber himself with the very boulders that block him way. It is up to him to animate the inanimate objects in his way if he truly wants to continue on his Way.

Now, I make this sound simple, as if it is easy to take on the burden of reconstituting perhaps a hundred years of cultural development. On the contrary, it is a nigh impossible task. More often than not, it will be us who are pushed off the Road while trying to budge the monumental structure standing in our way. It will often be the case that way must stray from the path just to find smaller weights with which to practice. And even after that, we still might not be capable of moving the mountain ourselves. We may need the help of others, and we might need to drop our belongings in order to move with such a tremendous burden on our backs.

Nonetheless, it must be done, so don’t worry about it. Confusion, delays, frustration, anger, setbacks, tragedy, and even betrayal are all parts of the Tao way and the Tao source of life. It is better to smile despite our suffering, set our course right, perhaps after having redrawn our maps, and then to get moving one step at a time. There is no hurry, because the goal is not the end destination but the journey along the Road itself. “Nothing else will solve the problem of getting lost,” so smile and move forward—because our other options are not worth exploring.

Those aforementioned options are, on the one hand remaining lost forever. No man survives long in those black pits of despair. On the other hand, we have the temptation toward force and tyranny which we’ve been so warned about. We will see people taking this option around us. It appears when people cling on to the skeletal institutions as they once were rather than seeing them for what they are. It is a form of denial, and type of senility in a metaphorical sense. It is the lie that accelerates the corruption and degradation of the very institution it purports to protect. It is the justification of the initiation of force—an excuse to use violence in order to impose the will of dead men onto everyone else. It is the mistake that material achievement or apparent tangible success is a sustainable substitute for meaning and moral development. As always, the deception becomes arrogance, and the arrogance fuels the deception until, inevitably, resentment foments. Life is turned against. So much better is it to smile and to accept the immense responsibility of revivification than to become enemy to being itself.

Lao-tzu. “Chapter Fifty-Three”. Tao Te Ching; An Authentic Taoist Translation, translated by John Bright-Fey, Sweetwater Press, 2014. pp.105-06