Tag Archives: Paradox

Political Wisdom From Ancient China Gives Us Political Instruction Today

2 Replies

A truly good man is not aware of his goodness,
And is therefore good.
A foolish man tries to be good,
And is therefore not good.

A truly good man does nothing,
Yet nothing is left undone.
A foolish man is always doing,
Yet much remains to be done

When a truly kind man does something, he leaves nothing undone.
When a just man does something, he leaves a great deal to be done.
When a disciplinarian does something and no one responds,
He rolls up his sleeves in an attempt to enforce order

Therefore when Tao is lost, there is goodness.
When goodness is lost, there is kindness.
When kindness is lost, there is justice.
When justice is lost, there is ritual.
Now ritual is the husk of faith and loyalty, the beginning of confusion.
Knowledge of the future is only a flowery trapping of the Tao.
It is the beginning of folly.

Therefore the truly great man dwells on what is real
 and not what is on the surface,
On the fruit and not the flower,
Therefore accept the one and reject the other.

Tao te Ching–(translation by Gia-fu Feng and Jane English)

Spirituality and Paradox

6 Replies

Spirituality is paradoxical. There is no other way to cut it. For example, I live when I die. I’m up when I’m down. I’m most when I’m least. I’m found when I’m lost.

Read how Kabir put it:

I won’t come

I won’t go

I won’t live

I won’t die

I’ll keep uttering

The name

And lose myself

In it

I’m bowl

And I’m platter

I’m man

And I’m woman

I’m grapefruit

And I’m sweet lime

I’m Hindu

And I’m Muslim

I’m fish

And I’m net

I’m fisherman

And I’m time

I’m nothing

Says Kabir

I’m not among the living

Or the dead

— Translated by Arvind Krishna Mehrotra

 

Failure is More Important than Success

Leave a reply

“Failure is more important than success because it brings intelligence to light the bony structure of the universe.” (E. L. Mayo)

I’ve always been captivated by this poem though I’m not for sure I understand it.  I just intuitively know that it conveys great wisdom and wisdom is always complicated, paradoxical, and convoluted.

Failure is necessary as it counters our obsession with “success.”  Oh, we need success and our species has been very “successful” in so many respects.  We have created so much stuff and have made our life so much easier, perhaps too easy in ways.  Auden noted, “We have made our lives safer than we can bear.”  But it is the failures that humble us and teach us that there is more to life than “stuff”.  These “failures” can show us a qualitative intelligence that allows us to see the graciousness of life and without this insight the “structure of the universe” is quite “bony.”