Introduction

I will post my thoughts that relate to the message presented in the Tao Te Ching. I will not though try to Translate or interpret, but instead write my own version with no realtion to existing passages but for their suggestion of the Tao and life themselves. I wish to do this as there are many great translations or interpretations but they all stick to the same passages, order and so on. I feel this is a valid new project rather than yet another of the same.

New Tao Te Ching

Out side of knowing,
it's reputation remains intact;
Don't get lost in thought or explanation,
When life is right there.

Sould you be up or down,
you remain with Tao;
No need love or hate either state,
as one leads to the other.

Though the best,
it can display the worst;
Seeing that it is just an interpretation,
let a swamp in your view remind you of a crystal lake.

It is all that is and is not,
beyond the bounds of concept;
Naturally we can't fathom it,
a clock can not time it self.

Our viewpoints are relative,
Tao takes no favour;
Extremes of mind are extremes of emotion,
are just nature at play.

It is there when you are lost within it,
missing when you are looking for it;
So do not let others tell you how it is,
if they knew they would know it was not possible to say.

Where there is nothing,
we find the greatest power;
Where we find nothing we are one,
seen correctly one and nothing are equal.

Like a ripe fruit decays,
to continue life;
We see a seed is not birth,
the bodies end is not death.

Your empty mind,
is your full life;
The impenetrateable solid reality,
is the ungraspable mind.

Nothing has to go when you give everything up,
just stop clinging to things;
When no thing binds you to it,
you have it all.

Could matter become so complex as to form Mind?
more acceptable to us is that mind lead to matter;
To skip the dualism,
mind is matter is mind - Mutually arising.

Happy free people do not require leadership,
so a leader must instill that need;
Truth guides with no thought of reward,
I let you chose.

Start right,
go easy,
Forget right and easy,
Enjoy

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Perfection is not to be found in physical form,
but radiate from the perfect soul.
One should not question another until they are perfect themselves,
Once perfect there is nothing to say as all you have to teach will be clear for all to see.

New Tao vs Old Tao

Many will say that only an ancient Tao is true, yet one would have to be Chinese and very old to know that. Every version is an interpretation as the original is not known. It was passed by word of mouth, written versions, and now over 2000 years later, in English and every other language. People work from increasingly more modern versions to make their own. I feel though little is lost - the messages are strong and apparent in any version I have read with only some doubts raised with versions using Christian, Buddhist, Hindu even Kabbalistic metaphor - this is ok to convey a message to people of that faith - but the Tao itself is most difficult to find within such translations. One must find themselves one that talks to them - Therefore I recommend reading every version you find.