Top 3 Valuable Lessons of Taoism
They can change your life
A couple of years ago, I embarked on a personal journey of self-discovery, as many people often do. Naturally, this wasn’t my first time attempting to discover myself or to change my mindset and seek mindfulness and whatnot, but this time was different. This time, I found a philosophy that would have changed me forever: Taoism.
What is Taoism?
Taoism is simple. As mentioned previously, it is more of a philosophy rather than a religion (although there is such a thing as religious Taoism). It doesn’t necessarily have a god, but it does follow what is called the Tao, or the Way. Now I could try to explain what the Tao is; however, that would probably take up an entire post, and that is not the goal of this article. So in basic terms, the Tao is pretty much everything around us, including us. You are Tao, I am Tao, and that random person you interacted with at your favorite coffee shop is also Tao. The trees, the grass, animal life, the inanimate objects we interact with, etc. Most importantly, the Tao is the balance between all the good and all the bad in our life (this idea of balance is crucial in Taoism).
As a way to further explain the main ideas of Taoism, in this article, I will talk about the top 5 most valuable lessons that I learned from Taoism over the last couple of years.
3. Don’t fight your feelings
Taoism teaches that everything that happens in life is only natural, and no matter how good or bad the situation might be, it is all a part of a natural cycle of balance. Whenever good happens, bad will happen sooner or later to balance out the good. And then, when the bad things come, it’s only a matter of time for the good to come back as well and balance out the bad.
In the case of our feelings, those are all natural too. We can’t waste our time trying to change how we feel, whether we feel guilty for being happy or upset for feeling sad. And it’s those negative emotions that are the real challenge because nobody ever wants to feel sad, angry, or anxious, and oftentimes we try to find ways to remedy those strong emotions. However, when you try to fight off those emotions, you’re just going against the natural way of things.
The correct thing to do, at least in the context of this philosophy, is to let your emotions play out and let them go away naturally on their own. This will feel less like an uphill battle and more like a tunnel where you know that you’ll reach an exit eventually.
2. View yourself as just another part of the puzzle
One of the biggest lessons in Taoism is to try to abandon your ego completely. The ego is dangerous, and it is always the people with the biggest ego that bring the most trouble in life, not only to themselves but to the people around them as well. But how do we prevent this from happening to us? Well, the answer is simple: practice looking at yourself and the situations that you get into from a big-picture point of view.
I’ve always liked the analogy of life being like this big jigsaw puzzle. And every single component in our lives is just the pieces that make up this puzzle. Every one of us is a piece as well, and when we start looking at ourselves like just another piece of the puzzle, we sort of humble ourselves in the idea that even though we are significant, we also aren’t that important to the rest of the world. It truly is a humbling idea to live by.
1. Always return to your center
There is a recurring concept in Taoism that talks about finding your “center. What this means can be better explained through the lens of meditation. Whenever you meditate, sometimes it is difficult to truly keep your mind blank, especially when we live in a world full of noise (figuratively speaking), and it is hard not to start having thoughts about the world and other things. Taoism teaches you that it is ok to have those thoughts and it is ok to go down a different path than the one you were currently in. It is ok, just as long as, at some point, you “return to the center” and come back to the initial path you were on.
This can be true for many other things outside of just meditation. For instance, I am a music composer and have always had the issue of starting multiple different projects at once. And this is perfectly fine. My version of “returning to the center” is that I try my best not to stray too far from my main projects and always have to come back to them and put them before anything else I venture off into. This keeps me grounded, and in a way, it also declutters my life significantly.
Taoism has taught me a lot about life and has completely changed the way I view the world for the better. With most philosophies, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all, so while Taoism works for me, it may not necessarily work for you. And that’s perfectly ok. The beauty of life is that we get to explore and experiment with different ideas and beliefs, and Taoism just so happens to be one belief that I find to be one of the most fascinating.
