Quiet Tao

Reason for the Season? – Quiet Tao Reason for the Season? December 19, 20180 Merry Christmas! That’s my main message, only read on if you have some time to ponder with me… Reason for the Season? I sat working during the morning over the weekend, listening to Jewel’s Christmas album, Joy a Holiday Collection (a favorite of mine ...

Mere fleas...

THE WELL

Although the sun edges the rocks, the morning air is cold. The well is a short walk from the hut. Hundreds of years ago, another recluse lined it with stone and fashioned a wooden cover for it. Think about that. Some unknown person cared enough to leave this vital source for others.

That person has long vanished, but their work has aided others ever since. You think of this as you lower the bucket. You’ll do the same. You think how you are, after all, temporary on this mountain. There will be others after you, century after century.

The bucket fills, and you start to haul it up, hand over hand. You might install a pump as your contribution for someone to appreciate later. But then, you wonder if installing a pump would be doing anyone a favor.

You fill one canteen, then lower the bucket again.

The hole is black. You can hear the water and feel it. You know it is precious. You regret what’s spilled as it seeps back into the earth. Nothing is lost. Just like death. Death is a mystery. So is the eternal filling of water at the well.

Why is there water on this solid rock peak? Why is anything so? Nature doesn’t ask, explain, theorize, or plan. It simply does. We search for resources, and we live on them. Nature didn’t make this place for you. You came to live where it was good. When you’re thirsty, you have to go to the well. The well does not come to you.

No well, and you die. No shelter, and you die. No air, cold or not, and you die. No gravity, and you drift away. No garden, and you go hungry. No sun, and you find neither warmth nor sight. The deluded think they can dominate the earth, but we’re mere fleas jumping in the crevices of a huge cloak.

You heft the canteens, only now you’re bringing something extra back: reverence.

Short piece for local studio's March newsletter here in Eugene, OR. A preamble for something more poignant coming soon.

The Struggle is Real – Quiet Tao The Struggle is Real April 2, 20180 You utter the popular “the struggle is real” saying to someone and you’ll almost always get an all-knowing nod or head shake. “Truth.” Because we all inevitably suffer the trials of life. It’s a thing that makes us human, and it connects us all. The st...

A Prayer for the Year of the Noble Dog – Quiet Tao A Prayer for the Year of the Noble Dog February 17, 20180 11th Wonder, Discerning Guardian Watch over Us as we Rest Enlighten our Dreams Bring Intelligence to our Designs Guide our Accelerations in Action Protect Our Risk-Takings Endow Us with your Compassion in Service Help us in Hope and Health Ma...

There is...

THERE IS A WAY

Tao: there is a Way.
Instead of a series of confusing encounters, arbitrary occurrences, and anxiety for the future, there is a path.

Tao: there is a Method.
Instead of trying things at random, we’ve been given a philosophy and a record that can help us make choices for surely a better life.

Tao: there is a Principle.
Life is understandable. It is not a gigantic existential crisis. There’s a principle, and a Method.

Tao: there is a Direction.
The universe flows together in one direction. When we take that same direction, we are preserved and our future comes more easily.

Tao: there is a Truth.
This life and this earth are honest. All around us is truth, and if we want to know that truth, it is there to be seen.

Way. Method. Principle. Direction. Truth.
These are just some of the translated meanings to the word “Tao.” Tao is a way of life, a way of knowing principle, direction, and truth.

Follow Tao and all will follow from Tao.

This for the Seeker.

WHY SUPERSTARS ARE BORING

If you’ve ever had the chance to be with a celebrity or superstar—and I’m also thinking of martial arts and spiritual masters—there’s little room for you except as a member of an adoring audience. You are one among the crowds restrained by barriers while the star is on the other side, smiling, shaking hands, and giving out the occasional autograph or posing for a selfie. That’s also how it is psychologically. The common people are always on the other side of the barrier.

In conversation, there’s little to talk about except that star’s accomplishments. They’re always the gold medal winner with the decades-long career at the top. The same is true of masters: they were the prodigies, the protégés, the great healers, the unbeaten records, the teachers to kings. And you know why that’s boring? Because they have little left to achieve and little left to realize. They keep cautious, never willing to risk moving an inch from their pedestal.

The spiritual path of the ordinary seeker is different. No pedestal—only the road. There is always something new. There is always another vista. Be a Taoist, where the path is endless, and the experiences always fresh. And you won’t be boring, because every day will be one of discovery.

We can categorize all we want...but it's this simple.

MEDITATION IS THE INVERSION OF REGULAR LIFE

You can’t understand meditation by our ordinary terms. I know lots of people are trying. Scientists want to prove that it’s clinically effective, and people promote it as an activity that will make us super. We’re supposed to be more smart, focused, healthy, and even psychic. If you’ve seen the Lone Wolf and Cub movies from the 1970s, you saw Ogami Itto deep in meditation—just before he was attacked by samurai and he rose to defeat them all. That was fun, but misleading.

But those movies can still offer us a metaphor: Itto was trying to get away from ordinary life. In the same way, meditation is the inversion of our regular life. Instead of working because you have to do something, it works because you don’t have to do anything.

It works by being still. You don't "do" anything. You "don't do" anything. If it was any different, it would still be regular life. Instead, it's the opposite, so you have to shed your regular attitudes. As soon as you sit down and let everything go, something extraordinary happens.

You breathe. You take in good air. You become calm. All the toxins drain from you. All your distractions fall away. Suddenly, you’ve awakened from a dream.

As it is.

This is so beautiful. I was crying by the second line, Written by Henry Scott Holland (27 January 1847 – 17 March 1918) was Regius Professor of Divinity at the University of Oxford

Welcome the Year of the Wood Goat - Make Connections.

Who am I?
Who am I meant to be?
Come, walk with Me now.
Together, We are meant to Be.
Walk with me into the Pastures.
Walk with me into the Mountains.
Walk with me…into the Great Sea.
Our differences are what We need.
We are what We must share.
For this is Our world.
This, is Our world.
Who am I?
Who am I meant to be?

QT - LNY 2015

Gallop swiftly on Wood Horse.

Carry Me from my Fears
So I may gallop toward Freedom.
Lend me strength so My
Heart may Persevere.
On your shoulders my Character
Will stand Tall and True.
With the Winds of Heaven
Propel me to Movement and Action

Winter's Course. "Let reality be reality." - Lao Tzu