The border guard at Changwu said to Zilao,
“The ruler must not leave clods unbroken in governing
and not pull up new growth in regulating the people.

Previously in ploughing my fields, I left the clods unbroken
and the result was a poor crop.
In weeding I pulled up good plants and
the result was a scanty harvest.

But later I changed my method:
I ploughed deeply and covered up the seeds carefully
and the harvests were plentiful
and I had more than I could eat all year long.”

When Zhuangzi heard these remarks he observed,
“At present, in attending to their bodies
and regulating their minds people are frequently
as the border guard has described.
They disregard heaven,
turn away from their real nature,
extinguish their spirit
and follow the common practice.
They neglect their true nature
and their nature is buried under
the unregulated growth of their inclinations and dis-inclinations.

At first, the weeds and rank growth
appear to support our bodies,
but they gradually destroy our nature
and become like
sores which break out like scabs
and ulcers discharging purulent fluid from fever.

Zhuangzi, trans. by Hyun Höchsmann and Yang Guorong, Book 25 Zeyang

From time to time insight comes unannounced in strange forms. For my lunch break I watch a few minutes of television while having lunch. A commercial which I happened upon yesterday remains in my mind. Appearing on screen an attractive female, with the obligatory smile. You know the beguiling visage when a sales pitch is immanent. She walks toward the viewer holding her cell phone. And she says that her life has taken a turn for the better, that she has discovered her “true” self. I only remember the product she was pitching was one of those “snake-oil” health/wellness formulations which you might be tempted to try if your circumstances entail unrelenting discomfort. 

How many clods are to be broken and how deep the plow has to go if one is to have a chance at improving one’s day to day experience? How much patient plowing and delicate seeding is called for? Demanding and time consuming. Yes! Others are crucial if you do not know how!

Enough of “taking a chance” upon the “sold-only-on-TV” remedy that medical science has overlooked… Screen media more than any other effectively shapes how we perceive ourselves and the world. The iphone screen is a lens by which we see everything (even if we happen not to be holding our phone). My inclinations and dis-inclinations are massaged!

To make a parody of Descartes well know dictum: Unable to think anymore, I consume, -therefore I am.

What nourishment from a bellyful of weeds?!