Way-Making the Dao

#daoism #wuwei #wuzhi #wuyu #ziran Making Life Significant   (by cultivating "Wu"-forms and zìrán) "Those who intentionally seek the  Dào , enter a relationship with the  Dào. " (From Daodejing Ch 23, my translation, 故從事于道者，同于道 gù cóngshì yú dào zhě, tóng yú dào .) I love Ames and Hall's subtitle for their translation of the Daodejing : "Making Life Significant." Seeking the Dào is not only about connecting through meditation and Qigong. It's also about participating in the Dào 's manifold interpenetration of those around us, about how we conduct our lives as we walk that Path. Fourth-Century BCE Daoist sage Lieh Y ü -Ko's  Liezi . 's Book 1, "Cosmogony," says it this way: "It is Heaven's function to produce life and to spread a canopy over it. It is Earth's function to form material bodies and to support them. It is the Sage's function to teach others and to influence them for good. It is the function of crea...

#meditation #qigong #daoism Way-Making and the  Dào  This entry is the second post in a series on studying Daoism. (The first post, which provides a list of essential readings, is at this link .) This entry will cover strategies taught by Daoist philosophers for ways to connect personally with the  Dào . And that's not metaphoric: As mystical as it sounds, these time-honored strategies actually facilitate bringing the presence of  Dào  into your awareness. They work. But the operative word is "work." The term "Way-Making" implies your participation: Way-Making is active--in fact, interactive--rather than passive, requiring commitment and persistence to practice regularly two kinds of activities: meditation and Qigong (breath exercises). Neither are difficult to practice, but both require perseverance to master. Let's look at them individually. Meditation No less than Daoist sage Laozi himself set the tone for Daoist meditation over two and a half millennia ...

  #walkingthetao, #laozi, #zhuangzi, #liezi, #taoteching, #iching #studyingdaosim #daoism Way-Making the   Dào   ( Disclaimer : I'm a student of Daoism--not a Daoist master. I was a teacher for 36 years and discovered I always learned best when I had to teach material, so the following is what I've distilled from a "Daoism Discovery Journal" I've kept since January 2025. If it helps others looking into Daoism as well--all the better. But this is as much for me as anyone.) T his entry is the first in a ten-part blog series that provides an introduction to Way-Making the Dào as an active, creative participant. Below is a list, with links, to each entry in this series. 1. Way-Making the Dao  (This page)     (Intro and essential readings) 2. Way-Making Exercises     (Meditation and Qigong) 3. Making Life Significant       (Wu-forms and ziran) 4. Yijing     (The Book of Changes) 5. It's about time!    (Time and Timi...