two sides of a coin-bill bunting

[robtex]

http://www.taoism.net/html.html

Bill Bunting, "The Oneness" (under tao articles the oneness)

Take a coin from your pocket and examine it. It has two sides, and each is different. There still is only one coin. If you could cut the coin in half, there would still be only one coin with two different sides. It is impossible to remove the parts from the whole. No matter how you try, the coin still remains the same coin with the same sides and the dividing of the coin does not make destroy the coin, it only changes its appearance.

It is the same with many things that appear opposite and different, sickness and health, wealth and poverty, love and hatred, living and dying, yin and yang. None of these things exist alone just as we do not exist alone. Each is part of a whole we call Tao, and each has its place and its time.

We can try all we can to change the course of the path, we can try with all of our strength to modify what is natural, we can deny till our last breath the oneness of the universe, but our effort and our words do not make the difference so. Just as the coin remains one coin, the Tao remains one Tao, life flows into death, flows into life again. Health flows into sickness eventually, even the sages caught a cold once in a while. Wealth and prosperity can be lost in a moment, only to be regained again.

If you study the symbol of yin and yang, there are no ridges or hard lines that separate one from the other, there is a pattern of flowing one into the other, this is the way of the Tao. The Tao is the source of everything, and the wellspring of nothing. It is the great fountain of life and energy, and everything returns to it. It is empty in appearance but the source of everything, and in its balance and flow there is peace and calm and power.

If you do not believe me, look into the ocean. Many things wash up on the beach, we did not ask to have them. Many people eat its fish and plants, it does not try to preserve them, A million creatures live and spawn and die there, it does not judge them. That is the picture of the flow and the balance. It is one way we may seek to understand the Tao.


[end story]


What are your views of this? Is the western notion of dicotomy a misnomer ? If life is an ebb and flow of time are we each just tiny waves in an ocean of the tao figuratively speaking? Lastly, is there a beginning and an end or an endless cycle within the Tao?

 

[YmirGF]

I have not thought in dualistic terms for so long I barely remember what it was like. Of course I meet dualistic nature every waking moment, but once you sense the oneness of it all, the duality just sort of vaporizes. One learns to not focus on duality, and it is simple as that. I simply will not argue this with Taoists and I encourage them to share their views.

Meditation IS the key and that is one thing Western thought does not understand. Sadly, Western thought is not particularly enlightened though I have no desire to expand on that opinion here. My last comment is my oft repeated "Time has nothing to do with it." There is only Now.

 

[Master Vigil]

There is a widely known zen story that goes like this...

Before I studied zen, I saw the clouds as clouds.
As I studied zen, I saw that the clouds did not exist.
When I finally understood zen, I saw the clouds as clouds.
(paraphrased of course)

I take the nature of Tao the same way. I see that taoists when they first start studying tao see tao as an endless cycle where the dual sides are constantly flowing into and out of each other. And when they finally understand Tao, they see that Tao is not full of duality. It is perfect peace where the very nature of duality and opposites no longer exist. And this is the peaceful nature that we should strive for. To recognize the dual nature is to be stuck within it. To step out of our finite human perceptions which create the illusion of duality, we become enlightened.

 

[YmirGF]

There is a widely known zen story that goes like this...

Before I studied zen, I saw the clouds as clouds.
As I studied zen, I saw that the clouds did not exist.
When I finally understood zen, I saw the clouds as clouds.
(paraphrased of course)

Thank you, Master Vigil. That quote has me grinning, ear to ear. Simply Lovely.

I take the nature of Tao the same way. I see that taoists when they first start studying tao see tao as an endless cycle where the dual sides are constantly flowing into and out of each other. And when they finally understand Tao, they see that Tao is not full of duality. It is perfect peace where the very nature of duality and opposites no longer exist. And this is the peaceful nature that we should strive for. To recognize the dual nature is to be stuck within it. To step out of our finite human perceptions which create the illusion of duality, we become enlightened.

Again, splendidly put, MV. What saddens me is the fact that enlightenment is so much closer than people percieve. If they only knew what they were missing. If they could only dare to dream and understand that they are that fine line between nothingness and eternity.

 

[munchkin]

Lastly, is there a beginning and an end or an endless cycle within the Tao?

hi,

both, there are begginings and ends, and constant flow. Life and death begining and end, yet also there is constant flow betwen them, form one ot the other, life becomes death death becomes life, physical death is the start, and the coninuation of a journey.

Tao is all things and al things are Tao.

love and peace
becca