Taoism · 369–286 BCE
Chuang Tzu
Philosophical Taoism · the Warring States period · Chuang Tzu · parables of freedom
A sage who laughed where others frowned. Freedom for those who are choked by the expectations of others.
The essence of the teaching: True freedom is born not from mastering circumstances, nor from accumulating knowledge, but from emptying oneself of ego and desire – from a perfect merging with the spontaneous flow of the Tao.
Transmission
Chuang Tzu frees you with a parable. Once he dreamed he was a butterfly, fluttering without a care; waking, he could not tell – was he a man who had dreamed a butterfly, or a butterfly now dreaming a man? In this way he shows how unsteady the very border of the self is. Float down the river of life like an empty boat: if another boat strikes yours, with an angry man aboard, you grow angry; but if the boat is empty, there is no one to be angry with. Make of yourself such an empty boat – without self-importance, without grievance – and your collisions with others will breed no enemies. To be truly useful, sometimes you must seem useless. The mind of the perfected is like a mirror: it reflects everything and holds nothing.
The full transmission — for members of the School. Here is its essence and its taste.
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