Number 48 Non-action

48
take off your backpack
next your boots, then your mask
lie down, be the forest

Lesson # 48

Our hunger to KNOW more and more
is yet another enemy
to our knowing deeply
the true nature of things.
We must begin to unknow.
Unknow
who we think we are.
Unknow
what we think this world is.
Keep looking within,
and unknow more and more.
What emerges
from unknowing it all?

From: 81 Lessons from the Tao Te Ching


Number 48 Learning and letting go

When you set off to learn something new
it pays to learn all you can about the subject
acquiring knowledge and experience along the way

But when you set off to meet the Tao
the more you can let go of everything
the closer you get

Let go of what you thought you knew
Let go of what you thought you were supposed to do
Let go of who you thought you are
Keep letting go and letting go until you find your empty center

Then, from that center
you act with non-action
not seeking gain praise power or recognition
And when you are done
you stop acting
and just support the natural flow of the universe
as it unfolds
without your controlling interference


NUMBER FORTY EIGHT

By activity in learning we are daily enriched.
By activity of Tao we are daily diminished,
diminished and yet more diminished,
until we arrive at activity of Inner Life,
and activity of Inner Life becomes stillness of Inner Life.
By the practice of Inner Life stillness we can continually conquer all things.
By the practice of returning to possessions,
nothing that we conquer will be sufficient for us.

Isabella Mears, The Tao Teh King, A Tentative Translation from the Chinese, William McLellan, Glascow, 1916.


Number 48 (commentary) What is non-action?

You will not find the Tao by reading this book.
It is not in any one book, lecture, experience, drug trip, blessing of the Guru, or moment of spiritual opening.
Awareness of the Tao sort of creeps up on you as you let go of parts of yourself: beliefs, judgements, rules, self-images.
Those hard places in you reluctantly start to break off and drift away until not much is left of who you took yourself to be.
From the quiet space in you where you are empty of the need for gain, empty of the fear of loss, empty of the desire to impress or please, you just give of yourself to what needs to be done and then return to stillness.
Welcome home!

Tangent and Tool #48, Nothing else (Reflective exercise) In Jean Paule Sartre’s play No Exit, one character, who is in a weird, Hell-like afterlife, is reflecting on the lasting worth of his life. He asserts, “A man is what he wills himself to be!” Another character answers back, “It’s what one does and nothing else, that shows the stuff one’s made of.” And soon after that she says, “You are—your life and nothing else.”
This existential tenant is especially relevant when it comes to spiritual teachings. You can be a high scholar of the sacred texts, a preacher of great renown, or a proselytizing, sincere student and have very little real spiritual realization. Neither the wealth of your learning, nor the eloquence with which you speak of it are real spirituality. Lao Tsu is pointing us to the only two things that really matter; How we embrace the Tao and how we live our life.