I just spoke with my dear friend Lauren, who’s in the throes of watching her cat, who’s been with her for 19 years, get ready to pass on. She asked for my advice about having Sweet Pea euthanized to avoid prolonging her suffering. After I read her this verse and told her my own experience with that tiny bee, Lauren elected to hold Sweet Pea in her lap until death claimed her. A reverence for life as a form of the Tao helps us all realize that we’re not in charge of death decisions.
Lao-tzu’s legacy is summed up magnificently in the words of T. S. Eliot, from his poem “Little Gidding”:
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started,
And know the place for the first time.
This is death—nothing to fear, nothing to do.
This is what I believe Lao-tzu is saying to you in this profound verse of the Tao Te Ching:
Discontinue fearing your death.
It makes as much sense to think about your death in fearful terms as it does to perceive the color of your eyes in such a way. The Tao is in it all—birth, life, and death. Reread the T. S. Eliot quote, as well as the 40th verse of the Tao Te Ching (which I titled “Living by Returning and Yielding”). By returning in death, you’ll truly know the Tao . . . for perhaps the first time.
Examine the ways you kill.
Make a decision that you’re no longer going to serve in the capacity of executioner, including even the smallest and seemingly most insignificant creatures, and then act on it. Live this principle by allowing the lord of life and death to decide when the return trip is to be made. Don’t make this a crusade; just make your own commitment to exist in harmony with the Tao. And by all means, don’t impose your beliefs on others, for noninterference is one of the major positions of the Tao Te Ching.
Do the Tao Now
During meditation, practice dying while still alive. That is, leave your body, discard it, and float above the world. This will help you disconnect yourself from feeling that your physical shell is who you are. The more you are the observer rather than the object of what you see, the easier it will be to remove your fear of dying. Do this for just a few minutes daily. Remember that you are not this body—you are a piece of the infinite Tao, never changing and never dying.
This excerpt from Neale Donald Walsch’s Communion with God elaborates on this thought:
Which snowflake is the most magnificent? Is it possible that they are all magnificent—and that, celebrating their magnificence together they create an awesome display? Then they melt into each other, and into the Oneness. Yet they never go away. They never disappear. They never cease to be. Simply, they change form. And not just once, but several times: from solid to liquid, from liquid to vapor, from the seen to the unseen, to rise again, and then again to return in new displays of breathtaking beauty and wonder. This is Life, nourishing Life.
This is you.
The metaphor is complete.
The metaphor is real.
You will make this real in your experience when you simply decide it is true, and act that way. See the beauty and the wonder of all whose lives you touch. For you are each wondrous indeed, yet no one more wondrous than another. And you all will one day melt into the Oneness, and know then that you form together a single stream.
75th Verse
When taxes are too high,
people go hungry.
When the government is too intrusive,
people lose their spirit.
Act for the people’s benefit;
trust them, leave them alone.
Living by
Demanding Little
This verse was intended to help the ruling classes and the nobility manage the realm. Understand that during the warring-states period in ancient China, rulers used onerous methods to impose order on the masses: They tended to keep all of the tax money that was collected from the people for themselves, flaunting their good fortune in the faces of the impoverished. Those who were overtaxed and overburdened would lose their spirit and sense of loyalty and ultimately rebel against the laws imposed upon them.
This book you’re holding in your hands isn’t intended as a social commentary to enlighten political leaders who take advantage of their positions (although I’d certainly invite any of them to take heed of Lao-tzu’s advice!). Rather, I wrote it to help you apply the inherent wisdom in each of the 81 verses of the Tao Te Ching. So you’re invited to change the way you look at assisting others to stay inspired and have contented and peaceful lives.
You may believe that demanding more from those in your charge, such as your children or co-workers, creates more productivity, but Lao-tzu suggests the opposite is true. Demand little, he advises, and even leave
