It is a philosophy which eschews the idea of image and exteriority. The Tao presents an idea of a life lived without the need for self-presentation, for praise or recognition. The Tao is a wonderful resource for reminding oneself of the necessity for silence and emptiness in a world which tells us that our life is worth nothing if we are not full, if we do not fill ourselves with food and experience, stuff our homes full of objects to display. I am trying to divest myself of the confusions created by desire, often desires which are fleeting and immaterial (or material in nature: the ownership, possession of books and things the ideologies which are spread by the news, by politicians) and which do not bring either comfort or meaning or joy to my life. It is an idea which has directed my thoughts and my actions for the past several months.

It is not, of course, the veracity of the translation which interests me here, but rather the ideas contained within the words. Like here, in his translation of one of the more famed passages, passage 33: There is something clean about it, modern perhaps, it reveals complexity of thought through simple language. I do not know which is the most faithful, but the one I enjoy the most is the translation by Stephen Mitchell. The Tao Te Ching consists of 81 passages, presented like poems.

As with my interest in buddhism I am not about to become a follower, but the ideas, the ways of being advocated by the Tao, hold great interest for me and in many ways it is closer to both how I feel and how I would like to be than any other philosophy I have encountered. It is a strange philosophy and yet it seems to encapsulate much of what I have been thinking and feeling over the past several months since I decided I needed to slow down, to restrict my reading and take more time over things. The Tao is like a logical puzzle, yet it is neither logical nor a puzzle. I have, for a long time, been interested in buddhism, not to the extent that I could become a ‘follower’ but rather because there are ideas in buddhism which intrigue me, and the Tao has similar appeal but I was not quite ready for how wholly it would entrance me. I think I must have read something else which made reference to it and out of the thinnest thread of curiosity I decided to borrow it from the library. Outside of my ordinary reading I have been dipping into poetry and other such things and somehow I came across the Tao, I can’t really remember how it happened.

This is not a regular review, more of a reflection.

Tao Te Ching by Stephen Mitchell