Centered in the Tao

Centered in the Tao

Around 2500 years ago Lao-tzu wrote:

The great Way is easy,
yet people prefer the side paths.
Be aware when things are out of balance.
Stay centered within the Tao.

When rich speculators prosper
while farmers lose their land;
when government officials spend money
on weapons instead of cures;
when the upper class is extravagant and irresponsible
while the poor have nowhere to turn –
all this is robbery and chaos.
It is not in keeping with the Tao.


Clearly, the “little” way of unconsciousness is at its zenith now. Before, perhaps a region or a nation could be impoverished by those in power not “in keeping with the Tao.”

Now the entire world is suffering from robbery and chaos.

Before waking to these words this morning, I had a dream. And the dream was like a foreshadowing of the Tao Te Ching reading.


In my dream I saw chaos. Things were swirling around, out of control, beyond human power to settle. Yet, still people strove against the tide of uncertainty, desperate to wrest their own order out of the confusion.



And a voice spoke to me, as it were, saying, “Resist not. Accept your part in this. Embrace all that comes to you with peace of heart. This is the only path to freedom.”


Be aware when things are out of balance. Stay centered in the Tao.



“Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flieth by day, nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand, but it shall not come near thee” (Psalm 91:5-7).

Stay centered in the Tao.