The Tao Te Ching and the futility of naming March 1, 2013
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Tao Te Ching.Tags: awareness, beyond ego, controlling ego, ego management, eternal tao, Lao-tzu, managing the ego, subconscious desire, Tao Te Ching
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One of the tendencies of the ego (the mind, the voice in our heads) is the propensity to apply labels to everything in life.
Perhaps this is a manifestation of our subconscious desire to feel a measure of control and understanding — a way to intellectually manage or make sense of the universe by categorizing all elements as we perceive them. But the “control” afforded by labelling can be illusory because many of the components underlying the real world cannot accurately be named universally.
By placing labels on phenomena, we are coloring everything with our own brush, which in many cases is not a reflection of the true colors of reality.
There is an interesting reflection on labelling or naming which I found when reading a passage in the Tao Te Ching (composed by Lao-tzu, in perhaps the 400-500 BC period) as interpreted/translated by Stephen Mitchell.*
In Chapter 1 Lao-tzu writes:
The tao that can be told
is not the eternal tao.
The name that can be named
is not the eternal Name.
The unamable is the eternally real.
Naming is the origin
of all particular things.
If we can resist the temptation to label, if we can accept things as they are, if we make a decision to try to not judge, then perhaps we can then better see reality.
*Stephen Mitchell, Tao Te Ching, A new English Version, HarperPerennial edition, 1991, paperback.
Overcoming the ego’s resistance to the idea of second chances in life February 25, 2013
Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Ego Management.Tags: controlling ego, ego management, managing the ego, personal development, personal development potential, personal growth, personal improvement
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In trying to implement our personal growth plan towards the development of our individual potential, our ego (that voice in our heads) may try to convince us that second chances in life are not possible.
Instead of focusing on the positive possibilities of the present, the ego often tends to dwell in the troubles and shortcomings past and on fears and self-doubts about the future. In this emotional environment, there would appear to be little room for the concept of second chances in life.
However, to help us, there is a lot of good material available in personal growth literature about techniques on how to create a positive future for ourselves, despite past “failures.” But, for these techniques to work we first must believe or have faith in the concept of second chances.
I recently watched a brief interview with the actor Frank Langella, which I will paraphrase because I was not able to write down all of his comments verbatim at the time.
Langella, who has had a lot of “ups” and “downs” in his career said that he never became discouraged with the difficult times in his acting career because he regarded these as growing experiences and made an effort to learn from each event in his career.
In the interview he said that he did not believe in the idea that we don’t have second chances in life. In fact there is chance #2, chance #22, chance #108 –there are always second and further chances “as long as you’re breathing,” Langella says.
Because of a lack of belief in second chances, Langella says, many people “decide to shut down and settle.” By not going for second chances these people shut themselves off from “everything that makes life worth living.” He concluded the interview by commenting that we all have two choices in life – we can either lie down or we can get up every day and keep going.
There is a brief Article on Frank Langella available at Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Langella
Personal Development Ideas 