“Ultimately, of course, it is absolutely impossible to understand our natural universe unless you know when to stop investigating.

In our restlessness we are always tempted to climb every hill and cross every sky line to find out what lies beyond, yet as you get older and wiser it is not just flagging energy but wisdom that teaches you to look at mountains from below, or perhaps just climb them a little way. For at the top you can no longer see the mountain. And beyond, on the other side, there is, perhaps, just another valley like this.

An old aphorism from India says, ‘What is beyond is that which is also here.’

And you must not mistake this for a kind of blasé boredom, or tiring of adventure. It is instead the startling recognition that in the place we are now, we have already arrived.

This is it.

What we are seeking is, if we are not totally blind, already here.

For if you must follow that trail up the mountainside to its bitter end, you will discover that it leads eventually right back into the suburbs. But only an exceedingly stupid person will think that is where the trail really goes. For the actual truth is the trail goes to every single place that it crosses, and leads to where you are standing and watching it. Watching it vanish into the hills, you are already in the truth beyond, which it leads to ultimately.”

“It is well said: ‘The mystery of life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.’

The song of birds, the voices of insects are all means of conveying truth to the mind. In flowers and grasses we see messages of the Tao.

The scholar, pure and clear of mind, serene and open of heart, should find in everything what nourishes him.

But if you want to know where the flowers come from, even the god of spring doesn’t know.”

“And so, the secret in Taoism is to get out of one’s own way, and to learn that this pushing ourselves, instead of making us more efficient, actually interferes with everything we set about to do.”

– from the book “What is Tao?”

peace, wayf