Taoism & Zen

I've recently started looking into Zen Buddhism. This may seem strange in a blog ostensibly about Taoism, but I've come to realize how close the two are. In the process I've had to shed a lot of ideas I held about Zen which were based on ignorance or misunderstandings. For anybody interested in Taoism I'd recommend they investigate the basics of Zen to see if it can be of use to them.

The origin of Zen Buddhism (or in Chinese - Chán) is credited to the Indian Buddhist monk Bodhidarma, who is said to have travelled to China to bring a new method of directly achieving enlightenment. Chán Buddhism evolved through the fusion of Taoist and Buddhist ideas, developing its full expression in China, Japan, Vietnam and Korea.

By my understanding, the enlightened state that Zen students seek is one and the same as the harmony sought by Taoists. Where Taoism & Zen differ is the path to this harmony or enlightenment. Taoism at its purest is spontaneous and unstudied. To practice any kind of discipline in order to achieve harmony is to have missed the point. Zen on the other hand is developed on the principal that while there are many paths to enlightenment, they are unreliable, erratic and transient. The Zen approach has been developed to enable more predictable and permanent results. Whichever side of the debate you find yourself, it is obvious that each have a lot to offer the other in the way of observations and perspective.

For myself, my interest in Zen relates to this idea of the transitory nature of enlightenment. I've had experiences which I'd describe as having glimpses of harmony, but after lasting seconds, minutes, or once a sequence of sporadic experiences over a few days, the state is lost again. Almost at will I can reach the state but I don't have the tools to keep myself there. I'm hoping that Zen may shed some light on this.

The experience of harmony also led me to misunderstand its significance. At first I attributed to it an almost mystical nature - something beyond the ordinary world, but now I've come to appreciate more of its true meaning. I hope that through understanding the observations of the Zen masters I might be able to even better judge my own experiences and continue to progress along the path.

To get a flavour of the similarities between Zen and Taoism, here's something written by Dr. D.T. Suzuki in his book An Introduction to Zen Buddhism (ISBN 0-09-151121-6) which is based on a series of essays he wrote during World War I. It's an interesting and thought provoking book which I'd recommend...

The basic idea of Zen is to come in touch with the inner workings of our being, and to do so in the most direct way possible, without resorting to anything external or superadded. Therefore, anything that has the semblance of an external authority is rejected by Zen. Absolute faith is placed in a man's own inner being. For whatever authority there is in Zen, all comes from within. This is true in the strictest sense of the word. Even the reasoning faculty is not considered final or absolute. On the contrary, it hinders the mind from coming into the directest communication with itself....

The central fact of life as it is lived is what Zen aims to grasp, and this in the most direct and most vital manner. Zen professes itself to be the spirit of Buddhism, but in fact it is the spirit of all religions and philosophies. When Zen is thoroughly understood, absolute peace of mind is attained, and a man lives as he ought to live...

Some say that as Zen is admittedly a form of mysticism it cannot claim to be unique in the history of religion. Perhaps so; but Zen is a mysticism of its own order. It is mystical in the sense that the sun shines, that the flower blooms, that I hear at this moment somebody beating the drum in the street. If these are mystical facts, Zen is brim-full of them...

When a Zen master was once asked what Zen was, he replied, "Your everyday thought". Is this not plain and straightforward? It has nothing to do with any sectarian spirit. Christians as well as Buddhists can practise Zen just as big fish and small fish are both contentedly living in the same ocean. Zen is the ocean, Zen is the air, Zen is the mountain, Zen is thunder and lightning, the spring flower, summer heat, and winter snow; nay, more than that, Zen is the man...

National Unitarian Fellowship

Well after further investigation I've decided to join the National Unitarian Fellowship forum fully, with a view to becoming a paid-up member of the NUF in due course. The natives seem very friendly and I've been very impressed with the breadth of discussion and the supportive nature of the community there & I'd recommend having a look. One point to note is that you don't really get to see most of the forum activity unless you join, but joining the forum itself is free. I'll post more when I've had a chance to more fully participate there.

New Taoist Community

Not a proper blog, just a "heads up." Along with another Reform Taoism member I've set up a site we're calling "The New Taoist Community." I've described it as being "an experimental site for philosophical Taoists, Pantheists, Zen Buddhists and others with an interest in the fundamentals underlying Taoism to explore the subject and find ways to develop a meaningful communal approach to expressing their beliefs in the 21st century."

The idea is that in the forum we can explore the aspects of our spirituality that we hold in common and try to find communal ways of expressing this to develop a real community. What form this will take & how it will look - well that's something for the members to decide.

You can find the New Taoist Community at http://sites.google.com/site/newtaoistcommunity/

Unitarian Universalism

Continuing on my search for Taoist suitable communities I've also been pointed by a fellow blogger to Unitarian Universalism. I'd come across them before but for some reason felt that they might be too much of a Christian organisation. Looking at them again I realise that while their roots are in liberal Christianity, they are more about supporting individual searches for spiritual development and understanding than about any particular creed, and they may be a potential home for this Taoist. Certainly what I've read online from Taoists, Buddhists, Pantheists and Pagans seems very positive.

From internet research it seems that some of the physical churches may be more centered on Liberal Christianity than others (particularly in the UK), but their modern tradition is striving to accommodate all seekers who support their principles which are....

• The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
• Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;
• Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations;
• A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;
• The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large;
• The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all;
• Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.

They list the sources of their faith as...

• Direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces which create and uphold life;
• Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion, and the transforming power of love;
• Wisdom from the world's religions which inspires us in our ethical and spiritual life;
• Jewish and Christian teachings which call us to respond to God's love by loving our neighbors as ourselves;
• Humanist teachings which counsel us to heed the guidance of reason and the results of science, and warn us against idolatries of the mind and spirit.
• Spiritual teachings of earth-centred traditions which celebrate the sacred circle of life and instruct us to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature.

They have members who identify with the major Western Monotheistic religions, but also members who are Buddhist, Hindu, Atheist, Pantheist, Pagan, Humanist and Taoist.

I'm interested in exploring this community more, so as a first step I've taken trial membership of the Church of the Larger Fellowship, the online Unitarian Universalist congregation. This site has lots of interesting resources including a new discussion list for Taoist members and those with some interest in Taoism.

For the UK the organising bodies are The General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches and the National Unitarian Fellowship, while the international body is The International Council of Unitarians and Universalists. I'll post again on this subject when I've had more time to explore, but you might find these sites useful if you're looking for a community expereience as part of your spiritual journey.

Pantheism

I've been thinking for a while that there's something missing from my Taoist experience. I've had difficulty putting my finger on it but I think at last I've got there. I seem to be missing the feeling of wonder and awe at the world around me and I feel that that is something which I need as part of my experience of life. It could be a failing of philosophical Taoism but is more probably something missing in my understanding or a level of experience of the Tao that I've not yet reached.

I've also been looking around at "spiritual" communities where a Taoist might feel at home. A place where there is the opportunity to explore my beliefs with those that share similar ones, but also those who have travelled seemingly complementary paths. I had hoped that the Reform Taoist Congregation might be that place but it has not got there yet. I hope that someday it might develop into such a place but for the moment I believe it will be a long while before it develops beyond being an internet forum, albeit one well worth participating in for the quality of opinions and the pleasantness of the company.

Through exchanging messages with some of the people I've met on the Reform Taoism forum I've found modern scientific Pantheism and the World Pantheist Movement. Scientific Pantheism seems to me to be Philosophical Taoism with an emphasis on a reverence for nature. They list their beliefs as...

• Reverence for Nature and the wider Universe.
• Active respect and care for the rights of all humans and other living beings.
• Celebration or our lives in our bodies on this beautiful earth as a joy and a privilege.
• Realism - acceptance that the external world exists independently of human consciousness or perception.
• Strong naturalism, without belief in supernatural realms, afterlives, beings or forces.
• Respect for reason, evidence and the scientific method as our best ways of understanding nature and the Universe.
• Promotion of religious tolerance, freedom of religion and complete separation of state and religion.

I'm not sure if the World Pantheist Movement might be that home I'm looking for, or one of several, but I feel it's interesting enough to be checked out further. I'll post more on this when I've gained more experience of the WPM and how this reverence does or does not fit with my understanding of Taoism, but I recommend that you visit their site to see if it has something to offer you.

Evil

I've just joined a new Taoism discussion list. It's hosted on the Unitarian Universalist "Church of the Larger Fellowship" site (for more on this see the following post). One of the first posts asked about Taoism's view on the existence of Evil and what it tells us about dealing with people who are destructive or intend to cause harm. Answering this question has probably been the most difficult post to write, requiring a lot of thought, and I'm not completely sure about everything in my answer. For what it's worth, the following is the answer I arrived at...

From a Taoist perspective Evil doesn't exist - it's just an excuse we use to distance ourselves from human actions which we find abhorrent. By saying "it's evil", "he's evil", "she's evil" etc, what we are really saying is that they must be evil or being influenced by evil because there's no way we would ever act like that. Of course the reality is that the potential for such actions lies within all of us.

So if we are all capable of truly "evil" acts, why are they relatively rare? Followers of monotheistic religions often claim that it is because of the moral guidance that they offer, yet people that don't follow those religions seem no more likely to commit such acts, and in fact some of the worst cases of genocide have taken place in countries with a strong monotheistic tradition (e.g. Germany, Rwanda, Bosnia, Darfur).

Taoism gives a different answer. We each have something called our "Te", which is our "inner nature", our bit of the Tao. Taoism teaches that the closer we are to being in harmony with our Te, the more in balance we are with the whole of existence. The further we move from our Te, the greater the stresses and pressures we are subject to. Chaos theory demonstrates that a complex system that is stressed has the potential for wildly extreme behaviour. Think of a pan of water boiling - when first the heat is applied patterns form as convection occurs, neat patterns of small bubbles start rising to the surface, and then at some point the amount of energy in the system hits a point at which it starts to wildly boil without any obvious order. People are the same, except instead of heat, it is the distance from harmony with the Te that is the driving force. That is the source of "evil."

In the case of some sexual crimes this distancing can easily be seen. The perpetrators are those who for some reason have become distanced from naturally expressing their sexuality - possibly because of attempting to conform to religious or social "norms", psychological problems resulting from parental relations, or due to being abused themselves. They have become so distanced from their Te that their sexuality becomes distorted and tangled with issues of power and self-worth, with pressure building until it finds an outlet.This doesn't excuse their actions, but understanding the source is a lot more useful than attributing the actions to some nebulous concept of "evil."

So what does Taoism teach us about dealing with "evil?" Taoism has a long history of supporting acts to defend the self or the defenceless but it offers no easy answers. It does however provide guidance which we can use to try to navigate our way through the problems we encounter. To explain these I'll talk about violence, but the principles can be applied to any situation.

In anything taken to the extreme there is the root of its opposite. So if you meet violence with enough violence, peace can occur - possibly because all the participants are sick of the carnage or dead - but if the violence is not in harmony with our Te, we might bring peace through violence but move ourselves further from our Te, increasing the stresses and maybe making us act as badly as those we were trying to stop.

To balance one action you can apply the opposite. So to combat violence you can use passive resistance. Gandhi used such tactics against the military power of the British Empire and won. By employing the opposite he took away the power of the violent. However, excessive passivity in itself can lead to violence, and perhaps events in India after independence can be seen as partly the result of this?

Taoism advocates finding the middle way. In Tai Chi the aim is to use your opponent's energy to defeat himself. Through a careful balance of force and passivity the energy is drained from the opponent and he is unable to attack any more - the heat under the pan is turned down, at least for a while. In everyday life the same techniques can be applied.

Back to the original question "how to deal with other's 'toxic' auras and behaviour?.....since others sometimes actively seek out to harm you or people close to you?"....A Taoist wouldn't seek to "defeat" or "fix" such people, but rather would try to use a mix of intuition, intellect, guile, distraction, force and passivity to negate the effects of their actions and to reduce the energy driving it - for instance an angry person shouting and bullying loses energy rapidly when encountering somebody who seems calm, polite, controlled and unflustered.

Hold on to your hats!

Last September I began studying for a degree with the Open University, the UK's national distance learning University. It began as a way of having some intellectual stimulus over the next few years while I'm staying at home raising our son, but I've also realised how many areas of study have something to say with regards to the world around us, and hence about Taoism.

In a few days I begin a course examining the impact of technology on the environment and the potential of technology to deal with the consequences. This will require me to spend extra time studying while I get organised with the course so I probably won't be posting here much for a while. There are however several things I've been meaning to write about, so I'm going to try to get them all out of the way in one go. I don't normally like to post on different issues in quick succession as I like to take some time to mull over my views, but I hope you'll excuse me if this time my ideas seem more half-baked than usual ;-)

The benefits of following Taoism

So to paraphrase the song, "Taoism! What is it good for?"

Well here's my take on it. I came to Taoism partly as a rejection of other belief systems that I had encountered. So many times religions encourage us to stop thinking, distrust the evidence of experience, and instead use "faith." Something like..."So you think the sky looks blue? Our holy book say it is green. Have faith and trust that it is green and it is just an evil spirit that is making you think it is blue!" There also tends to be reliance on teachers, priests, gurus or saints who hold some deep hidden knowledge which they "interpret" for the masses, but which the "masses" are for some reason unable to see directly for themselves. For me it all smacks of fraud and deception.

Taoism on the other hand encourages us to seek our own experience and develop our own understanding. Through the observation and direct experience of nature we find a way to live a life true to who and what we are, but not one that suppresses another's chance to do the same and reach their own understanding. Something like "You think the sky is blue? Then for you it is blue, but maybe for somebody else it might look green." As Taoism is not telling us how things are it encounters no conflict with advances in scientific understanding.

Taoism is free of things such as guilt and shame which IMHO never have a positive influence on human behaviour. If you believe that you are shameful or guilty just through being alive, what sort of person are you likely to become? I believe these are just tools used by some religions as a means of control.

Taoism is a path of peace. Whilst violence is not precluded in Taoism, the self-awareness that is developed in following the path reduces the influence of the ego which I believe is at the root of most conflict. For most Taoists resorting to violence is a final step reserved for the most extreme situations and for the protection of those that are unable to protect themselves.

Taoism also equips Taoists with tools which help them live their lives, understand events and develop the perspective which helps to avoids the extremes of living where so many problems are found. Taoism is also a rejection of intolerance and hatred of difference, and variety is part of the joy of existence. Balance, harmony, perspective, compassion - all of these are at the heart of Taoism and lead to IMHO an enhanced life experience.

Taoism also helps us to understand our place in existence, neither deluding ourselves about how important we are, nor undermining our relevance or diminishing our place in nature. Learning to really know who we are gives us the ability to make the most of our lives without wasting time pursuing illusions.

How to become a Taoist

I want to write a couple of short posts about becoming a Taoist and what I see as the benefits. Firstly I'll concentrate on becoming a Taoist.

For philosophical Taoists there's no ceremony, initiation or exam required before you can consider yourself a Taoist, but I do believe that there's a process. Taoism is about a journey of self-discovery, or more correctly self-rediscovery, a rediscovery and acceptance of your true nature while stripping away the baggage, preconceptions and misconceptions that you've collected growing up or in adult life. Through this journey you begin to experience reality in a different way and find that the highs and lows of life have less impact upon you.

So at what stage do you become a Taoist? Well, you'll find that lots of Taoists say something like "...and then I realised that I'd been a Taoist for ages, but just didn't know it!" In my experience, for most people, by the time they come across Taoism or the Tao Te Ching they're already on the journey and just recognise in Taoism something that they've understood on some level for ages. However I believe that there's an extra step beyond this recognition before you should consider yourself a Taoist, and that's taking the step of deciding to actively engage with Taoism and to decide to live your life exploring what this means.

Change

Change seems to be the word of the moment. With Barack Obama's election in the US, with chaos in financial markets, with the change in direction of economies. How should we deal with change?

Personally, I've reached one of those points where you wonder which direction you should go next. There's a debate in the Reform Taoist community about how we progress in the future - whether we continue the way we have been going or try a new direction. The question for me is "Is my journey best served by trying to fight for change within the organisation, or would it be better for those of us that want change to form a new community that reflects our needs at this time?"

I've been reading around looking for inspiration and I found some in Deng Ming-Dao's book Everyday Tao. He talks about the early observers of Tao, and how they found it by observing the world around them, seeing things born, grow and wither. He uses the image of a man running down a path to describe Tao. This movement and change is at the heart of the Tao, although of course stillness and stagnation are also there. It is in the movement and change that we see the vitality of the Tao. It got me thinking that if Reform Taoism has stagnated from my perspective, perhaps starting a new community where members were more able to express themselves and develop would be the "running man" path.

Any change is a step into the unknown - it's easier and safer to go with the status-quo. If you change, you might fail so maybe it's better to leave things as they are. But does this truly lead to a fulfilling journey through life though? If I'm asking the question, maybe the decision is already made? Is it possible to return to acceptance? I think you can see where this is leading me, but I've not completely decided so watch this space!

On the wider front, what does Taoism teach us about dealing with change? Change is inevitable. It can be held at bay for a time through effort, but it can never be stopped. In following Taoism we try to experience and understand our true inner nature. Using the analogy of water (well the clue's in the name of the Blog!) if we are in a river we can cling for as long as we can to the sides before our strength fails and we are swept helplessly downstream by the current. Or, through self-knowledge and self-confidence, we can embrace the flow of the river, let the current take us, and use our strength and skill at appropriate moments to avoid any rocks in our path. The latter is the Taoist way, but be warned! It can be scary.

Tao,Taoism & Atheism

I'm continually trying to find a way to make my understanding of the Tao and Taoism more accessible. I haven't got there yet, but as part of this process I've written a response to a post on the Atheist Nexus questioning whether somebody could be an atheist and a Taoist at the same time. FWIW my response follows - the bits in orange are excerpt from the original poster's entry...


People get hung up on the Tao - imagining that it is some esoteric mystical something far away or out of sight. In fact it is mundane, routine, common & everywhere. The roots of Taoism are in the observation of nature and, while some Taoist religious traditions may adopt a mystical or god-like interpretation, Taoism is basically a set of observations about the world around us and what they can tell us about how we can live our lives. Note: how we can NOT how we should live our lives.

Taoism states that everything in the world is believed to be a manifestation of the Tao and are restricted, in a sense, by the Tao....The Tao is unity (whatever that means...

A simple way to envisage it is...

There is something which for convenience we call "the Tao" which has certain properties.
Part of the Tao we call "the Universe" and it has some, but not all, of the properties of the Tao
Part of the Universe we call "the Earth" and it has some, but not all, of the properties of the Universe
Part of the Earth we call "Me" and I have some, but not all, of the properties of the Earth.

...still not happy? ...Think about your big toe.

It is part of the unity you call "you" - yet it can also be thought of as a separate thing called "a big toe."



the tao is described as being indescribable (doesn't that sound familiar to something other theists say about their God?)

The Tao is not indescribable, it is just impossible to completely describe. Any description is just a poor approximation capturing only some of its true nature, and the description is not the same as the thing itself. This is easy to demonstrate with an example...
.
Think of a nice yellow painted HB graphite pencil. Now describe it completely

Obviously you can talk about it's colour, length, width, and weight. You can talk about he paint on its sides, the type of wood it is made from, how pointy it is, does it have an eraser, where the graphite came from, and who made the pencil. You can describe all the different uses for the pencil - writing, drawing, poking holes in things...

Have you described it completely yet?

What about the design & the designer of the pencil? What about the culture that produced the designer? What about the evolution of mankind that produced the pencil designer's culture? What about the evolution of the tree that provides the wood? What about the origin of the Carbon in the graphite? What about the subtle changes occurring in the pencil due to variations in temperature & pressure, or decay over time? What about the origin and evolution of the universe in which the pencil exists?

To fully describe the pencil you need to describe everything in the entire Universe from the dawn to the end of time, otherwise all you have achieved is an approximation. Then of course you'd have to repeat the above for all different cultures and languages on earth because language and culture can accommodate subtle differences in understanding and meaning. Once you've done that you'd then need to describe it from the perspective of a dog, or a bird, or the subtle gravitational effects the pencil's mass exerts on a distant Sun and its impact on any alien life. Even if this could be achieved it would still be an approximation because at the sub-atomic level it becomes difficult to describe things except through probability.

Assuming it were somehow possible to compile a complete description in all ways of the pencil - could you write with the description? Could you draw a picture with it? All you would have would be a description not the physical pencil.

So the Tao that can be described is not the real Tao - it is just a collection of words that goes some way to give an approximate description of the real Tao.

Celebrating the Winter Solstice

As Reform Taoists we try to celebrate certain events, not for the belief in a higher power, but because they remind us of the path we are on. One of these events is the Winter Solstice (Northern Hemisphere) as the time when a process changed direction and the world begins the journey towards Spring.

This is how I plan to mark the Solstice...

I'll wait until the rest of my noisy family have gone to sleep, pour out a small glass of Port and then I'll have all the lights off and light a single candle. I'll relax just watching the candle for a bit, then I'll spend a short time remembering good things about family members & friends who have died, drink a toast to them with the Port, blow out the candle and then probably stub my toe trying to find the light switch

The candle is for a few reasons...

1 - Midwinter celebrations across the world have long associations with light
2 - At the time of maximum darkness there is a point of light, reminiscent of the taijitu (yin yang symbol).
3 - I like candles


Thinking about deceased family members & friends is because...

1 - There are long associations with this time of year being linked with death & renewal
2 - It's nice to take some time out to remember people who have gone & this time seems as good as any.


The Port is because I like Port.

Physics & the Tao

We've been discussing the Tao and the Big Bang, how they are related and how Taoism is viewed by scientists. Is the Big Bang the same thing as the creation of the 10000 things referred to in the Tao Te Ching and can Taoism make predictions relevant to Physics?

My feelings are that I'd be cautious about directly linking the origins of the universe with the origin of the 10000 things. Taoism teaches us that there are no absolutes and already scientific theory is moving beyond the big bang with ideas such as M-theory and ideas that "time" in some form can pre-exist the big bang. There will also be the limitless manifestations of Tao which are forever beyond our knowing. What is interesting is that again and again in science we come across the same ideas as are found in Taoism and it is no surprise that we see something of the origin of the 10000 things reflected in our knowledge of the big bang.

As for Taoism and science? I'd venture that most scientists don't know or understand Taoism. Certainly those that encountered it like Bohr clearly saw the conceptual links between Physics and Taoism. Taoism is a series of statements of demonstrable fact combined with conclusions on what this tells us about how we can live our lives. The statements hold true wherever they are applied and so are just as valid in Physics or Mathematics. For example, by my understanding, Mandlebrot's analysis of the length of the coast of Britain demonstrating that a finite area can be enclosed by a line of infinite length is easily predicted from the opening lines of the Tao Te Ching - for exactly the same reasons. Equally Mandlebrot's work is an elegant example of the meaning of "The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao".

The advancement of science has been repeatedly held back by adopted orthodoxies - like the belief of God's hand at the heart of everything, celestial bodies moving in perfect circles, or the mechanistic predictable view of the universe's workings. These orthodoxies have repeatedly led to the dissenters being ostracised, outcast or whatever until, in a revolution brought about by a failing of the old orthodoxy, suddenly the old paradigm is overturned leading to some of the dissenters being validated. To the best of my knowledge, each time this has happened the new paradigm has moved closer to a picture of the universe in accord with that of Taoism.

Taoism doesn't need science to validate it, and science doesn't need Taoism - but the roots of both are the same and I believe each can provide something useful to the other.

Homosexuality

On the Reform Taoism forum a question was raised about what Taoism tells us about homosexuality and legal gay relationships. For what it's worth, here's my answer...

IMHO there's a few points here.... The first is that the Tao Te Ching is not a religious text in the same way as the Bible or Qur'an. It does not claim to be the "word of God" or some kind of infallible reference, but rather is the observations of either one or a group of people depending on what you believe. I like to think of it as a travel book, where the writer says "I did this to get where I wanted to go", and you can take from it what is useful to get you to the same destination, but it is not something to be blindly followed. If other texts pass any comment I don't know, but it would only be an opinion not a law. At the end of the day you are your own guide to the Tao.

Secondly Taoism is about finding your own way to live rather than telling others how they should live theirs. I see no way that two people having a consenting relationship affects me finding harmony with the Tao, so I don't see why what they do should be any of my business.

Finally, one of the foundations of Taoism is observation of nature. Apparently homosexual behaviour is common in nature and, while one should be cautious about reading too much meaning for humans in the behaviour of other species, it does make it difficult to claim that gay humans are "unnatural".

Crying children

On a more upbeat topic, a poster on the Reform Taoism forum was a while back asking for ideas on how to deal with a baby who was healthy but crying a lot due to teething, and the stresses that places on parents. Obviously it's important to check with professionals to ensure there is no serious problem, but assuming all is OK, here are my few thoughts....

I was helped by my mother-in-law's experiences - she used to be a maternity nurse training as a midwife but even she found times where being a new mother got to her. Her life got a lot easier when she reasoned that when she worked in the hospital they checked that any crying baby was basically OK healthwise, well fed and with a clean nappy, and then the nurses would leave them to cry because they were very busy. The babies in the hospital grew up fine, so she brought up 3 kids working on the basis that if the baby was basically OK (e.g. suffering from teething) then if the crying was getting to her the simplest thing to do was to put the baby somewhere where they were safe (e.g. their cot/crib), shut the door, sit down & have a cup of tea for 10 mins, then go back to trying to comfort them feeling a bit less stressed.

If you feel you're close to snapping the child will be a lot better off if they're left to cry in a safe location while you regather your composure than they will be with a stressed out parent. The other thing of course is that babies can sense their parent's distress and that makes them distressed which makes them cry, so it becomes a vicious circle.

Another important thing is to look at your expectations. If you're getting stressed because you want or need to be doing something other than comfort the baby, just accept that it isn't going to happen & just live for that moment.

One other thing I'd add is that as parents we seem to feel pressure to "fix" everything "wrong" with our children. I'm not suggesting that you don't try to comfort your child, but teething hurts, and when things hurt, children (and adults) cry. It's a natural process. Don't feel that if you can't stop your child crying you've failed somehow - just comfort them and be there for them, calmly soothing them as they work through the pain of growing.

All the world knows beauty but if that becomes beautiful this becomes ugly
all the word knows good but if that becomes good this becomes bad (11)

Taoism teaches us that our judgements are relative. By deciding that something is good (e.g. a quiet baby), something else (e.g. a crying baby) is therefore bad. We then try to achieve the good and remove the bad but in reality they are two sides of the same coin. Through excessive efforts to quiet a baby we can actually cause the baby to cry more, or we can get the baby quiet but the methods used can cause more problems further down the line.

In Taoism we seek a middle path, trying to find balance. A baby that cries all the time or never cries should both be causes for concern, but so too should be parents that seek to have a baby that never cries or that they consider to be a burden to their lifestyle.

The Soul

Continuing on my cheery theme of death (I'm really in quite a happy place right now so I don't know why this theme keeps coming up - maybe the Tao is trying to tell me something?????), a while back the question came up of whether there is a separate "Soul" which survives after death and whether science can tell us anything about it. The following is my take on this - YMMV....

What we know is that nature is part of the Tao & that by observing nature we can gain some understanding of the Tao.

Nature is unsentimental. Once things have finished their "usefulness" they die. Our science and technology can postpone this for us but only for a while. If we have a soul separate to our physical existence it seems reasonable to assume that it dies too unless it has some "usefulness" separate to physical existence.

Nature is efficient. It doesn't repeatedly create new energy from which to form matter. When we die, everything that we are is not destroyed - just recycled into new forms. Presumably the same would be true for a separate soul.

The Tao is more than Nature so it is possible to conceive that the essence of a soul falls outside of Nature, but if it does there's nothing that science will be able to tell us about it.

Funerals

Nice cheery subject, I know, but I've seen a few posts on forums over the years discussing how to arrange a funeral service for a philosophical Taoist. I saw another the other day and it got me thinking about how I might want it done given that most probable attendees might not even really know anything about Philosophical Taoism or even Taoism in general.

I was also looking for some structure which would not be completely unfamiliar to the attendees, but which would be true to my beliefs. It's not going to matter to the deceased whatever happens but ritual is a useful mechanism to help the mourners cope.

Whatever...this is what I came up with as a possible structure for such a service. It's envisaged that one or more people would handle the officiating (speaker) role and my personal request would be that all attendees wear brightly coloured clothing - just to brighten things up!

Any opinions and/or suggestions gratefully received.


Philosophical Taoist Funeral Ceremony

Welcome & thank you for coming to this ceremony to mark the passing of ..insert-deceased's-name.. .

..insert-deceased's-name.. was a Philosophical Taoist. The concept of Tao is the Taoists most deeply held belief, and the Chinese word "Tao" roughly translates as "Way". Lao-tse, the ancient Chinese philosopher widely regarded as the founder of Taoism, taught that the Tao simply defies description and that the only true way to seek it is through personal spiritual exploration and dedication.

The Tao is difficult to explain but amongst other things it is conceived as the fundamental non-sentient, impersonal basis of reality. The Tao can be seen behind the natural processes and balance of the Universe and all things in the Universe, while seeming separate and distinct, are actually just aspects of the Tao.

Philosophical Taoists believe that Death is not a loss, but a transformation, and that what we knew as ..insert-deceased's-name.. has now moved on to participate in the endless dance of manifestation and change that is the Tao. While it is natural to feel sorrow at ..insert-deceased's-name.. passing, it is important to balance this sorrow with our memories of the life ..insert-deceased's-name.. lived, our times together, and the love and friendship that we shared.

<...insert short obituary for the deceased, hopefully with a story or two of happy experiences & giving personal idea of deceased's personality...>


Philosophical Taoists do not have Gods or prayers or hymns, but they do follow the teachings of Lao-tze's book called "The Tao Te Ching", which he wrote over 2500 years ago. The Tao Te ching is not a Holy Book like the Bible or Koran, but rather is a guidebook on how one can live in harmony with the universe. I'd like to read you just an excerpt, adapted from a translation by Jonathan Star...

Become totally empty
Quiet the restlessness of the mind

Only then will you see that all things emerge from emptiness
Only then will you see that all things flourish and dance in endless variation
Only then will you see that all things dissolve back into perfect emptiness
Emerging, Flourishing, Dissolving back again - This is the eternal process of Nature

Be still
With stillness is revealed eternity
With Eternity is revealed a vision of oneness
With a vision of oneness is revealed universal love
With Universal love is revealed the great truth of Nature
The great truth of Nature is the Tao

Whoever knows this truth lives forever
The body may perish and deeds may be forgotten but he who has the Tao has all eternity


Now can we all take a minute of silence to consider our own memories of ..insert-deceased's-name..


This was ..insert-deceased's-name.. favourite ..music/reading/etc....

<...Play music/read etc... while coffin is buried or curtains close for cremation or coffin buried...>

Thankyou

I'd like to say thanks to those people that have kindly taken time to post comments, and to reassure them that I do intend to add posts to this site over the coming month & years.

I'm no expert on Taoism and much of what I write on this site is as much to help me clarify what I believe at this time - tomorrow I might have a different perspective - and I hope that, whether on not you agree with my beliefs, there will be something on this site that may help you on your own journey.

I can't guarantee when posts will appear. The process can't (or at least shouldn't) be forced in case I fall into the trap of writing for the sake of writing, or writing because some people have said some nice things about my previous posts. When the time feels right I'll add more posts but I can't say what he frequency will be.

In my personal life I'm at a point of reflection. Our baby son was born in March and there are few things that can teach us as much about living in harmony with the Tao as a new baby.

Who is filled with harmony is like a newborn. (10)

So what is the Tao?

This is either the hardest or the easiest question in Taoism, depending on how you look at it.

It's the easiest because there is no definitive answer possible. The opening lines of the Tao Te Ching are variously translated as...

The Way that can be described is not the absolute Way; the name that can be given is not the absolute name. (5)

Existence is beyond the power of words To define: Terms may be used But are none of them absolute.(6)

The Tao that can be described in words is not the true Tao The Name that can be named is not the true Name. (7)

...and what all this is trying to say is that if you had all the time and all the words in the lifetime of the Universe they wouldn't be sufficient to describe the Tao.

This may be difficult to grasp, so maybe an example would be useful here...

Take the word "table" & what comes to mind? You might think of a sleek glass & metal designer construction, personally I think of an old wooden farmhouse table - by the use of a word common to both of us we are already heading off on different tracks of thought. We have also unconsciously limited our understanding as we've both thought of a "table" as piece of furniture, which means we've excluded other aspects of what constitutes a table such as the nature of the materials used to make it, the technology required to construct it, or the development of a culture in which tables are conceived in the first place. And then what about a "table" as used in a spreadsheet, or a medal table listing the most successful nations at the Olympics?

So we now get together a concise definition of a "table" - "it's a piece of furniture which can be made out of a variety of natural or synthetic materials constructed with tools which have developed over millennia of technological development and which performs a variety of roles that have evolved as human society has developed." Of course this is an inadequate definition - what about the origins & varieties of the designs, the origins of the materials, the atomic structure of the materials & their origins being forged in the heart of stars & how those stars came into being? What about the origins of mankind who made the table? What about the feel of a table when you touch it. What about how it feels when you bang your knee on a corner of one? Or how it feels when you're struggling with a heavy parcel and then you reach a table and put it down?

The point is that to fully describe a table would take forever. There is always more you can say, and while we may have an established concept of "a table" it is not necessarily the same thing to two different people.

There is also a problem in that as soon as you start to describe a "table" in any way the restrictions of both language and thought tend to exclude other equally valid descriptions. For example if you start down the line of describing it as a piece of furniture used in dining you're already moving away from any description that might discuss their use in operating theatres, or their use as improvised air-raid shelters. As soon as you start any form of description, the words will always describe something less than the totality of the thing you wish to describe.

Although we can demonstrate that we can never derive an exact definition, we can however identify properties of a "table" which have significance to our everyday experience of them, which are common for most people, and which enable us to communicate ideas.

So, getting back to the Tao, what does this tell us?...

"What is the Tao?" can be easily answered with "It's impossible to say!"

...but of course, that answer's not very useful is it? Seeking insights to better experience the Tao is how we move to the hard answer.


We know so far that anything we say about the Tao will at best only be an approximation of some of its characteristics, but is there anything that can lead us to some kind of understanding? Have a look at the next bit of Chapter 1 of the Tao Te Ching...

Nameless it is the source of heaven and earth; named it is the mother of all things.(5)

In the absence of names Lies the origin of heavens and earth The presence of names Is mother to the 10000 things.(8)

Tao existed before words and names, before heaven and earth, before the ten thousand things. It is the unlimited father and mother of all limited things.(2)

...so all things in existence (the ten thousand things) have their origin in a source which we call the Tao. Given that all things have their origin in the Tao, all their observable characteristics come from the Tao and hence tell us something of its nature. Can we use this to understand better what the Tao is?

Well, we can use the observation of existence to understand facets of the Tao, but as per our little "table" thought experiment, as soon as we concentrate on any particular thing we obviously start limiting our overall understanding by excluding all the other things out there with differing properties.

The third part of chapter 1 in the Tao Te Ching gives us an insight into how to approach the observation of existence to shed light on the Tao's nature...

Whoever is desireless, sees the essence of life. Whoever desires, sees its manifestations.(5)

Freed from desire, you can see the hidden mystery. By having desire, you can only see what is visibly real.(9)

Free from desire, you realize the mystery. Caught in desire, you see only the manifestations.(3)

...so by actively pursuing the knowledge you are getting caught up in viewing the manifestations of the Tao. This gives us a big problem, one which Buddhists have been aware of for a long time. We want to experience the truth behind existence and we know that to do this we need to free ourself from desire, but the problem is that the "wanting to experience the truth behind existence" and the "wanting to free ourself from desire" are both in themselves desires! We're stuck!

As creatures we are wrapped up with the manifestations of the Tao and we are always thinking back to the past, or planning what will happen in the future, wanting things to happen, and wishing things hadn't happened - themselves just more manifestations & desires. With us being wrapped up with all these manifestations and desires there's nothing we can do to break out to experience the underlying truth, so what happens now? Well if there's nothing we can do, the only other thing we can try is to do nothing!

Finally we are getting somewhere! It is through doing nothing that we have the chance to experience something of what lies behind these manifestations. Unfortunately doing nothing is a lot more difficult than it might sound (Hey! I never said this was going to be easy!), there's always desires and thoughts and plans bubbling up in our minds, and all the events in our lives to get in the way.

Doing nothing doesn't mean being inanimate: Staying in bed all day won't do it. Being lazy won't do it. Doping yourself up to the eyeballs won't do it. For me Taoism is about learning how to do nothing.


So, this is all very interesting, but how would I attempt to come up with an approximation of a description the Tao? Well I've looked at a lot of definitions many of which I feel capture some aspects well...

The Reform Taoist definition says...

The Chinese word "Tao" roughly translates as "Way"; for Taoists, it refers to a non-sentient, impersonal power that surrounds and flows through all things, living and non-living. The Tao regulates Natural processes and nourishes balance in the Universe. It benevolently embodies the harmony of opposites (i.e., there would be no love without hate, no light without dark, no male without female).

...now I'm not completely comfortable with this description. I believe it is something flowing through all things, but it is also the things being flowed through; the non-things; a non-flowing; a nothingness; the source of the things, the non-things, the flowing, the non-flowing, and the nothingness; and the thing "behind" all these other aspects. I also feel that the use of terms like "regulates", "nourishes" and "benevolently" imply a level of conciousness and personality that I don't think we have any evidence for in our experience.

You can see we're falling into the problem of how to describe something again. If we can't describe a table, how are we going to describe the source of reality? Of course, the actual reason for the problem with the table description is that the table itself is a manifestation of the Tao and the more detail you get into the more you're heading towards trying to describe the whole of the Tao, of which our whole physical universe is only one manifestation.

Jennifer Emick writing on altreligion.about.com says...

The Tao is the living source, the ineffable from which all creation springs…it is the totality of the infinite, which cannot be described in words. Naming or describing is always a limiting act, therefore, that which is limitless cannot be named or described.

...which I think is a nice definition but fails to emphasise that nothingness & non-being are also part of the Tao.


Beliefnet.com says...

The Tao is a transcendent state of being--beyond the reality of the mind that includes words, and beyond the reality of the senses. Yet paradoxically, the Tao is also right here and now since we can perceive the Tao by observing the course of a stream or the flow of our own breath. The Tao is available to our perception when we are fully in the present. The Tao is the divine life that moves through all things.

I really like this definition but I feel it again talks about something moving through things, when the Tao is also the thing being moved through as well as limitless other things, and as well as nothingness.


For me, how I would attempt to describe the Tao at this time (ask me in a year and I'm sure I'll say something slightly different) is something like this...

We experience existence as a collection of separate things: this & that, you & me, life & death, then & now, love & hate, here & there; but the truth is that these things are not separate, but rather all just some of the characteristics of one single thing - the Tao.

The closer we look at things, the more we get wrapped up in the specific details and attributes of that particular thing. The more detached and distant our view, the more we gain a different perspective and see things in a more holistic and unified way. If we wish to experience more of the nature of the Tao we need to let go of the details of particular things to better experience the whole.

Were it possible to stand outside the Tao and see it - all we would see is the Tao. All the "separate" manifestations would be seen truly as just a part of the whole Tao and not separate from it or each other.

Death, Immortality & the Soul

There's a bit of discussion regarding death and what, if anything, happens after. I thought I'd post my brief thoughts here as well...

My belief is that Death is not really a loss, but a transformation, and that what we knew as the person moves on to participate in an endless ever-changing dance of manifestation, existence and de-manifestation that is the Tao....

All things emerge from emptiness
All things flourish and dance in endless variation
All things dissolve back into perfect emptiness

..I don't claim to know any better than the next person, but from observing nature we see things conceived, born, growing, dieing, decaying and becoming source material for new life. It seems to me that the desire for some form of personal survival is a natural feature of the ego.

Fundamentally there is no you and I, this and that - all are part of the same single thing - The Tao. The Tao is the thing that is immortal and as a part of it, so are we, but I see nothing in nature to convince me that anything of my personal identity would survive after death, and indeed what use is that identity without the physical person? Nature doesn't retain things out of sentiment.

I can't remember where I read it (somewhere online) but somebody wrote that you already know what death is like. You have been dead (i.e. non-existent) for billions of years before life existed on Earth, or before you were conceived, and death is exactly like that. That seems reasonable to me.

I've tried to synthesize my thoughts into a few brief paragraphs, using the beliefs entry on the Reform Taoism site as a starting point, and this is the best I've come up with so far...

I believe that mortal existence is just one of the infinite number of manifestations of the Tao. Will we be reunited with our loved ones after mortal death? There is no way to know, so I believe that we should focus on the living of life, and not on speculation on what happens after.

I believe that we must learn to overcome the human instinct to view mortal death as bad and as the "ultimate end", and to rest comfortably knowing that what happens to us after mortal death is also part of the eternal process of the Tao. If we can learn to live in harmony with the Tao during our mortal lives, we will be in harmony with the Tao at the time of our mortal death. If we can manage that, then everything else will fall into place; that is the nature of the Tao.