Chapter 19

Lao Tze says:

Abandon holiness
Discard cleverness
and the people will benefit a hundredfold.

Abandon the rules of "kindness"
Discard "righteous" actions
and the people will return to their own natural affections

Abandon book learning
Discard the rules of behaviour
and the people will have no worries

Abandon plots and schemes
Discard profit-seeking
and the people will not become thieves

These lessons are mere elaborations
The essence of my teachings is this:

See with the original purity
Embrace with original simplicity
Reduce what you have
Decrease what you want.

*Jonathan Star Translation

Holiness and cleverness are concepts. Holiness and cleverness are goals to attain, or the means to attain goals. This is not what we are concerned with in our study of the Dao. There is a natural holiness that is ever present - just stop a moment and notice if you are still breathing. Is your breath coming in or going out? Just this is enough. All our desires to make this moment something more - to add to the sacredness of what is - only steal the joy that is ever available to us.

Go out into the woods on a clear night and look up into the sky. There is no word for the numinosity of the shining stars and silence, but we might call it holy.

How many rules of "kindness" do you have in your own life? How safe do you wish to keep your heart? How many images do you keep of what "righteousness" is? Or perhaps you call it "right action", or "integrity". All images are stale - this is why the Buddha never allowed representations of him to be produced.

When we practice kindness because we think we should, we are falling short of the glorious reality which is our true nature. When we practice the rules of "righteousness" because of what they will get us, we are missing out on the only possible opportunity for salvation - this opportunity occuring right now.

If we sit still and quiet we might begin to recognize who we are, just a little bit. In that same instant, one will feel a great freedom like wings unfolding - and a great sadness. Simply looking around from the center of this moment, one is no longer able to keep the world at arms length. The suffering of a closed heart nearby is felt as ones own heart, and one cannot help but act. It might be a smile, a heroic effort, a joke, or a shout, but kindness will naturally arise - you cannot help it, it is who you are.

Infants hearing the cries of other infants become stressed, and relaxed when the other is soothed. Small children seeing infants in distress naturally seek to comfort them. This does not depend upon rules of conduct.

"Abandon book learning" the master tells us in his 81 chapter book! What are you seeking through more learning. How full is your mind, and yet we seek to put more knowledge on top? This seeking has become an addiction - we begin to think that if we just get the next fix, maybe that will finally be the one that will make it all o.k.. Maybe the next one will finally feel like it's enough. Maybe when I'm finally smart enough, clever enough, then I'll finally be safe and fulfilled. The truth is that you will never be safe - not in the way you want to. The big universe will eventually win - all your fragile accomplishments, all your hard-won personality traits will come to nothing. All the rules of behaviour in the world will not save you from this inevitability. The only safety available to us is to find that which is indestructible within us. But that has nothing to do with all that we've put on to protect ourselves.

Look beneath the layers of conditioning. Look beneath who you've become to live safe in this world. Look beneath your goals and aspirations. Who do you find there? Has this one ever not been? Could this One ever be added to or subtracted from? When you live openly as this One, you will be free from worry. What could possibly harm you?

In this one, there is no plotting or scheming. Everything is enough, just as it is. We so often walk about and think "well, it's a nice day, but i wish that breeze wasn't blowing". "Oh, dinner was great - except the coffee wasn't very good" - or the like. Or perhaps the day is exactly the type we could wish for, then we might think "I hope the sun stays out" or "I wish this vacation would never have to end". Unfortunately for the desiring mind, there is no permanant vacation, no endless summer- all things change and cycle. Denying this, the ego strives to get as much as it can, while it can. The desire to add something to reality is the only sin.

When we seek profits, what is really going on is thievery. What will you do with all this excess you generate? Will it keep you safe? Often a body will feel like it wants profit, wants a little extra just in case. So we eat little extra at each meal. In fact, we might want to eat the densest, most calorie rich foods at each meal to make sure that the profit accumulates quickly. Soon our profits will show for all to see, in the extra pounds we are carrying around. Storing up more is just a way of trying to create security, but which becomes just another addiction. When the body stores up its profits in the form of fat, it is robbing the heart, robbing the joints of thier mobility. When we seek to profit from reality we are afraid that we don't have enough - that just a bit more would feel safer, and yet we steal from ourselves the enjoyment possible in this moment.

In a culture that prizes profit, you will see the distance grow between the "haves" and the "have nots". When the "have nots" grow poor enough, they will resort to stealing and violence rather than starve and chaos ensues. All these profits have not truly created more safety, more happiness, only more striving and deprivation.

Lao Tze tells us "Reduce what you have, decrease what you want". What we have is everything that gets in the way of our enjoyment of what is - right now. What if there was no chance at salvation, elightenment, happiness some time in the future? What if this was it - as enlightened as it gets? What would it be like if no relationship, no religion, no accomplishment, no meal, no orgasm, no art project, no new movie, no new fashion, could ever add anything to the sanctity and holiness that you are. What if all the powers of compassion and happiness you ever needed to help yourself and others were available right now? Would you then wish to enjoy this moment? Would you let go of the pain of wanting for just a breath and enjoy the holiness of being?

Seeing the original purity one recognizes that there is nothing which should not be. Grasping Original Simplicity one can rest in just what is - plain, boring, and amazingly sacred and numinous.