Becoming The Channel

April 17, 2026 Jerry King Comments 0 Comment

Lao-tsu said,
“He knows his masculine force
but prevails in his feminine receptivity,
becoming the channel into which all streams flow.

He knows his purity
but stays at the low level,
becoming the valley of the world.

Men all prefer to be first;
he alone prefers to be last,
saying that he will accept what the world discards.
Men all choose fullness;
he alone chooses emptiness.
He does not accumulate and therefore
has ample abundance.

He appears alone
but a multitude gathers about him.
In his conduct he is at ease and leisurely
and never wasteful.

He does nothing
and laughs at the enterprising and the astute…

‘That which is strong will break
and what is sharp will become blunt.’

Zhuangzi, trans. Hyun Höchsmann and Yang Guorong, Book 33 Under the Heaven

A good friend began a series of six posts on the topic of religion. The introductory post was confessional, a personal viewpoint, as any and all religious commentary must be. Artificial ‘objectivity’ borrowed from the scientific-method could not be more unsuited for exploration of religious experience in any of its forms. What is left for any of us, when the paraphernalia of stuff, the accessorization, vehicles, apparel, that virtue-signaling code meant for our audience is put aside? Shakespeare wrote it this way:

All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;

They have their exits and their entrances;

And one man in his time plays many parts,…

–As You Like It

If you dared to step away from the staging, the role play, what would you declare your location to be in the cosmos? If space and time were a 3D map, where would you place the X to say, ‘here is where I am.’

The austere, stressed relationship between the open, empathic life, counter poised with the gut-feel that the universe owes me nothing, that I am damn lucky to be here at all, is a taoist-flavored quasi-religious view that is persuasive to me. That’s personal. That arises from a past that is mine alone, strictly speaking.

Nevertheless I think that we humans would be well served to branch into a path that grafts a variety of taoist insight, to the story collection that is indigenous to those of us whose ancestors originated from European soil. There is impersonal depth to the dying, and to the birthing of everything, of all life, nothing excluded. (You or I, are not special) The cosmos is uncaring, BUT somehow we are a species able to care. Go figure! It is ok to be agape, speechless at the paradox, — it is our job to care!

Re-ligio, a Latin noun meaning ‘to bind back, tie again’, is the foundation for everything else. So let’s talk and write about this a lot. Eventually we will get around to politics, to economics, to education, to the serendipity of holidays, what merits celebrating, etc., etc..

First things are first.