One who excels as a warrior does not appear
formidable.
One who excels in fighting is never roused in
anger.
One who excels in defeating his enemy does not
join issue.
One who excels in employing others humbles
himself before them.
This is known as the virtue of non-contention.
This is known as making use of the efforts of
others.
This is known as matching the sublimity of
heaven.
The plethora of books, advice and workshops
(ensuring people like you, getting others to do what you want, managing your
anger, becoming the person you’ve always wanted to be, obtaining the most from
your staff, winning at work, maintaining a healthy and successful relationship,
achieving optimal orgasms) miss the Daoist center.
The sage doesn’t need to manage her anger, to
exercise restraint … there is nothing to manage, nothing to restrain. The Daoist soul is as empty as the universe,
and fighting—when it’s necessary—is as natural as breath. So the sage participates in what she excels
at and leaves everything else to others.
Why would she want to do a poor or mediocre or even satisfactory job
when there are others who would excel?
So excelling,
abstaining, and making use are attributes of heaven.
With so much of human motivation and
behavior—despite the fashions of communication and civilization—little
different than our simian cousins, the prime distinction (perhaps the only one)
of our species is our ability—through the simian—to access and embody aspects
that are not wholly simian: to evolve
ourselves from ourselves. (We might call
these aspects art, nobility, or spirit.) Not aspects
divorced from the simian, not aspects that have no claws—the Dao is no suburb,
no lululemon spirituality, no sugary i-did-it-my-way,
no christian heaven, no conventional cloying virtue—but rather that which reach
sufficiently into the simian, into claws, and draw, living, from heaven’s dark
pool nature’s knowledge: that the human
is no better than a giraffe and i am no better than a butterfly.
I may be a butterfly.
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