MEDITATIONS: TAO TE CHING CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT

remember
to be at your best
pattern yourself after water

nothing in all the world is softer or more powerful
nothing in all the world can substitute for it
nothing in all the world can stop it

in their hearts
everyone easily knows that
the soft and weak
will always overcome the hard and strong
but they find it difficult to live this way

the secret is to
move the bodymind like water

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

Recall the “soft and weak” as being the changeable and adaptive. Think of the “hard and strong” as being rigid and stubborn. From this understanding, the conclusion naturally flows: that which is fit for the situation at hand, that which is adaptive, suited to handle the particular set of circumstances one finds himself in, is necessarily more powerful—meaning better able to make manifest one’s will. Nothing can stop a will whose exercise of power is to adapt to the conditions of the universe it finds itself in. On the other hand, a rigid will which acts according to how it desires circumstances to be is by definition maladaptive. It is necessarily powerless, as the actions and beliefs which flow from such a will shall encounter obstacles unaccounted for (i.e. ignored), and therefore such a will can only run headlong into walls.

We all know this to be true, though still we find great difficulty in making the best of what we have rather than wishing for the world to be different than it is. The secret to overcoming this challenge is habit. Think and act like that we wish to be, and we will become that very thing. If we spend all of our time merely fantasizing, never working toward betting ourselves nor practicing preferable thought patterns, then of course we will make no headway. But if instead we remind ourselves daily to be like water, to humble ourselves and to gladly put our hands to work, nourishing all thing with which we come into contact, then we can find equilibrium within ourselves and success in our callings.

Lao-tzu. “Chapter Seventy-Eight”. Tao Te Ching; An Authentic Taoist Translation, translated by John Bright-Fey, Sweetwater Press, 2014. p.140