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Hello~ Happy Chinese New Year and a Comment from E-mail~
Hi Jmeldridge and Michael from a mountain,
And welcome.
I’ve been occupied elsewhere, missing out on this flurry of conversation going on. It is usually so quiet here I can go away for days or weeks without the dust ever being disturbed.
That question of balance is a mysterious one. To paraphrase the chapter, ‘[chref=36]If you would have a thing balanced, you must first unbalance it[/chref]’. I guess you could say there is apparent balance and then there is meta balance – ‘the big picture’ of balance. Forgive me for one more paraphrasing, [chref=2]Thus unbalanced and balanced produce each other; The unbalanced and the balanced complement each other; [/chref] and so on.
It is easy, when we feel life’s suffering, to label a source for that suffering. You know, ‘the devil’, ‘desire’, ‘expectations’, ‘evil spirits’, ‘democrats’, ‘pollution’, ‘communists’, ‘republicans’ ... I suppose the list is endless. One more to add might be ‘unbalance’.
I suspect that [chref=32]naming[/chref] the source of our suffering doesn’t alleviate the suffering, but rather adds to it. It gives us a way to make a mountains out of a mole hills, or much bigger mountains out of a big ones. Ironically however, in our subjective experience, we feel it lessens the suffering and so continue to name 'it'. Or, on the other hand, such labeling may make no difference what so ever. Perhaps I’m just naming the labeling as the source of suffering. Who [chref=71]knows[/chref]? That’s why I always end up watching out for that subtler side of ‘reality’ [chref=56]known as mysterious sameness[/chref].
Life is two sided: up and down, young and old, foolish and wise, happy and sad (not to mention life and death). As far as I can make out, these two produce each other. Although we, and probably all life, are instinctively driven to want only one side – the pleasurable, and urgently seek to avoid the other side – the pain and suffering. How futile is that? What a superb [chref=65]hoodwink[/chref] Nature serves up on life. Oh well, time to go plant some tomatoes.
And welcome.
I’ve been occupied elsewhere, missing out on this flurry of conversation going on. It is usually so quiet here I can go away for days or weeks without the dust ever being disturbed.That question of balance is a mysterious one. To paraphrase the chapter, ‘[chref=36]If you would have a thing balanced, you must first unbalance it[/chref]’. I guess you could say there is apparent balance and then there is meta balance – ‘the big picture’ of balance. Forgive me for one more paraphrasing, [chref=2]Thus unbalanced and balanced produce each other; The unbalanced and the balanced complement each other; [/chref] and so on.
It is easy, when we feel life’s suffering, to label a source for that suffering. You know, ‘the devil’, ‘desire’, ‘expectations’, ‘evil spirits’, ‘democrats’, ‘pollution’, ‘communists’, ‘republicans’ ... I suppose the list is endless. One more to add might be ‘unbalance’.
I suspect that [chref=32]naming[/chref] the source of our suffering doesn’t alleviate the suffering, but rather adds to it. It gives us a way to make a mountains out of a mole hills, or much bigger mountains out of a big ones. Ironically however, in our subjective experience, we feel it lessens the suffering and so continue to name 'it'. Or, on the other hand, such labeling may make no difference what so ever. Perhaps I’m just naming the labeling as the source of suffering. Who [chref=71]knows[/chref]? That’s why I always end up watching out for that subtler side of ‘reality’ [chref=56]known as mysterious sameness[/chref].
Life is two sided: up and down, young and old, foolish and wise, happy and sad (not to mention life and death). As far as I can make out, these two produce each other. Although we, and probably all life, are instinctively driven to want only one side – the pleasurable, and urgently seek to avoid the other side – the pain and suffering. How futile is that? What a superb [chref=65]hoodwink[/chref] Nature serves up on life. Oh well, time to go plant some tomatoes.
Comments
Let all of your fortunes accumilate with dilligence of Rat and blah blah...
Haven't been here since I have some notes to go over regarding next semester, either case an interesting question came up so I thought I would share.
Q: Why do I have to believe Tao? I have been a devoted (name of the religion be removed) and all my understanding is far better than Tao...
umm well, I told him exactly what the book says. Tao is not a religion.
Yeah, this guy asked that question didn't like that very much.
So I played with him a bit.
"comparing Tao with religion would be trying to find the word 'Lao-Tsu' on original text."
this guy didn't like that at all but I had so much fun with this guy.
And it turns out this was 4th yr Phil researcher, which means he was trying to have some fun talking about nothing but I got him so angry he decided to conjuncture on confucious...
Well it was fun while it lasted.
Biggest illusion that common people have is that Tao is some sort of religion with limitations and replacements and explanation of will of Tao.
BS... Tao is common sense. Simple and delicate. Why don't most people get it? Because they haven't felt it yet. Tao exists and being able to differenciate and being able to understand is 2 different thing.
I thought I would bring that up since its a new year and whoever decides to further their study this year, please let the knowledge come to you.
Wish everyone a happy new year and Kudos for everyone~
Lol, I briefly thought about taking a philosophy PHD for a while but it's kind of exposing the entire flaw of the education system.
Though, there's a really good Taoist Prof called Chad Hansen http://www.hku.hk/philodep/ch/
Just think, the two most important thinks we ever learned in life were how to walk and talk, and neither required a moment of 'education'. All we simply did was observe, try, and stumble over and over until we 'got it right'. I've found this to be the only true way of learning. The rest (education) is a hoodwink.
well...
learning and education is 2 different thing gang, don't confuse them.
just because everyone speaks, doesn’t mean we all speak the Shakespearian words with notes of Pavarotti.
I for one intend to post my lecture on learning the teachings on this site when I do have some free time. I do this after they finish at least so called research on their thesis (cause for some damn reason these educated personnel can't seem to let someone know what they learned over 4 yrs.... such a sad feeling when I see this...)
how many of us think that they can explain their thoughts to someone?
assuming that we can't completely express our thoughts in words what are we actually doing when we communicate with someone?
Take the phrase, "How are you?" why do you ask how? does you mean you me and myself or the spirit? I constantly get attacked with questions of Who is this "I" and "You" When they call attendance, you answer "here."
If you had some experience with 100 questions in Buddhist scriptures you would pick this up right a way. And as it is mentioned in the Buddhist text, this causes so much parable gaps its harder not to keep what is "I" and "you." To keep in line with western philosophy this "I" and "you" discussion is also cited in the Plato's Discussion series...
Is this mean the limitation of our so-called talking and communicating is nothing more than writing words and then spend time to explain what it means?
....
where the hell did common English go? yeah, these guys lose touch with reality real quick. and then after about few days in ritual beer and pizza they stop using vocabulary altogether and start composing stuff you see on Mtv meets Run DMC...
educated means to X, and learning means to Y; X does not equal to Y.
X can be derivative of X prime and Y can be a derivative of Y prime. Can't be equal. Their outcomes may have similar outputs, ahhhhhhhh... Some of you might caught on but this is the concept of leaning the teachings.
I know my postings give people cramps but you know what? You will come across these questions and by god I did post an educated guess here for you to defend your stand~ hahaha so there~
Kudos for everyone~
We are born and begin learning something.
We die and [chref=16]emptiness[/chref] returns.
Or simply,
Nothing returns something.
Something returns nothing.
[chref=2]Something and Nothing[/chref]
So, what’s the point?
Learning something brings nothing,
Learning [chref=40]Nothing[/chref] brings something.
First we climb up the hill,
Then we walk down the hill.
[chref=19]Exterminate learning and there will no longer be worries.[/chref]
so by that there is no learning?
or have you forgot to post learn and move on from learning, hehehe~
I love tao postings~
kudos~