On the Absolute Tao

The Tao the can be told of
Is not the Absolute Tao;
The Names that can be given
Are not Absolute Names.

The Nameless is the origin of Heaven and Earth;
The Named is the Mother of All Things.

Therefore:
Oftentimes, one strips oneself of passion
In order to see the Secret of Life;
Oftentimes, one regards life with passion,
In order to see its manifest forms.

These two (the Secret and its manifestations)
Are (in their nature) the same;
They are given different names
When they become manifest.

They may both be called the Cosmic Mystery:
Reaching from the Mystery into the Deeper Mystery
Is the Gate to the Secret of All Life. (Tao Te Ching, Chapter 1, Lin Yu Tang trans.)

This will be a two or perhaps three-part blog on the Manifestation. What is it? Why is it here? How do we move in it?

I want to begin with what Lao Tzu says about the manifestation.

First, Lao Tzu refers to the Manifestation in chapter 1 of the Tao Te Ching. While he spends a lot of time discussing how to live in the manifestation, he doesn’t refer to it by name except in a few places.

In Chapter 40 he says: Reversion is the action of Tao. Gentleness is the function of Tao. The things of this world come from Being, And Being (comes) from Non-being. Here, he does not explicitly say the word manifestation, but when he says “being”, that is what he is talking about.

However, I think the key to understanding the Manifestation and the Tao is in chapter 21: From the days of old till now Its Named (manifested forms) have never ceased, By which we may view the Father of All Things. How do I know the shape of the Father of All Things?   Through these (manifested forms.)

Lao Tzu is telling us that the father of all things is accessible and visible in its manifested forms. All we have to do is look around and see Tao, or, as Lao Tzu says, “The father of all things. Indeed, Tao is the father of all things. It is the father of everything in the Universe. All that we know and don’t know.

Lao Tzu also makes clear that the manifestation has always existed. It is an essential part of the Tao.

The Tao has another nature which Lao Tzu calls the secret, but that is just another aspect of the Tao. Knowing both as, Lao Tzu says, is the secret of all life. That means the path to enlightenment is not just meditation and losing the “real world,” your mind, and ego. Why? Because the “real World” is the Manifestation and it is part of the Tao. To shun it or to turn away from it is to turn away from a fundamental nature of the Tao.

The problem, as I have said before, is that we are born into the manifestation with a body, mind, and ego that are not our true selves. Our true self, that immortal consciousness that is who we really are, is suppressed in the body and disregarded by the mind and ego, who quickly assume command and define “who we are.”

It takes a long time for those on the path to knowledge to overcome the mind/ego so that our true selves can emerge and take over the mind and ego to be used as tools by our true self to navigate in the manifestation.

Those not on a path to knowledge have no clue about any of this. So most people alive today move through the manifestation unaware of who they really are. They gain or lose based on any number of things. Thoreau once said “most men live lives of quiet desperation.” I believe that is true for most people in the world today.

People who are unaware of who they really are, often suffer from all kinds of maladies that are problems of the mind/ego. They are easily insulted or suffer from fragile egos. They have to act like big people to feel important. I could go on, but I think you get the idea.

Getting back to the Manifestation, as I have said, it is an essential nature of the Tao. So it exists. It is not an illusion. Nor is it a product of our minds. It is real.

I want to turn now to why the Manifestation exists. Lao Tzu tells us that the nameless is the origin of heaven and earth. The Named is the mother of all things. But he doesn’t tell us why the Tao has two natures.  I think it is not important to Lao Tzu why the Tao has these two natures. It just does. But I know it is essential to understand the two natures and learn to live in them as a complete person.

When we are not incarnate, we exist in the formless or the nameless of the Tao. There is nothing but consciousness. While existing in such a state is good, it is lacking in a way to progress up the levels of consciousness. The consciousnesses with the Tao created the manifestation to enable consciousnesses to advance.

Since consciousnesses are immortal and the existing universe is approximately 14 billion years old, there must have been countless other universes since the beginning. Scientists today are not sure how the universe will end. Some say it will continue to expand faster and faster until it falls apart. Others say, at some point, the universe will stop growing and start to contract until it shrinks to the size of a tiny dot, after which, it will explode in another “big bang”.

It isn’t important how it will end. Perhaps it won’t end. Again, it doesn’t matter.

Similarly, the earth won’t last forever. Again, it doesn’t matter. Remember we are incarnated here on the world. Consciousnesses are no doubt incarnated on other planets throughout the universe.

All I know is that the manifestation, in whatever form, is necessary and fundamental to the Tao.

Yes, we are alive here and now. The manifestation is not something we can ignore. Nor can we escape it as long as we are here. So, how does one move through the manifestation and not suffer? That will be the subject of my next blog.

Namaste,

Michael Tavella, author of

“Break Through To Your True Self”

Yourtrueself.blog