Simple and Minute

    I am doing some writing tonight, working on a chapter that introduces "key concepts" of Taoism and Confucianism for the book I mentioned in this post.  It's going well; I will likely finish a draft of this chapter as the month ends, just what I wanted to do.

    Searching for references for wu-wei - "doing nothing" or "nothing's own doing" - I re-read passage 63 of the Tao Te Ching.  It's marvelous, especially if you are feeling overwhelmed by all the big and complicated and difficult things in life. 

If you're nothing doing what you do,
you act without acting
and savor without savoring,

you render the small vast and the few many,
use Integrity to repay hatred,
see the complexity in simplicity,
find the vast in the minute.

The complex affairs of all beneath heaven are there in simplicity,
and the vast affairs of all beneath heaven are there in the minute.
That's why a sage never bothers with vastness
and so becomes utterly vast.

Easy promises breed little trust,
and too much simplicity breeds too much complexity.
That's why a sage inhabits the complexity of things
and so avoids all complexity.

 That's all.

Comments

[bing chen]

I think wu-wei can be easily misinterpreted as “do nothing” that it leads people thinking that Taoism is “just follow the nature and do nothing”. Hippies in the 60s could be one of the distorted example.

Recently a thought struck me like the lightning that wu-wei should be “do a lot and do your best but no controlling, no manipulation, and no pursuing for authority, wealth, …, etc” instead of “do nothing”

In other words, wu-wei could mean “do great efforts but do nothing to benefit, credit, boast, enrich or empower himself” like sun nurturing the earth. Similarly, it takes tremendous of efforts to raise the kids but the care takers need to understand wu-wei (discipline but not controlling) to be successful parents. It’s definitely (and better) not just “do nothing”.

Just my humble opinion, what do you think?

[Sam]

I very much agree with you. That is why I like the translation "nothing's own doing." When you are not pushing against Way - the natural unfolding of things - you are "doing" but you are not interfering or channeling or trying to dominate. Too literal an interpretation of "do nothing" is not very helpful. We all do - we just need to be attuned to the limits of our doing.