I was reading the 78th Verse of the Tao Te Ching today. It speaks to the softness and yielding nature of water. The ability it has to easily find a way around an obstacle or through a tiny crack. Always seeking equilibrium. Patient. And yet, the Tao informs us, water dissolves even the hardest substance. It finds its way over land and rocks creating mighty canyons. It is relentless in its flow. It is persistent. In its gentleness it overcomes what might have seemed insurmountable.
The Tao suggests this is a path we should consider as well. In the midst of turmoil, heartache, hatred, violence, things that are hard and seem insurmountable…we might become like water. We don’t try to push or fight but rather we flow easily and with great persistence and patience. We allow our softness to do the work.
What is the softness? Why, it is Love Itself. Working Its magic, in Its own way and in Its own time. It is paradoxical that softness could be the answer in the hardest of times. Almost unbelievable. But that is the nature of faith…to believe in the unseen. And in this case, to believe in the power of Love.
Here is the verse as interpreted by Stephen Mitchell.
Nothing in the world
is as soft and yielding as water.
Yet for dissolving the hard and inflexible
nothing can surpass it.
The softness overcomes the hard;
the gentle overcomes the rigid.
Everyone knows this is true,
but few can put it into practice.
Therefore the Master remains
serene in the midst of sorrow.
Evil cannot enter his heart.
Because he has given up helping,
he is people’s greatest help.
True words seem paradoxical.
And so it is.
Paula