Chapter 20

Chapter 20

Renounce knowledge and your problems will end.
What is the difference between yes and no?
What is the difference between good and evil?
Must you fear what others fear?
Nonsense, look how far you have missed the mark!

Other people are joyous,
as though they were at a spring festival.
I alone am unconcerned and expressionless,
like an infant before it has learned to smile.

Other people have more than they need;
I alone seem to possess nothing.
I am lost and drift about with no place to go.
I am like a fool, my mind is in chaos.

Ordinary people are bright;
I alone am dark.
Ordinary people are clever;
I alone am dull.
Ordinary people seem discriminating;
I alone am muddled and confused.
I drift on the waves on the ocean,
blown at the mercy of the wind.
Other people have their goals,
I alone am dull and uncouth.

I am different from ordinary people.
I nurse from the Great Mother’s breasts.

================================================================

I infer from the above passage that Lao Tzu might have been a shy person. As occurs with most of the introverts like myself, a shy man tends to feel awkward at a social meeting or party. Lao Tzu was famously known to be a recluse befriending nature, after all? On the other hand, some commentators (Ogangnam, especially) note that this chapter illustrates the existential solitude of a sage. It is well known that “ordinary” people like to depict smarts or geniuses as weirdos. I certainly do not think that Lao Tzu was a math genius because he barely mentions anything about numbers. His insights into nature, human psychology, and leadership were all produced through some type of solitary meditation and observation. His philosophy is far from “calculus of thoughts.” (Of course, whether we can call somebody a genius simply because his ideas or philosophy is based on calculus is disputable. In addition, even though Spinoza wrote the notoriously difficult Ethica based on geometry, I do not have a high appraisal of his books including that one. In my view, Spinoza is merely an old relic of western metaphysics.)

But I do admit the profundity of Lao Tzu’s thoughts. In the times when Lao Tzu wrote these chapters, there was in fact no paper made from trees; there were only some bamboo plates on which to draw some Chinese character strokes with an animal fur brush. His philosophy could not have come about without much thought on the nature of the universe and humans.

OK. Now back to the subject.

Regarding this “existential solitude,” one quote comes to mind.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said:

“A great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.”

According to Emerson, it is easy to retreat into yourself when you feel that no one understands you (especially when we are teens). It is also easy to try our best to conform to social demands to feel and affirm that we belong in society. These feelings are natural and understandable.

However, according to Emerson, a great man, or a sage, would not resort to either of the two exclusively. He would be able to alternate between the two modes. In addition, ideally, such a person would perfectly meld well with the people around him while remaining at his core a distinct person that he was destined to become, that is, a sole unique person that occupies a humble position in this vastness of the universe. This type of person also coincides with a fearless person depicted by Greene that accepts his unique character as a destiny in the 50th Law.

Maybe Lao Tzu needed some lesson from this great modern thinker, Emerson. However, Emerson’s quote above is actually one of the ideas that I believe can be deduced from the tao te ching.

Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Forget about knowledge and wisdom,
and people will be a hundred times better off.
Throw away charity and righteousness,
and people will return to brotherly love.
Throw away profit and greed,
and there won’t be any thieves.

These three are superficial and aren’t enough
to keep us at the center of the circle, so we must also:

Embrace simplicity.
Put others first.
Desire little.

================================================================

I do not consider myself to be a materialistic person not because I want to believe myself to be a detached person from such issues but because I know (for a fact) that I do not pursue money to have more than what I deem to be necessary to satisfy my basic necessities. I do not know whether my lack of interest in making a huge amount of money makes me a virtuous person, but I think this is a good thing because it at least prevented me from such gambling as bitcoins. Of course, if I had lots of money, things would be quite better. I wouldn’t have to live in this shitty house and can move somewhere better and no longer listen to, against my will, all the noise from these residents living next doors. (My neighbors are my enemies because my mood and life cycle are disrupted because of their noise .I am resentful of the fact that they are not considerate enough for me and cause me stress. I, on the other hand, am careful not to make any noise because I do not want them to be aware of how I live. There is a reason why Sartre said, “Hell is other people.”)

Or maybe I was wrong. I like money. I remember skipping meals on a few occasions at college because my parents could not afford to send me money. I had several part time jobs from time to time, but could not earn very much because I worked only on weekends due to class schedules. In addition, I would not certainly have had to borrow government loans for tuition if I had had lots of money.

And if I had lots of money now, I think I would have went to graduate school in the US and studied analytical/mathematical philosophy.

I personally believe that humans are born with some fixed personalities. If some of these fixed characters are bad, it takes a big effort to compensate for these flaws. Your deficiencies or immaturity never goes away entirely. They always stay with you till the day you die. Therefore, I can only believe in “fake it until you make it.”

Regarding the appetite for money as well, I believe that people are simply born differently. Even though people mostly want to have lots of money and strive for wealth, there are some of those that are not so keen in the idea of working too hard for only money.

I do not think that if we “throw away profit and greed,” then there won’t be any thieves.  There will always be thieves. I hate to tell you this, but there will always be rapes, murders, and a lot of other felonies. In that sense, I believe that the descriptions in the above chapter simply represent Laozi’s wishful thinking.

Therefore, instead of trying hard in vain to educate people to learn contentment by having less, the authorities must make strategic use of limited resources on reducing the number of such crimes – e.g., hiring more police officers, strengthening law enforcement, and providing rehabilitation programs . This idea can be best represented by the principle of economics. We must find on a graph an ideal point at which a maximum utility value is achieved by properly allocating limited human power resources and budgets in regard to the efforts to reduce crimes.

Chapter 18

Chapter 18

When the great Tao is abandoned,
charity and righteousness appear.
When intellectualism arises,
hypocrisy is close behind.

When there is strife in the family unit,
people talk about ‘brotherly love’.

When the country falls into chaos,
politicians talk about ‘patriotism’.

================================================================

Is it possible that Lao Tzu had some affinity with the ideology of anarchism? Because Lao Tzu seems to emphasize the importance of “naturalness” in this chapter.

Apart from that issue, I believe that this chapter provides an insight into how Lao Tzu’s binary opposites can help us on a practical level.

One friend of mine once told me that he can tell whether or not he is in good mood by watching a comedy program. When he laughs a lot watching it, he says, he can tell that he feels fine. When he doesn’t, then that indicates he is in bad mood.

However, I have a little different way of making such a judgment on myself. If I discover myself reading Greene’s 50th Law a lot more often than usual for a reason other than simply reading for entertainment, then I take it that I feel a little insecure for some reason. I won’t define specifically what causes those feelings. But that could mean losing your job or being about to lose it. Or it could mean losing friends or growing insecure over my circumstances.

When I look for guidance through books and write lots of encouraging quotes or personal thoughts on paper to cheer myself up or toughen myself, then that means I want to do something about myself feeling uneasy.

Lao Tzu rightly indicates that a superficial movement for encouraging positive qualities and virtues suggests hidden uncomfortable feelings such as inner turmoil or fear of losing control. Because if society was virtuous already, no one would need to argue that we should become virtuous. When you say that something should be done, it means that it is not being done and that there is a problem. It’s simple.

When something is happening and you see it, you must figure out what is the substance behind it that causes it. When you see something, it usually indicates in reality an opposite of what you see.

For example, Greene notes in the 33 Strategies of War that when somebody has suddenly changed and shows some exaggerated niceties to you in a competitive work environment, it means that something bad is going on. He is plotting against you. People that have not experienced this kind of “passive aggression” would not understand what Greene is talking about. I’ve experienced this myself and therefore can attest to his argument.

Chapter 17

Chapter 17

The best leaders are those the people hardly know exist.
The next best is a leader who is loved and praised.
Next comes the one who is feared.
The worst one is the leader that is despised.

If you don’t trust the people,
they will become untrustworthy.

The best leaders value their words, and use them sparingly.
When she has accomplished her task,
the people say, “Amazing:
we did it, all by ourselves!”

================================================================

I can agree with Laozi on the point that a masterful leader is somebody that can make people think that accomplishments were made by themselves.

Nowadays, unlike the people of his times, citizens are not fools and have pretty much information and the ability to see through political affairs. I am, on the other hand, not familiar with the knowledge of politics or political issues, so I won’t discuss them.

However, I do find it surprising that an ideal leader that Lao Tzu had in mind was a sage that can make people think that they achieved prosperity on their own. A monarchy would usually focus on the idea of keeping the throne and sustaining one lineal dynasty and not much on other issues. Lao Tzu’s leader type seems to be more akin to a competent, honest leader sought in a contemporary democracy.

Chapter 16

Chapter 16

If you can empty your mind of all thoughts
your heart will embrace the tranquility of peace.
Watch the workings of all of creation,
but contemplate their return to the source.

All creatures in the universe
return to the point where they began.
Returning to the source is tranquility
because we submit to Heaven’s mandate.

Returning to Heaven’s mandate is called being constant.
Knowing the constant is called ‘enlightenment’.
Not knowing the constant is the source of evil deeds
because we have no roots.
By knowing the constant we can accept things as they are.
By accepting things as they are, we become impartial.
By being impartial, we become one with Heaven.
By being one with Heaven, we become one with Tao.
Being one with Tao, we are no longer concerned about
losing our life because we know the Tao is constant
and we are one with Tao.

================================================================

When people taste power and glory, they feel the huge boost to their ego and wish to hold on to that feeling of invincibility. Once you taste its intoxicating effects, it is hard to hold back or accept your downfall when you do experience such a setback. Nobody can accept his fallen grace readily. As for myself, I’m merely a minion and haven’t been close to such honors. But I can do imagine what it would feel like to be seated in a position of glory, for there were times that I thought (maybe very mistakenly) I was a better man than some of my friends in a small circle of my social relationships.

When I was young, my uncle used to tell me that at school it is usually the previously highest performing kid that kills himself and not a guy that cares whether he receives low marks on exams. A kid that is indifferent to his school performance could not care less about whether he does well or poorly on exams. On the other hand, another kid that his parents have high anticipation for lives under constant stress and pressure for having to not only satisfy himself and his parents but also to prove his uniqueness and talent to others. I do not think it is wrong to yearn for excellence. Nietzsche would precisely encourage you to cultivate yourself and strive for excellence. Nevertheless, it is better to become able to live as an ordinary man enjoying relationships with his  ompanions than to continue to despair upon having fallen from grace, should we choose between the two. Therefore, you do not have to kill yourself or become an alcoholic because of the failure that you define for yourself.

Let me try some “Laozian sidetracking” here. When I first got my job in Gangnam, Seoul, while I was still about to graduate college, I could not understand why my superiors worked so dearly to cling to their jobs. Why do not care and worry less for yourself, I thought. I could read from their faces that they were constantly worried about being fired and anxious to check whether everything was right. I will not explain in detail here why I had to leave my first workplace only after a year as a rookie. However, I will say that in hindsight I realized that they had a reason to feel nervous and even occasionally panicky and paranoid. It was precisely their anxiety that enabled them to stay in their position for over a decade. They knew that at their age they could not find a better job to replace the current one. They had kids and family to take care of, and so dreaded losing their jobs. Me, on the other hand, was relatively free from such concerns, so I acted however I wanted.(Not that I did not live under pressure because I also often felt like vomiting while having dinner alone alienated from those teammates.) I did not know I was being so naïve and even daring in that tense work environment. People also seemed to care about our boss’s approval. In fact, if they did not care as much about their employer’s view of them and how well they were doing at work, they would have already lost their lucrative job and been downgraded to some menial job elsewhere. The intense pressure that they put themselves under actually made them survive. The irony was that they so much hated having to spend long hours in the office and wanted to leave the workplace but did whatever it took – even including playing some dirty tricks on others (I was one victim) – to protect their place. I could smell in their stink their ugly desperation to drive out whomever they did not like as a new comer in the workplace; that made me feel like punching in their selfish dirty face. (For the record, I will say that now I thank them for teaching me a lesson and having considered me to be a target worthy of their political attack. I still consider those years spent in the business built and maintained through their tears and toils to be some of the prime moments of my life.)

A person that does not think he has anything to lose cannot accomplish anything. Here, I am not talking about a guy in a “deathground” mode. A person that cannot appreciate the value of something so much as to risk even his life and tranquility for it may never be able to attain it, unless by some tremendous luck he comes to have it. In some sense, you should be real desperate like you are about to fall in hell to achieve anything substantial. A guy that is idle and does not care hard enough is unlikely to spend much time for work and may make his family members or friends financially suffer for his idleness. Therefore, I am not recommending sloth as an alternative to our contemporary neurosis.

It sometimes happens that a person who feels he has nothing to lose if it is all for this particular goal actually achieves tremendous success and makes his achievement a lasting legacy in history. Look at Napoleon or Renan Cortez. (However, for another sidetracking, it should also be noted that they are two of the very few that turned out to be successful; the rest of the other guys that took the gambling were wiped out at an instant.)

So much for my Laozian sidetracking.

Let me mention Marcus Aurelius, who was a mighty emperor of the then superpower, the Roman Empire. As the stoic writer Ryan Holiday notes, he constantly reminded himself to be humble and even referred to the teachings of the stoic guru Epictetus, who was once previously a slave, for guidance on maintaining his stoicism.In fact, stoicists encourage us to have a flying bird’s view of the ordinary world affairs. For example, the usual objects of our anger appear to be so petty once looking upon them from a distance.

Let us say that the above chapter of the tao te ching encourages us to expand that bird’s view even further into the universe itself. I do not think Laozi would have known this scientific fact then, but even the earth and heaven are not eternal. In Chapter 7, Laozi notes that they are eternal because they do not live for themselves. However, everything in the universe, or even the universe itself, is in a “constant state of flux.”

Greene notes in the last chapter of the 50th law that as you consciously bring yourself closer to the realistic idea of the possibility of death, you would be able to focus your energy more on things that truly matter and less on other trivial things that do you no good in the end. He also tells us to realize the sense of the “oceanic.” We are essentially one and the same, if contemporary cosmology is telling me right – because everything in the universe exploded from a single big bang point. If a man achieves this tranquil “aloofness,” he will not probably be harmed even after falling from grace.

Chapter 15

Chapter 15

The Sages of old were profound
and knew the ways of subtlety and discernment.
Their wisdom is beyond our comprehension.
Because their knowledge was so far superior
I can only give a poor description.

They were careful
as someone crossing a frozen stream in winter.
Alert as if surrounded on all sides by the enemy.
Courteous as a guest.
Fluid as melting ice.
Whole as an uncarved block of wood.
Receptive as a valley.
Turbid as muddied water.

Who can be still
until their mud settles
and the water is cleared by itself?
Can you remain tranquil until right action occurs by itself?

The Master doesn’t seek fulfillment.
For only those who are not full are able to be used
which brings the feeling of completeness.

================================================================

The Sage described in the above “poor description” by Lao Tzu is certainly far from an ideal lofty person looking down on his neighbors from atop an ivory tower. I don’t have any intention to disparage a Confucian sage, but it is my belief that a practitioner of Confucianism is prone to fall in the error of developing condescending attitudes towards non-practitioners; this is like several Jehovah’s Witnesses condemning “foreigners” for not following their doctrines. As a matter of fact, I believe that Confucius’ intent in itself was innocent and pure because the only thing he ever wanted was to establish order and bring lasting peace and stability to families and society. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that Confucianism as an organized effort –especially, as in the case of medieval Korea, or Chosun – was an utter failure. Confucius himself was a good Master; he personally reminds me of an oriental stoic sage. He even said, “What the superior man seeks is in himself; what the ordinary man seeks is in others.” (I like this quote.) Just as the majority of the sects of Christianity now and then severely distorted the original teachings from Jesus, the later self-proclaimed followers of Confucius also distorted him or at least failed to realize the real intent of his teachings. They instead clang to their dogmatic interpretations of Confucius and were, most of the time throughout Korean history, incorrigible hypocrites. They were rigid and inflexible. Their attitudes were somewhat similar to the European Catholic priests of the dark ages. They are geniuses at rhetoric. I believe a current psychologist can rightly diagnose them to have suffered personality disorders. The scary thing is that they truly seemed to have believed they were good people. No ordinary person has the ability to think they are good people while destroying the spirits of others. They were like the Jon Jones’ of our community – some pathological liars and deceivers having no scruples. There was something about these thick-skinned characters that deeply maddened and frustrated good ordinary people.

Some may suspect I am all against Confucius. That is not true. I certainly have a decent respect for the man. In some way, he reminds me of Nietzsche in that he persevered to the end in the mission of morally perfecting himself and society despite cold responses from people.

Now I will turn to Lao Tzu. If one confines Lao Tzu to a sage that practices wu-wei and only stays away from a mess; and contrasts Lao’s “idleness” with the unending zealous efforts of Confucius to correct a corrupt society, one will see only one facet of Lao Tzu. My renewed version of Lao Tzu, however, is a sage that embraces even that Confucius. This renewed Lao Tzu embraces both the conventional Lao Tzu and Confucius. Such a Lao Tzu would know when to be a conventional Lao Tzu or Confucius.

“Who can be still until their mud settles and the water is cleared by itself? Can you remain tranquil until right action occurs by itself?”

The above quote illustrates a beautiful metaphor illustrating the wu-wei philosophy of the tao te ching.

However, as much as I do really appreciate the beauty of this metaphor (I emphasize this again, I really love the muddy water metaphor), I need to add qualification to Laozi’s metaphorical advice.

In Chapter 2, I stated as a possibility a case in which one may achieve inner piece by harmonizing himself between the conscious and the unconscious by putting faith in the self-correcting power of the self. Lao Tzu compares this autonomous power to natural purification of water that is made to remain still. A river or sea has the ability to get clean by itself.  Likewise, a depressed patient – although it is highly advised that he should take antidepressants and consult a psychiatrist – may also heal after a long, long period of time.

However, I must say that there are cases where mental, psychological pain never disappears. You may even have to continue to carry this heavy load on your mind throughout your lifetime. If that is the case, instead of waiting for the pain to disappear, you may have to learn to exist in relation to this perpetual pain, like Sisyphus narrated by Albert Camus. There are moments when your pain feels insurmountable. There doesn’t seem to be an exit. In fact, the more you wait for the muddied water to purify by itself, the longer it takes for your unconscious to work it out (this is my “psychological theory of relativity,” which is not really difficult to understand based on common sense). You may or may not be able to heal from your trauma or immense emotional pain that weighs you down. Nobody can tell.

As for myself, I think about this constant nagging noise. What noise? The literal noise. I am allergic to noise and hate every unwanted noise – especially, the loud noise from people that I am not acquainted with, noise from cars on the street, noise from the motorcycles that I wish I could flip over, noise from an airplane in the sky, noise from the people next door, noise from the pulses in my earlobe which are made audible when I put my ear-plugs as I try to fall asleep, noise from my coworker in the next cubicle constantly chatting with her colleagues, and especially, noise from that goddamn repugnant printing machine in the office. It pains me. I am not kidding. All these noises are extreme irritations to my life, and I do seriously believe that they are taking a heavy toll on my cardiovascular health. In fact, I am not able to urinate at ease in the bathroom when a different person is making sound in a bathroom for the other gender's use. I sometimes have minor heartaches because of stress coming from noise and people. You may think I am an erratic, easily irritable person.  I am. But this recognition does not help me any better. I even thought about consulting a doctor taking some pills that can kill down my nerves. But I am worried about their side effects so haven’t tried one. It turns out that the only sound that cures me is Linkin Park’s instrumental and Chester Bennington’s voice – along with some other alternative rock music such as Limp Bizkit.

Why am I talking about noise? Personally, I do not believe that I am able to grow immune to noise. I have suffered this since I was about fifteen and things never got better for me. There were several occasions of arguing with my neighbors which could have escalated into a violent altercation. When I lived with a roommate in my freshman year at college and could not fall asleep because this guy would constantly make noise while playing a computer game, this guy once asked me, “Haven’t you got used to all this?” I did not tell him this then, but I never got angrier with him than that. Noise is constantly wearing down my inner peace, piece by piece. It hasn’t improved at all. Likewise, if some psychological problem is constantly nagging you and hasn’t improved even a little since a long time ago, perhaps we may have to rethink if this water metaphor can work for you. You may begrudgingly have to accept that this is your fate. In other words, you must learn to exist your pain. We all have thorns in the flesh as Apostle Paul did. Do not fight it. The more you fight it, the stronger it binds you. Do not wait for it to disappear, either. Befriend it. The previously muddied water, even after having been “cleared by itself,” is more likely to get muddy again as time goes by. This is, I believe, a way of practicing our amor fati.

Chapter 14

14

Look for it, and it can’t be seen.
Listen for it, and it can’t be heard.
Grasp for it, and it can’t be caught.
These three cannot be further described,
so we treat them as The One.

Its highest is not bright.
Its depths are not dark.
Unending, unnameable, it returns to nothingness.
Formless forms, and imageless images,
subtle, beyond all understanding.

Approach it and you will not see a beginning;
follow it and there will be no end.
When we grasp the Tao of the ancient ones,
we can use it to direct our life today.
To know the ancient origin of Tao:
this is the beginning of wisdom.

=======================================================

So far from chapters 1 to 13, I have tried to analyze the content of the tao te ching from a logical perspective. However, the more I read through the chapters of the book, the more I find Laozi’s statements to be primarily mystical. Of course, I am aware that Lao Tzu did have insights into nature, and based upon them, he unfolded his core ideas.

In the last verse of the chapter, Lao Tzu encourages us to know the “ancient” origin of Tao. Whereas Solomon declares in Proverbs that to learn to to fear Yahweh is the beginning of wisdom, Lao Tzu asserts that it is the knowledge of the tao’s origin that will empower us to attain wisdom. But what Tao really is is subject to one’s interpretation. In addition, one’s interpreted tao is not quite the Tao of the universe. Therefore, it is essentially vain to attempt to define it. Because you can never quite reach it.

Because Lao Tzu never clearly identifies the identity of the tao, it is difficult to discern what he precisely meant to tell us. Hegel rightly notes that while Lao Tzu’s book contains many profound maxims, most of them cannot be understood clearly due to their ambiguity. The tao te ching does include a lot of elements that lead one to make a mystical interpretation of the text.

In that sense, it is no wonder that many ancient Chinese people developed mystical faith in the transcendental power of Tao, which led to the religion of Taoism. Mysticism is not found only in Asia; it pervaded Western societies as well. In fact, mystical beliefs are still observed among many of our contemporaries. As a matter of fact, even Wittgenstein’s first published monumental book ended in mystical notes – i.e., concluding that we should only remain silent regarding things we cannot describe but only experience.

Actually, I have a feeling that some of the descriptions in Chapter 14 can resonate very well with someone seeing fantasies after taking LSD. I will put here a bold guess simply for fun. Is it possible that Lao Tzu included in his book some descriptions of his fantasies after taking opium?