Do the Tao; find your personal ways of living in the mystery. As Lao-tzu says in this 1st verse, “And the mystery itself is the doorway to all understanding.”
Here’s my advice for translating this passage into daily practice in this 21st century:
First and foremost, enjoy the mystery!
Let the world unfold without always attempting to figure it all out. Let relationships just be, for example, since everything is going to stretch out in Divine order. Don’t try so hard to make something work—simply allow. Don’t always toil at trying to understand your mate, your children, your parents, your boss, or anyone else, because the Tao is working at all times. When expectations are shattered, practice allowing that to be the way it is. Relax, let go, allow, and recognize that some of your desires are about how you think your world should be, rather than how it is in that moment. Become an astute observer . . . judge less and listen more. Take time to open your mind to the fascinating mystery and uncertainty that we all experience.
Practice letting go of always naming and labeling.
The labeling process is what most of us were taught in school. We studied hard to be able to define things correctly in order to get what we called “high grades.” Most educational institutions insisted on identifying everything, leading to a tag that distinguished us as graduates with knowledge of specific categories. Yet we know, without anyone telling us, that there is no title, degree, or distinguishing label that truly defines us. In the same way that water is not the word water—any more than it is agua, Wasser, or H2O—nothing in this universe is what it’s named. In spite of our endless categorizations, each animal, flower, mineral, and human can never truly be described. In the same way, the Tao tells us that “the name that can be named is not the eternal name.” We must bask in the magnificence of what is seen and sensed, instead of always memorizing and categorizing.
Do the Tao Now
At some point today, notice an instance of annoyance or irritation you have with another person or situation. Decide to do the Tao (or practice the Way) in that moment by turning inward with curiosity about where you are on the continuum between desire and allowing. Permit the paradox of wanting the irritant to vanish and allowing it to be what it is. Look inward for it in your thoughts and allow yourself to feel it wherever it is and however it moves in your body.
Turn all of your attention to becoming open-minded, allowing permissiveness to befriend the mystery within yourself. Notice how the feeling manifests itself: perhaps doing “loop-de-loops” in your stomach, giving a rigidness to your skeleton, making your heart pound, or tightening your throat. Wherever it is, allow it as an enigmatic messenger within you, and give it nonjudgmental attention. Notice the desire for the feeling to disappear, and allow it to be monitored compassionately by you. Accept whatever comes. Encounter the mystery within without labeling, explaining, or defending. It’s a subtle distinction at first, which you must take personal responsibility for identifying. You alone can prepare the ground of your being for the experience of living the mystery.
2nd Verse
Under heaven all can see beauty as beauty,
only because there is ugliness.
All can know good as good only because there is evil.
Being and nonbeing produce each other.
The difficult is born in the easy.
Long is defined by short, the high by the low.
Before and after go along with each other.
So the sage lives openly with apparent duality
and paradoxical unity.
The sage can act without effort
and teach without words.
Nurturing things without possessing them,
he works, but not for rewards;
he competes, but not for results.
When the work is done, it is forgotten.
That is why it lasts forever.
Living the
Paradoxical Unity
The concept of something or someone being beautiful is grounded in a belief system that promotes duality and judgment. This way of thinking is prevalent and commonplace for just about everybody in our culture, perhaps even having some value in society. I encourage you to explore the concept of paradoxical unity in this 2nd verse of the Tao Te Ching. By changing your thoughts, you can change your life and truly live the bliss of oneness.
Has it ever occurred to you that beauty depends on something being identified as ugly? Therefore, the idea of beauty produces the idea of ugliness, and vice versa. Just think of how many concepts in this “duality belief system” depend on opposites: A person isn’t tall unless there’s a belief system that includes short. Our idea of life couldn’t exist without that of death. Day is the opposite of night. Male is the antithesis of female.
What if you instead perceived all as a piece (or a glimpse) of the perfection of oneness? I think this is what Lao-tzu is suggesting with his description of the sage who “lives openly with apparent duality and paradoxical unity.” Imagine the perfect oneness coexisting in the apparent duality, where opposites are simply judgments made by human minds in the world of 10,000 things. Surely the daffodil doesn’t think that the daisy is prettier or uglier than it is, and the eagle and the mouse have no
