The Master views the parts with compassion, because he understands the whole. His constant practice is humility. He doesn’t glitter like a jewel but lets himself be shaped by the Tao, as rugged and common as a stone.
Hope and fear are both phantoms that arise from thinking of the self. When we don’t see the self as self, what do we have to fear?
A vessel is formed from a lump of clay with care, however, it is the empty space within the vessel that makes it useful.
If you go searching for the Great Creator, you will come back empty-handed. The source of the universe is ultimately unknowable, a great invisible river flowing forever through a vast and fertile valley. Silent and uncreated, it creates all things.
The Way of Tao is this: It strives not, but conquers; It speaks not, but all is made clear; It summons not, but its house is crowded; It contrives not, but the design is perfect.
My own words are not the medicine, but a prescription; not the destination, but a map to help you reach it. When you get there, quiet your mind and close your mouth. Don’t analyze the Tao. Strive instead to live it: silently, undividedly, with your whole harmonious being.
The Tao’s principle is spontaneity.
When you accurately perceive the fluidity of things, you can also begin to perceive the constancy behind them: the creative, transformative, boundless, immutable Tao.
The Tao of the sage is work without effort.
The one who can dissolve her mind will suddenly discover the Tao at her feet...
The first practice is the practice of undiscriminating virtue: take care of those who are deserving; also, and equally, take care of those who are not. When you extend your virtue in all directions without discriminating, you feet are firmly planted on the path that returns to the Tao.
Act without expectation.
The wise man is one who knows what he does not know.
The way of heaven is to help and not harm.
The Tao never acts with force, yet there is nothing that it can not do.
The great Way is easy, yet people prefer the side paths. Be aware when things are out of balance. Stay centered within the Tao.
As it acts in the world, the Tao is like the bending of a bow. The top is bent downward; the bottom is bent up. It adjusts excess and deficiency so that there is perfect balance.
Tao loves and nourishes all things, but does not dominate it over them.
When Simplicity is broken up, it is made into instruments. Evolved individuals who employ them, are made into leaders. In this way, the Great System is United.
Intelligent people know others. Enlightened people know themselves.