Posts Tagged ‘tao te ching’

Stay Loose

Whether you are waiting to return a serve on the tennis court or listening for your name to be called for a job interview, your instinct is to stay loose. Be ready, be flexible, be poised to respond when the time is right. Staying loose is part of living in the present moment. Your readiness to move is part of your wisdom and gives you the power you need to live your best life. In the 76th verse of the Tao Te Ching, Lao-tzu describes the flexibility that living things possess: “All things, including the grass and trees, are soft and pliable in life.” He contrasts that living pliability with the dry and brittle quality of death. Choosing to remain flexible is choosing life: “A tree that cannot bend will crack in the wind.”

You may have been taught that strength is measured by how “hard” you are in your thinking or how inflexible you are in your opinions and that weakness is associated with those who bend. But when confronted with any stressful situation, keep in mind that being stiff won’t get you very far, whereas being flexible will carry you through.

Change the way you think about strength. Aren’t the physically and mentally strong those who can bend and adapt to life—especially as we age? The more you think in rigid ways, refraining from considering other points of view, the more you’re liable to break. As Lao-tzu reminds us, “The hard and stiff will be broken,” while “the soft and supple will prevail.” Our minds and our bodies need flexibility to thrive. When we see ourselves as flexible and supple, we are able to bend in harmony with our Divine source. By listening, yielding, and being gentle, we all become disciples of life.

Measuring Your Worth?

If you’re presently evaluating your level of achievement based on how much you’ve accumulated, here’s a way to make a major shift in your state of personal satisfaction and contentment. Verse 46 of the Tao Te Ching invites you to discover a more peaceful and self-satisfying way of knowing success. “Contentment alone is enough,” says Lao-tzu. “Indeed, the bliss of eternity can be found in contentment.” As you let go of the determination to acquire more, your new views will change the world you’ve known. You’ll find that the experience of inner peace becomes your true gauge of accomplishment.

The “disease of more” has created an environment that personifies Lao-tzu’s observation that there is “no greater tragedy than discontentment.” When you truly understand what it means to live peacefully, satisfaction will begin to replace your desire for more. Your world will begin to become tranquil as you change your own life and then touch the lives of your immediate family, your neighbors, your co-workers, and ultimately your nation and the entire planet. Begin by simply thinking of the opening line of the famous Prayer of Saint Francis when you notice that you’re demanding more of anything.

Silently say, Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace. As that instrument of peace, Continue Reading

Dr. Wayne Dyer begins Excuses Begone Tour in July

Dr. Wayne W Dyer spent 2006 immersed in the ancient teachings of Lao-tzu, studying his monumental tome, the Tao Te Ching. He read, meditated, lived, and then wrote an essay on each of the 81 verses of the Tao, which many have called the wisest book ever written. That collection of essays is titled Change Your Thoughts–Change Your Life: Living the Wisdom of the Tao. He learned, and to this day practices, what to think through all that Lao-tzu taught him in that year.

Excuses Begone, was also influenced by that eminent master Lao-tzu. Since the Tao Te Ching taught him what kind of thinking harmonized with our higher selves, he asked Lao-tzu for advice on how to change long established habits of thought. Wayne realized that knowing what to think does not necessarily clarify how to go about changing a lifetime of habitual thinking. He has drawn on Lao-tzu’s wisdom by contemplating his teachings and asking for his guidance on what it takes to bring about a change in the long held habits of thought that manifest as excuses.

In this tour, Wayne will take you through the seven questions that constitute the Excuses Begone paradigm and show you how this paradigm worked on himself and how it can work for you. By examining the support system that a person has erected over a long period of time, often going back to early childhood, and putting these time worn thoughts through the seven steps in this paradigm, excuses begin to fade away, and are replaced with thoughts that speak fervently, almost shouting, Yes, you can change any excuse pattern, no matter how long or how pervasive has been the conditioning process.

Wayne has seen people give up a lifetime of being overweight or addicted to all manner of substances by simply applying the principles that are inherent in the Excuses Begone approach to life.

If you are truly serious about changing any long established habits of thought that have led you to use excuses as your rationale for staying the same, then I encourage you to follow the principles and practices presented in this lecture!

Dr. Wayne W. Dyer presents live lectures in major cities across the US. Please click here for locations and details.