Translation
Grasping and yet full of, not in harmony with oneself;
Surmising and yet of keen spirit, cannot long protect.
Treasures fill a room, none can keep;
Wealth and pride, one’s gift to one’s blame.
Meritorious deeds that satisfy oneself recede;
This is the way of nature.
1) hold (grasp; support; maintain; manage) <conj.> and (yet, but) be full (be filled with; have a surplus of) of no (not) in harmony with (in compliance with; like; as; if) his (her; its; that; such) oneself (personal); 持而盈之不如其己；(chí ér yíng zhī bù rú qí jĭ)
2) estimate (surmise; conjecture) <conj.> and (yet, but) sharp (keen; acute; vigor; fighting spirit) of no (not) can (need doing, able> but; yet) long (steadily, older; chief; grow) protect (keep; preserve; ensure); 揣而锐之不可长保；(chuăi ér ruì zhī bù kĕ cháng băo)
3) gold and jade (treasures) full (reach the limit) room no one (nothing) of ability (skill) guard (defend; keep watch); 金玉满堂莫之能守；(jīn yù măn táng mò zhī néng shŏu)
4) rich (wealthy) expensive (valuable) <conj.> and (yet, but) proud (arrogant; conceited), self (one’s own; certainly) offer as a gift (make a present of something) his (its; he, it, that; such) fault (blame; punish). 富贵而骄，自遗其咎。(fù guì ér jiāo ,zì yí qí jiù)
5) meritorious service (merit; work) satisfy (fulfil) body (oneself) move back (withdraw; quit; recede; ebb; return), 功遂身退，(gōng suì shēn tuì)
6) sky (heaven; day; nature) of road (way, path; principle; speak; think). 天之道。(tiān zhī dào)
Fourth Pass: Chapter of the Month
(pandemic era)
Zoom on YouTube Recordings:
https://youtu.be/Ha_ZtrdaHs0 is a link to unedited Zoom video of this month’s Sunday meeting. The shorter first part of the meeting begins with a chapter reading followed by attendees’ commentary, if any. A little later on begins the longer open discussion part of the meeting when those who wish to discuss how the chapter relates to their personal experience.
Corrections?
None this time
Reflections
Grasping and yet full of, not in harmony with oneself;
This touches on our natural absence of an appreciation instinct. Unable to be innately content with what we have, we can’t help but grasp for more. The instinct “more is better” pushes us to grasp. Much of this is obvious. What may be less obvious is how natural it all is. Nature has no need for an animal to feel so called ‘appreciation’. On the other hand, feeling contentment at-the-moment is an utterly natural respite from the hunt-and-gather needs of survival. However, feelings of contentment are fleeting as life’s ‘just do it’ hunt-and-gather instincts rebound. Any ongoing sense of appreciation depends largely upon wisdom’s ability to see beyond oneself interest, or as chapter 52 puts it, Nearly rising beyond oneself.
What sets us apart from other animals is our ability to imagine myriad matters over which to grasp. Imagination stimulates desire and urges us to grasp to the point of becoming too much of a good thing. It is useful here to note that desire = need + thought. Other animals have little to no ability to imagine, and so live very much in the present moment. Need moves both humans and other animals, but thought allows us to add a kind of ongoing virtual sense of need, i.e., desire. This makes moments of contentment even more fleeting than would otherwise be the case without imagination stirring the mind’s pot. This leaves us very much with a sense of not in harmony with oneself.
The first few lines of Buddha’s Fourth Truth offers the most succinct solution to this uniquely human predicament: “There is salvation for him whose self disappears before truth, whose will is bent on what he ought to do, whose sole desire is the performance of his duty”. To grasp this fully, one needs to deepen and broaden the meaning of duty. For example, a squirrel’s ‘duty’ is to gather nuts for the winter. A birds ‘duty’ is to migrate south for the winter. The need is instinctive, and transcends any ‘personal’ agenda those animals may have at the moment. Their “will is bent on what they ought to do”, which incidentally is not dictated by another squirrel or bird.
Civilization bombards us with notions of what we ought to do. These so-called duties are a projection arising from other people’s needs and fears… their agendas. To tap into one’s duty, one’s dharma, requires taking these external pressures with as many grains of salt as possible in order to look within one self for their truth. Frankly, this calls on one’s deepest reserves of honesty and courage. It is no wonder that people frequently take the ‘easy way’ and—somewhat grudgingly—conform to the current social norms of their ‘outside world’.
The Bhagavad Gita sheds egalitarian ‘inside world’ light on duty. “And do thy duty, even if it be humble, rather than another’s, even if it be great. To die in one’s duty is life: to live in another’s is death”. 3:35
Surmising and yet of keen spirit, cannot long protect.
When we are uncertain, we surmise—we take our best guess. That’s fine so far. However, when we are also of keen spirit, the chances of danger increase exponentially. As chapter 16 cautions, Not knowing the constant, rash actions lead to ominous results. Not knowing the constant is tantamount to surmising, and of keen spirit propels rash actions.
Treasures fill a room, none can keep;
Ah yes, we can’t take it with us. As Jesus put it,
“Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also”.
To have any chance at succeeding with this, I find I need to constantly… and I mean constantly… remind myself of where I wish my heart to be. That goes back to Buddha’s point, “There is salvation for him whose self disappears before truth…”.
I must first ask myself, “What part of my life is the most timeless?” After determining this truth, “all” I need to do is offer myself to that. This became significantly easier once I realized that I never regretted doing my duty; I only regretted it when I didn’t. Remembering that helps me keep duty in the forefront of the mind’s eye.
The nature of duty I’m talking about is not only of action. Obviously, any action can qualify as one’s duty. Here, one’s approach to life is what distinguishes common action from duty. In other words, self-honesty is my duty, listening is my duty, and so on. Sure, I fail at times, but having this to be my aim, my life’s goal, works well. In other words, it is not about being perfect in duty, or anything else for that matter. It is the march towards perfection—the journey—that works. After all, perfection is simply another illusion the mind conjures up to whip itself. As the first line of chapter 45 puts it, Great accomplishment seems incomplete, its use doesn’t harm.
The Bhagavad Gita describes the path well, albeit, from a mythical “many lives” point of view. Simply combine all the references to “many lives” as actually referring to your one life span, here and now. You begin stumbling as a child to walk and talk. Then, you stumble on in numerous other ways throughout life, moving closer and closer to perfection. Note: “merely yearns for Yoga” means simply yearning for connection—natural balance.
And he begins his new life with the wisdom of a former life; and he begins to strive again, ever onwards towards perfection. 6:43
Because his former yearning and struggle irresistibly carries him onwards, and even he who merely yearns for Yoga goes beyond the words of books. 6:44
And thus the Yogi ever‑striving and with soul pure from sin, attains perfection through many lives and reaches the End Supreme. 6:45
The “attains perfection through many lives” is an aspirational ideal, not rational and real. Reading between the lines, I see this as saying that with diligence I move closer to whatever my ideal of perfection is, but never achieving it, i.e., it is the journey, not the destination, that soothes!
The Bhagavad Gita 6:17 is a good model for living moment-to-moment.
A harmony in eating and resting, in sleeping and keeping awake: a perfection in whatever one does. This is the Yoga that gives peace from all pain.
I interpret “a perfection in whatever one does” as saying something like ‘work with perfection without expecting perfection’. Nothing is more insane, more diseased, than thinking perfection is real. Perfection is the antithesis of nature’s way. As chapter 40 observes,
Wealth and pride, one’s gift to one’s blame.
It is easy to regard wealth and pride from a moral standpoint. That is the normal “judge a book by its cover” way of viewing life for any animal. Due to our disease, this surface approach is problematic for humans, i.e., Realizing I don’t know is better; not knowing this knowing is disease. A great deal of sanity can be recovered by viewing life from a profoundly deeper Symptoms Point Of View. Naturally that is difficult simply because viewing life this deeply requires effort, i.e., no animal evolves to choose the more effortful, energy wasting, way of doing anything.
The effort I refer to is the work watchfulness takes. This dynamic gives competitors and predators an edge, i.e., the wavering of a prey’s watchfulness increases a predator’s chances of thinning the herd and having dinner. Now, it is not necessary to follow a long trail of symptoms back to ultimate sources, although doing so somewhat will illuminate the natural balancing process. What process you ask? Put simply, the external characteristics we can see are actually counterbalancing deeper realities. Here are simple examples: empty -> eat; bored -> stimulate; lonely -> companionship; insecure -> brag. This last example fits wealth and pride, one’s gift to one’s blame. One’s blame is a sense of insecurity, failure, guilt, weakness. Such inner feelings urge one to compensate by grasping for wealth and pride. Of course, it is much more profound, subtle and multilayered than this, but then all we need to know is that the “cover” we see is not the “book” we think we know.
Meritorious deeds that satisfy oneself recede;
This is another way of saying how contentment is fleeting, and life throws us back into the game of survival. The only ‘choice’ we have is how we’re going to play the game. And, the ‘choice’ we have is solely dependent on how fully we know the rules of the game. In other words, knowing, and more importantly remembering, how life plays out is critical. For example, if I truly know driving fast on a slick rain soaked street is dangerous, I can easily ‘choose’ to slow down. In fact, I won’t actually choose to slow down because truly knowing that it is dangerous makes it virtually impossible for me to drive fast. Survival instinct is always in charge. Thus, deeply knowing the truth of life makes it virtually impossible not to conform to that truth.
This is the way of nature.
Knowing—and more importantly remembering—the way of nature is the only way to stop repeating the same mistakes. As chapter 30 suggests, Those most adept have results, yet stop, not daring to seek better. Again, in chapter 32, Man handles the realization to stop. Knowing to stop [he] can be without danger.
Finally, chapter 65 sums it all up, To the outside world, contrary indeed. Then, and only then, reaching great conformity. As I see this, reaching great conformity can only mean becoming one with your personal truth, your duty, your dharma, your original self (see Taoist Thought: Returning to Original Self). Again, as Buddha said, “There is salvation for him whose self disappears before truth, whose will is bent on what he ought to do, whose sole desire is the performance of his duty”.
Video Archive https://youtu.be/Ha_ZtrdaHs0
Third Pass: Chapter of the Month
Corrections?
None this time
Reflections:
Grasping and yet full of, not in harmony with oneself hints at the result of our ideals getting ahead of reality. Reality is the full of, and the grasping is setting our sights on ideals and expectations. This happens when we don’t appreciate what we have, and that is completely natural. Appreciation is NOT innate. Just think, if appreciation was an evolved trait — an instinct — we would appreciate what we have TOO MUCH, and have less incentive to get out there and hunt and gather as nature intends us to do.
One might say that we no longer need to hunt and gathers; we can get what we want at the store. Ha! Our biology doesn’t know that. We are biologically hunt and gatherers and will always be unless evolution changes that. When I think about the chances of that, I come up with a big fat zero. All life hunts and gathers in some way for survival. Hunting and gathering are a good definition for life itself!
In the civilized circumstances in which we find ourselves, our hunt and gathering instinct merely plays out in other ways. Specifically here, grasping after idealistic expectations is just a surrogate for the hunt and gather instinct. We chase our dreams, yet dreams have no grounding; this makes not in harmony with oneself all too easy to occur. (See The Tradeoff for background)
Surmising and yet of keen spirit, cannot long protect. I see this directly connected to chapter 71’s, Realizing I don’t’ know is better; not knowing this knowing is disease along with chapter 16’s, Not knowing the constant, rash actions lead to ominous results. Surmising (guessing, assuming, inferring), and having a lot of enthusiasm to act on your assumptions is folly — uniquely human folly. Chapter 70 warns us of this trap, and the way to sidestep much of it.
The last line of chapter 70 resonates with the next two lines of this chapter: Treasures fill a room, none can keep; Wealth and pride, one’s gift to one’s blame. Valuing and seeking wealth and pride are sophisticated forms of hunting and gathering. The difference lies in the ‘prey’. The disconnection we feel drives an urge to ‘be somebody’. This expectation turns us into becoming our own ‘prey’.
Deep social connection instills a genuine sense of ‘I am somebody’ security. The hierarchical nature of civilization makes that kind of intimate organic egalitarian connection virtually impossible; especially at the depth our ancestors experienced pre agriculture. The treasures, wealth, and pride are simply substitutes. These don’t truly work, they only promise to in our expectations — our dreams. Once achieved, we are left as empty and alone as ever. That is why Wealth and pride, [are] one’s gift to one’s blame. We can’t help but end this futile race with some sense of guilt and self-blame. Self-blame because we chased our expectations ‘down the rabbit hole’.
Meritorious deeds that satisfy oneself recede. What are meritorious deeds? Doesn’t all this come back to the hierarchical urge ‘to be somebody’? In life, the niche we seek and achieve in whatever hierarchy can never be secure. This is the way of nature. This is why civilization’s hierarchical nature always leaves us feeling isolated. Chapter 39 seems to hint at this… This, and so rulers call themselves solitary, scant, pathetic.
Finally, this brings me to chapter 22. D.C. Lau puts it clearly:
Word for Word requires a little more pondering perhaps.
Interestingly and importantly, D.C. Lau’s translation puts the cart before the horse, so to speak, while the more literal less so, if at all. The difference lies between D.C. Lau’s “and so is” and the literal’s “for”. “And so it” points the arrow of causation forward, i.e., “… does not drag, and so[as a result] …”. Conversely, “for” points an arrow of effect backward, i.e., “… not attack himself, for [because]…”.
The literal invites a symptoms point of view. Here, a lack of feeling merit drives one to brag, or attack himself (or others). A lack of feeling deeply connected and secure creates a void that drives us to grasp and fill up with wealth, merit, pride, treasures, righteousness, and so on. Note: treasures are not only material things, like gold, but frankly anything one values: friends, reputations, knowledge, status, etc. We treasure anything that promises to fill the void within, even though we know the promises are empty. As we say, “Money doesn’t buy happiness” or as the first lines of chapter 70 say, Our words are very easy to know, very easy to do. Under heaven none can know, none can do.
Second Pass: Work in Progress
Issues:
There are a few punctuation changes this week. I like to call them improvements. I also trimmed superfluous words from line 3. Somehow using more words is easier than using fewer words. Probably, I want to cover all the bases—silly me. The Taoist in me knows it is better to cover one and let space take care of the rest.
Commentary:
Today this chapter had me reflecting on the overall message of the Tao Te Ching. It is mostly a cautionary tale about how life is, as I see it, and not how life should be, or what I should do. The more I understand the underlying dynamics, the more wisely I am able to act. This is obvious isn’t it? The hitch lies in my depth of understanding, or more precisely, in my having the will and courage (1) to take it seriously enough.
Overall, instinct drives living creatures (including us) to act and survive successfully, and as D.C. Lau put it, fill it to the brim and hammer it to a point. In the wild, nature pushes back on this drive, which helps maintain overall balance. Thanks to our superior intelligence, we have devised ways to bypass this natural governance—from stone axes to computers and beyond. We have freed ourselves from many limitations nature employs to counter-balance ‘blind’ response to need and fear (desire and worry in us). In the process we’ve helped destabilized our very existence. You could say we’ve intoxicated ourselves with our own success. Now, how is that for irony, especially if our survival success ends in our early extinction? (i.e., Not knowing the constant, rash actions lead to ominous results.)
The Taoist worldview gives voice to these underlying natural dynamics. Understanding these helps me be more minutely subtle, open and deep beyond knowledge—naturally. The more aware I am of the way of nature, the less likely I get intoxicated and shoot myself in the foot. I don’t need anyone telling me what or what not to do. All I need to know are the stakes and the process, and nature takes care of the rest (regardless of my wants or worries). As least, that is how it looks to me. You’ll have to test this hypothesis out yourself!
Christ echoes Treasures fill a room, none can keep when he says, “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
Wealth and pride, one’s gift to one’s blame is a particularly striking way to put this. It is a poetic way to describe the interconnected, difficult and easy become one another nature of it all. While Christ’s teachings do resonate with me; the Tao Te Ching says so much more with so fewer words. Of course, I’m sure it would be different if I had need of a personal savior.
Suggested Revision:
Grasping and yet full of, not in harmony with oneself;
Surmising and yet of keen spirit, cannot long protect.
Treasures fill a room, none can keep;
Wealth and pride, one’s gift to one’s blame.
Meritorious deeds that satisfy oneself recede;
This is the way of nature.
(1) Having will and courage is actually an emotional issue, like visceral knowing. In fact, I’d say they are two aspects of the same thing. Once you give up the notion of free will, it becomes clear that the courage to carry out—to will—what is essential come naturally once you know it is essential. All our hesitation and second-guessing in life comes from not really knowing what is essential. We have divided needs, desires, worries and fears, which makes life very confusing at times. We yearn for certainty, and as a result, hastily cling to dead ends… The great way is easy, yet people prefer by-paths, as D.C. Lau put it.
First Pass: Chapter of the Week
Why do we feel the need to hold surplus, maintain a fighting spirit (vigor), keep treasures to fill a room, and chalk up meritorious deeds? All these fit a common m.o. (modus operandi) – an unremitting quest for perfection. Why? It is as though we are driven to fill an essentially bottomless pit; a void we don’t feel is bottomless. On the other hand, when we feel the full emptiness of the ‘perfect’ moment there is nothing left to do or get, and no where to go. We are content; the ‘task is accomplished‘.
So, holding on (and the rest) appears to be symptomatic of what we currently feel missing. Many are the ways to fill this personal void: food, sex, work, rest, friends, enemies, music, silence, art, collecting, sports, travel. Rather than saying, ‘idle hands are the devil’s workshop’, we should say ’empty hands are the devil’s workshop’. The deeper the emptiness feels, the stronger the drive to fill it. Ironically, the more that emptiness is integrated in our life, the less driven to fill it we feel. I suppose you could say, you become the emptiness. To paraphrase Tat Tvam Asi (That Thou Art), ‘I am the void; the void is I’.
Personally, it helps knowing that this process is natural and no part needs fixing. It is the way of nature. Also, it helps knowing that all the myriad creatures in the world are in this ‘ordeal of life’ together. Whoopee, it’s the party of life and everything is invited! Like any party, it has its high points and low ones. As I realize that, ‘better to have stopped in time‘ seems to become easier. Although, I’m not really sure it has anything to do with realization. After all, the same preference for stillness occurs in all animals as they age.