Tao Te Ching
Tao Te Ching
Chapter 58Goals Without Means
Chapter 58
The less a leader does and says,
The happier the people.
The more a leader struts and controls,
The more discontent.
Misery lurks under good fortune,
Happiness hides under misery.
Since nothing is certain,
Who knows what the future holds?
Happiness and misery alternate like the seasons:
Honesty becomes deception,
The fortunate becomes unfortunate,
The ominous becomes auspicious
And our bewilderment goes on and on.
And so the wise become:
An edge that doesn’t cut,
A point that doesn’t pierce,
A line that doesn’t extend,
A light that doesn’t shine.
Commentary
“Set thy heart upon thy work, but never on its reward.”
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“Happiness does not depend on what you have or who you are, it solely relies on what you think.”
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“In politics we presume that everyone who knows how to get votes knows how to administer a city or a state. When we are ill... we do not ask for the handsomest physician, or the most eloquent one.”
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“Education and study confer no greater benefit than learn to avoid the wildness of extremes.”
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“Do not indulge in dreams of having what you have not, but reckon up the chief of the blessings you do possess, and then thankfully remember how you would crave for them if they were not yours.”
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“If there is an ‘owner’ then there is something that can be ‘owned.’ But if from the beginning there never has been a ‘self,’ then what ‘owned’ can there be?”
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“When the bottom is filled with rubbish, just walk though the sludge.”
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“When the government leaves power with the people… makes no demands, the people respond with openness instead of deception. When the government makes demands, the people use every means to escape.”
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“The more perfect civilization is, the less occasion has it for government… government, even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worse state, an intolerable one.”
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“Better to shun the bait than struggle in the snare.”
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“whenever the conscious mind clings to hard and fast concepts and gets caught in its own rules and regulations - as is unavoidable and of the essence of civilized consciousness - nature pops up with her inescapable demands.”
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“Remain true to yourself, but move ever upward toward greater consciousness and greater love! At the summit you will find yourselves united with all those who, from every direction, have made the same ascent. For everything that rises must converge.”
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“People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.”
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“Spare me the political events and power struggles, as the whole earth is my homeland and all men are my fellow countrymen.”
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“Armaments, universal debt, and planned obsolescence—those are the three pillars of Western prosperity. If war, waste, and moneylenders were abolished, you'd collapse. And while you people are over consuming the rest of the world sinks more and more deeply into chronic disaster.”
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“Consistency is contrary to nature, contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are the dead.”
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“All the present bureaucracies of political governments, great religious organizations, and all big businesses find that physical success for all humanity would be devastating to the perpetuation of their ongoing activities.”
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“The quest for certainty blocks the search for meaning. Uncertainty is the very condition to impel man to unfold his powers.”
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“People make mistakes in life through believing too much, but they have a damned dull time if they believe too little.”
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“Relative mind is the mind which sets itself in relation to other things, thus limiting itself. It is this small mind which creates gaining ideas and leaves traces of itself.”
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“The ownership and the consumption of goods is a means to an end, and Buddhist economics is the systematic study of how to attain given ends with the minimum means.”
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“Taoists gain their ends without the use of means. That is indeed a light that does not shine.”
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“The most important thing is to enjoy your life - to be happy - it's all that matters.”
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“Although almost all our attention goes toward the surface, the form of government; the deep importance and influence has much less to do with the description, the name - much more to with integrity of the people involved.”
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“We Americans are not usually thought to be a submissive people, but of course we are. Why else would we allow our country to be destroyed? Why else would we be rewarding its destroyers? Why else would we all — by proxies we have given to greedy corporations and corrupt politicians — be participating in its destruction?”
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“The promoters of the global economy...see nothing odd or difficult about unlimited economic growth or unlimited consumption in a limited world.”
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“Know the rules well, so you can break them effectively.”
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“The tantric tradition builds us up so we do not have to relate at the level of a donkey reaching for a carrot anymore. The donkey has the carrot already”
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“We didn't know it was possible to be happy all the time. We didn't know you could have a heart without any heckpoints.”
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“Happiness is a flimsy premise upon which to base one’s life.”
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