from Verse Ninety-EightThe Way can be used for weakness or for strength, for flexibility or for firmness, for passivity or for activity, for darkness or for light. It can be used to embrace heaven and earth, it can be used to respond to the times without fixed convention.~ Wen-tzu: Understanding the Mysteries ~
Our world is filled with self-anointed gurus who will charm you with their one-size-fits-all approach. Follow these 4, 10 or 100 easy steps and you too will reach the realm of enlightenment!
They will dazzle you with their commitment to passivity or aggressiveness and they will beseech you never to touch the other. They offer a very narrow path that leads more to their door than anywhere else.
The beauty of yin and yang is that both energies are needed in the world. If we choose completely to eschew one for the other, we will quickly find ourselves hopelessly out of balance. As The Byrds sang in the 1960s, to everything there is a season.
They will dazzle you with their commitment to passivity or aggressiveness and they will beseech you never to touch the other. They offer a very narrow path that leads more to their door than anywhere else.
The beauty of yin and yang is that both energies are needed in the world. If we choose completely to eschew one for the other, we will quickly find ourselves hopelessly out of balance. As The Byrds sang in the 1960s, to everything there is a season.
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I had to smile at this...
ReplyDeleteI once met one of the byrds, in the bar of a hotel near heathrow airport, around 1972.
Maybe they sang about high-minded things, but this character was the biggest wanker I have ever met.
I think it was he that gave rise to my first ever usage of the terms: hypocrite, and egomaniac.
I remember being astonished that anybody who played a guitar so incredibly badly could ever become a celebrity.
Maybe I just happened to run into him on the worst day of his life.
As I am so fond of saying:
The Master is not always The Master.
And of course, you know, "Turn,turn, turn" is from Ecclesiastes.
ReplyDeleteCrow,
ReplyDeleteSome of the greatest singers, songwriters, poets, artists and philosophers aren't the most exemplary people. The song "Turn! Turn! Turn!" was made famous by The Byrds, but it was written by Pete Seeger.
Baroness,
Yes, I indeed was aware of that.
And here was me, thinking that all people are exemplary people...
ReplyDeletePete Seeger! Ah! I knew someone else had written that song, but all I could come up with was Woody Guthrie.