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Use fewer words; commit yourself to long periods of listening; and eliminate giving advice, meddling, and participating in gossip.
I’m doing so to encourage you to change the way you see your world. If
See yourself in all others and you’ll find the compassion, love, and willingness that replaces your belief in your uniqueness and differentness.
Mother Teresa was an outstanding example of how one person’s way of seeing the world can change the world itself:
In the following excerpt from the Koran, the great prophet Mohammed tells the followers of Islam to practice compassionate action.
The Tao is everywhere; it has become everything. To truly see it, see it as it is. In a person, see it as a person; in a family, see it as a family;
How do I know this is true? By looking inside myself.
Even if no one sees or acknowledges it, an act of unkindness contains energy that impacts our entire universe.
And a silent blessing or thought of love toward others contains a vibration that will be felt throughout the cosmos.
But Lao-tzu knows that these men and women are simply in harmony with the Tao, just as some individuals appear to have the right
Verse 55 of the Tao Te Ching invites you to realize that what you call luck isn’t something that randomly happens—it’s yours for life when you decide to live by letting go.
You attract the cooperative power of the Tao when you release the need to control your life. So change your thoughts and see how your life changes to a very fortunate one indeed.
Living by letting go means releasing worry, stress, and fear.
Lao-tzu reminds you here that “things that are forced grow for a while, but then wither away.”
Visualize yourself as indestructible.
In this visualization, remove the image of your physical body and instead see the part of you that’s as constant as a spirit or a thought.
Change the way you look at your potential for becoming a lucky person.
Peace will replace stress, harmony will replace effort, acceptance will replace interference and force, and good luck will replace fear. You’ll become what you think about, so even things that you previously believed were evidence of bad luck will now be viewed
as what helps you move toward greater harmony. Living by letting go will allow you to appreciate Lin
Persuasive speakers with a good command of the language, who are forceful in their pronouncements and confident in their point of view, are generally considered to have
superior knowledge . . . but Lao-tzu suggests that precisely the opposite is true. Those who talk, he says, aren’t living from the place of silent knowing, so they do not know.
perhaps it’s to a point of view, to being right, to winning, or to profiting in some way.
And the more talking they do, the more they appear to be swayed by such attachments.
Your need to be knowledgeable or dominant is replaced by the deep realization that it’s all irrelevant, and you lose interest in seeking approval. Living in silent knowing becomes the process that casts your existence in a different light—you have less of an edge and feel settled, softer, and more centered.
Those who care the least about approval seem to receive it the most.
Talking to convince others actually says more about your need to be right than their need to hear what you have to say!
Untie the knots that bind you to a life that’s dedicated to showing profit and demonstrating victory,
Since your emotions are like waves on the ocean, learn to watch them return to the vast, calm, all-knowing Source.
not giving unsolicited advice.
Ask a question,
On the other hand, when children are encouraged to explore and exercise their inquisitiveness, they’re inspired to be their best with little need for regulation. So when you change the way you view the need for rules,
Examine the restrictions that you enforce in your family. Remember that effective parents don’t want to be leaned on; they want to make leaning unnecessary. After all, you want your children to be responsible, healthy, successful, and honest—not
Allow them to learn to trust in their highest nature, rather than having to thumb through a rule book to decide what’s right.
I am free to be myself. I do not have to live by anyone else’s rules, and I release the need for laws to regulate my behavior.
Be like the Tao—allow others, and enjoy how your nonauthoritarian leadership inspires them to be themselves.
Begin to see wholeness rather than good or bad fortune.
See opposites as parts of oneness, rather than disrupting surprises. In a world of pure Taoist unity, there’s no good or bad luck; it’s indivisible. What you’re calling “bad” fortune has “good” just waiting to emerge because it’s the other half.
Accumulated wealth has poverty hidden in it; popularity has nonrecognition camouflaged in it, too. And, of course, the same is true during the periods that are generally thought of as unfortunate.
The elderly individual you may become is part of the wholeness of your development through the levels of change that are your physical existence.
you’re unable to see a circumstance or situation as part of a larger picture, remind yourself that good fortune is leaning on this bad one, just as morning follows the darkest night.
If nothing is impossible, then there are no limits.
Feel joyful knowing that the example you’re modeling is helping others make the right choices, as this is the essence of Tao leadership.
Children raised in families where that blind obedience is demanded have the highest levels of prejudice when they become adults.
That’s why it’s so vital to give your kids an example of leadership that encourages them to make choices based on higher standards.
Gather as much virtue as you possibly can.
See yourself as a being who gives rather than collects, and live on what you need rather than practicing conspicuous consumption. You’ll
My loved ones and I cannot and will not be impacted by the presence of evil anywhere in the world.
This is not about me. I choose not to have any thoughts of harm directed to anyone by me. I am a being of lightand love, and therefore the only thoughts that can emerge from me are in harmony with the great loving Tao.
Bolster your immunity to negativity by controlling yourself in the midst of noxious thinking.
Become the sage, the leader who governs your life and the lives of those around you, and who can’t be hurt.
