20 Stop thinking, and end your problems.
What difference between yes and no?
What difference between success and failure?
Must you value what others value,
avoid what others avoid?
How ridiculous!

Other people are excited,
as though they were at a parade.
I alone don’t care,
I alone am expressionless,
like an infant before it can smile.

Other people have what they need;
I alone possess nothing.
I alone drift about,
like someone without a home.
I am like an idiot, my mind is so empty.

Other people are bright;
I alone am dark.
Other people are sharp;
I alone am dull.
Other people have a purpose;
I alone don’t know.
I drift like a wave on the ocean,
I blow as aimless as the wind.

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

excerpt Tao te Ching by Lao Tsu trans. By Stephen Mitchell

A quick read through today’s New York Times Wednesday Update offered two reports which compelled my attention.  There is a new cold war in the making between ourselves and China.  I am dismayed that two major centers of commercial and cultural influence are facing off in a competition, when collaboration would benefit everyone.

In addition there is report that the Trump administration is compelling hospitals to submit their pandemic data directly to the White House, bypassing the CDC.  No more need be said about what this means for public safety, for reliable information necessary to saving lives. 

There is plenty to be concerned about.  One could become lost, immersed in the whirlpool of concern about our pandemic invested society.  There is no doubt that cause and effect is continuous, that all of this surely effects me and everyone that I care for.  I am composing these sentences on a laptop manufactured by a Chinese company.  As to the pandemic what is the value in dollars of continuing to be healthy, to avoid this debilitating vascular disease?  There is no price.

I know all of this and am reminded by these words from Lao Tsu of a more fundamental, more basic “truth” of my life.  I am connected to the great energy flow that enlivens all of Nature, the oceans, the sun, and all of the planets.  This vital energy, an élan vital (vital impetus), is prior to the ‘yes’ and the ‘no’ of competition between ambitious leaders, is greater than petty definitions of ‘success’ and ‘failure’ offered by political parties. 

There has to be a point, when I say, “enough!”  Sure I care about current events, and the policies of my government.  But, there is a greater obligation that I bear:  to follow, to be passionate about and engaged with family members, friends, and the well being of my vegetable and flower gardens.  There is enough to celebrate, ample satisfying work, and lessons to be learned from the Tao that sustains us all.

Other people are excited,
as though they were at a parade.
I alone don’t care,
I alone am expressionless,
like an infant before it can smile.

---

Our family spent four days together at a Michigan beach house close to the big lake.  Four special days were spent preparing meals, play, conversation, swimming in the often ferocious waves, and walks on the sandy beach.  On the last day of our visit, as is the custom, everyone walked down to the shore to watch the sun set to the west over the lake.  To normal perception the sun moves too slowly across the dome of the sky for the movement to be noticed.  At sunset the half circle of the sun drops behind the horizon of water noticeably.  When this happens I know palpably that I am on a rotating planet.  I know that I belong here with the lake, the shore, with family members, the lake house where we are staying, and with everything else.  Being there is worthy of a toast!

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