Live the Present Moment - Taoism

Hello my friends, I am Chen Li. Today we begin our journey through the Tao Te Ching with its very first words, words that have puzzled and intrigued seekers for over 2,000 years. Listen with your whole being as I share them with you. The Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao. The name that can be named is not the eternal name. The nameless is the origin of heaven and earth. With a name it is the mother of all things. Therefore, when one is constantly free from desires, one sees its spiritual essence, when one constantly has desires, one sees it under a limited form. Let these ancient words settle into the silence of your heart. Do not try to understand them with your mind yet. Let them rest there like seeds in fertile soil. What is Lao Tzu telling us here? Is pointing to something beyond all our words, beyond all our concepts, beyond all our attempts to capture reality in the small boxes of language. Think of the most beautiful moment you have ever experienced. Perhaps it was holding a newborn child for the first time. Perhaps it was standing before a mountain at sunrise. Perhaps it was a moment of deep love when words disappeared completely. In that moment, were you thinking about it or were you simply being it? This is what the sage is inviting us to remember. There is a dimension of existence that cannot be captured by any word, any explanation, any definition. It can only be lived, only be experienced, only be breathed into being. Your mind right now may be working very hard to understand these words. Notice that. Feel how your thinking mind wants to grasp, to categorize, to make sense of everything. This is natural. This is human. And this is also the very thing that keeps us from touching the deeper truth. When we name something, we think we know it. When we label an experience, we believe we have mastered it. But Lao Tzu whispers to us across the centuries. What you can name is never the whole truth. What you can speak is never the complete reality. Watch a flower blooming in your garden. You may call it beautiful. You may name it species. You may describe its color and fragrance. Do any of these words capture the living mystery of this being reaching toward the sun? Do any of these labels contain the miracle of life expressing itself through petals and stem? There is an old story about a master and his student walking by a river. The student pointed to the flowing water and asked, "Master, what is the true nature of this river?" The master smiled and cupped some water in his hands. "This," he said, showing the water to his student. But master, the student protested, "that is not the river. That is just water in your hands." The master opened his hands and let the water flow back into the river. "Exactly," he whispered. The river that can be held is not the true river. Before your mind gave names to anything, what was there? Before you learned to call the sky blue and the grass green, what did you experience? This original awareness, this pure seeing before concepts, this is what Lao Tzu calls the nameless. Close your eyes for a moment if you can, or simply soften your gaze. Feel into your breathing, but do not call it breathing. Feel into your heartbeat. But do not name it heartbeat. Feel into the sense of being alive, being aware, being here. This presence that you are, what would you call it? Can it be named? Can it be captured in any word? This unnamed presence that you are is the same unnamed source from which all things arise. The truest nature and the source of the universe are not two different things. They are one mystery expressing itself as countless forms. With the name, it is the mother of all things. Now Lao Tzu shows us the necessity of language, of concepts, of naming. We need words to navigate this world. We need language to share our experience with each other. We need concepts to organize our daily lives. Names are not the enemy. They are tools. But when we mistake the tool for the reality itself, we lose our way. Your name points to you, but it is not you. The word love points to something real. But it is not love itself. The word peace can guide us toward peace. But it is not peace. This is why the sage says, with a name, it becomes the mother of all things. Names give birth to our human world, but they are not the source itself. Therefore, when one is constantly free from desires, one sees its spiritual essence. What does it mean to be free from desires? It does not mean to want nothing. It means to stop grasping, to stop trying to possess experience. To stop demanding that reality be different from what it is. When you watch a sunset and you simply watch without wanting to capture it, without comparing it to other sunsets, without thinking about how to describe it later, what happens. The beauty reveals itself completely. You and the sunset become one witnessing. This is seeing the spiritual essence. But when your mind is busy wanting, comparing, judging, analyzing, you see only the limited form. You see your thoughts about the sunset rather than the sunset itself. You experience your concepts about beauty rather than beauty itself. This is not about forcing yourself to stop thinking. This is about recognizing when you are caught in the web of concepts and gently returning to direct experience, like returning home after a long journey in foreign lands. Right now, as you listen to these words, what are you experiencing beyond the words? Can you feel the space in which these sounds arise? Can you sense the awareness that receives these meanings? This space, this awareness, this cannot be named. Yet it is more intimate to you than your own heartbeat. The ancient commentary tells us that these two things, the name and the nameless, have the same origin and receive different names. Both are called profound. They are profound, doubly profound. This is the gate of all spiritual things. What does this mean for your daily life? How do you live this understanding when you must answer emails? Care for your family. Navigate the busy world of forms and names. Here is the secret. You do not need to choose between the world of names and the nameless source. You learn to dance between them. You use words and concepts when they serve life. You return to the wordless source when you need to remember who you truly are. When someone asks how you are feeling, you might say happy or sad or confused. These words are useful. They create connection. But in your heart, you can remember that what you truly are is larger than any emotional state, deeper than any temporary experience. When you look at a tree, you can appreciate knowing that it is an oak or a maple. This knowledge helps you care for it properly. But you can also rest in simply witnessing the miracle of this being reaching between earth and sky, participating in the eternal dance of growth and change. There was once a famous calligrifer who spent years perfecting his art. One day a young student asked him to paint the character for water. The master took his brush and painted the most beautiful character the student had ever seen. "Master, the student said in awe, 'How did you learn to paint water so perfectly?'" The old calligraver smiled and walked to his window, which overlooked a mountain stream. He stood there in silence for a long time, just watching the water flow. Finally he turned back to his student. "I did not learn to paint water," he said softly. "I learned to become water. When there is no separation between the painter and what is painted, the truth reveals itself. This is the middle way that Lao Tsui points us toward. Not rejecting the world of names and forms, but not being trapped by it either. Using language skillfully, while remembering the wordless source from which all words arise. Practice this today, my friends. Choose one moment when you are eating, walking, listening to music, or simply breathing. In that moment, put aside all the words you know for what you are experiencing. Just be present, to the raw experience itself. Touch the nameless source of your own being. When thoughts arise with their labels and explanations, smile at them gently. Thank them for their service. And return to the wordless wonder of simply being alive, being aware, being here. And yet here we are, using words to point beyond words, using concepts to touch the inconceivable, using language to celebrate the mystery that cannot be captured by any language. This is the beautiful paradox of our human journey. We are beings who live in two worlds simultaneously, the world of names and meanings, and the world of pure being that exists before and beyond all names. Learning to honor both. To dance between them gracefully. This is the way of wisdom. Thank you for taking this journey with me today into the first mystery of the Tao Diching. If these explorations nourish your spirit, join me at Words of Taoism on Substack or on my website, where we continue walking this path together. Until we meet again with gratitude. (gentle music)