Number Thirty Five Don’t Tell
35
the night sky
goes on forever
easier to look at the moon
Lesson # 35
How do you teach enlightenment?
Not by attracting others
to your great wisdom.
Just greet those who come to you,
feed them well,
talk gently
about inconsequential things.
The traveler will not understand
what impact your peace of mind
has on them,
but you will be doing
the Tao’s work.
From: 81 Lessons from the Tao Te Ching
Number 35 Don’t tell
There is something weirdly compelling
about the Sage who lives grounded in the One
People know this person is safe
and folks begin to relax and feel at peace around them
The sage serves them food puts on some music
but doesn’t even try to preach to them
or explain to them how one can become so peaceful
This they cannot understand.
Don’t tell them about the Tao
about how it is so infinitesimal that it cannot be seen
about how it is formless but is the ground that all forms arise from
about how it is not a thing but the core principle behind everything
about how it is eternal and inexhaustible
or you will lose them for sure
NUMBER THIRTY FIVE
Hold fast the idea of “The Great,”
Then all men will be drawn to you.
They will come to you and receive no hurt,
But rest, peace and great calm.
When you provide music and exquisite food
The traveller will stay with you gladly.
When the Tao flows out from you to him
By his palate he does not detect its savour,
By his eye he cannot perceive it,
By his ears he cannot hear it,
But in using it he finds it to be inexhaustible.
Isabella Mears, The Tao Teh King, A Tentative Translation from the Chinese, William McLellan, Glascow, 1916.
Number 35 (commentary) Why don’t they get it?
Lao Tsu described the workings of the noblest kind of action, Wu Wei: Acting without efforting, influencing without manipulating, impacting others just by living your own life authentically.
When you give up trying to fix and change other people and when you give up trying to alter circumstances, people start being drawn to you.
Since you seek not to judge, they don’t feel judged and they relax.
This is enough. Don’t try to proselytize or to explain anything.
The Tao does not need you to sell it. Just live your authentic life, gently serving the life principle.
That is enough.
Tangent and Tool #35, Not Knowing (Reflective exercise) We desperately try to convince people that we are right and that they need to see things from our perspective. How is that going for you? Probably not so well. In the beginning of the second section of this book, I asked you to just listen to someone who disagreed with you. The task was to ask questions and be curious about their position without shoving yours down their throat.
Let’s go a little deeper with this exercise. After you have asked an open-ended question about a controversial topic that you hold a passionate point of view about, do this:
Step one: listen and shut up about your opinion.
Step two: Let them know that they have been listened to. “So, what I’m hearing is that you believe that …” And whether it is that they do not believe in global temperature rise or that the moon landing was staged in Hollywood by Walt Disney, keep your opinions and reactions out of it. Just receive their opinion and then do an accurate job of feeding those opinions back.
Step three: “Did I get your position correct about this?” That is all. No rebuttal. You are learning to use new muscles. This is not about winning any argument, just about learning how to receive another person’s views skillfully. And learning how to stop needing to win.