Tao Te Ching

by Lao Tzu

The Tao Te Ching offers us a wisdom that feels like sunlight: gentle, ever-present, and beyond grasp. Laozi speaks not of striving, fixing, or earning, but of returning—to the Tao, the Way that flows through all things.

In our PlayfulProcess terms:

The triangle—Thoughts, Feelings, Behaviors—is the realm of form, of personality, of the conditioned self. When we act within the triangle, we walk a long path: shaping the self, balancing opposites, cultivating harmony. It is a worthy path—rooted in humility and service.

But above the triangle is the sun of Being—the Tao itself. You cannot reach it through effort. You cannot own it, name it, or control it. And yet it animates every thought, every breath, every blade of grass. Laozi writes:

“The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.”

The Short Path in Taoist terms is wu wei—non-doing. It is the art of not pushing the river. You recognize that the Tao is already flowing, and the more you let go of grasping, the more you are carried by it.

You don’t become the sun by improving the triangle. You remember you are already light—quiet, spacious, always now. In this way, the Tao Te Ching doesn’t call us to rise above or reject the triangle, but to allow it to rest in the greater rhythm of the Way. Presence is not a goal. It is the ground of all things.