"Not giving preference to capable men prevents the people from contesting. "Not valuing precious objects prevents the people from stealing. "Not exhibiting things that can arouse greed, "prevents the people's hearts from getting troubled.
" And now we say, what a complicated thing. "Not giving preference to capable men", how come? Isn't it fair to do that?
That's what he says. No one can force a human being to evolve. There's a very uncomfortable law called free will.
I can't force anyone to evolve. Not even myself. But I can create ideal conditions for him to feel invited to it.
And the ideal conditions consist in not to satisfy the desires of men. Make his basic needs be met and that he's invited to go up. When a person does what is fair in our society, it's very common, I mean, not always, but sometimes it happens.
You know that person who thinks a bag of money and returns it, everyone is impressed, and publish it on the first page of the newspaper. Okay, we do that because it's very rare. But consider, this person didn't do only his obligation, which was to be honest?
And who guarantees me that if I keep doing this, she won't do it only because of the publication on the newspaper page? Because this is a gain. Try putting your photograph in the newspaper to see how much it costs.
This is a gain. And who guarantees me that this won't motivate me? Well, I'll get absolutely nothing, and I do it anyway.
Action by duty. I'll win something, and I start to desire it. An ideal State, which is what Taoism is trying to propose, a collective ideal State to command humanity, and also the command you have of yourself.
Don't be enticing desires. If a person does something right, he has to feel that he did what he should. Because if you start to feed emotional desires, mental desires, spiritual desires, as we talked about, it's more difficult to free from them than from physical ones.
An ideal State doesn't force a person to grow, but creates the ideal conditions for her to grow. Do you know how? By not provoking the animal inside her.
And creating all the appropriate conditions for the human to manifest. Now, will it manifest or not? I don't know.
It will depend on her. But I did everything possible. I unobstructed all paths.
Unobstruct, what a difficult word. Isn't it? So this is more or less the idea of his State.
Attends to natural needs so that needs and desires don't arise. If a person has any need, I don't know, food, water, she will start to feel distressed. And then a desire will be born.
And from this desire will be born separatism. So I meet all the natural needs of man, but I don't invent artificial needs. From then on, I let him start looking for what is really missing to complete his life.
That is no longer one thing. It's himself. If I start putting more things, instead of helping, I'll divert his attention.
So we're talking about an ideal state. There's an excerpt that I have here for you. "The State gives the basis for the bird to fly.
" This is a tale that's not properly Taoist. It's Zen. But Zen was strongly influenced by Taoism.
Zen is Japan. It was born in China. It was Buddhism mixed with Taoism and Confucianism.
It says there was a master and a disciple. The stories are always like this. The disciple asks something, the master answers.
10/10, that brilliant answer, and the story ends. The disciple came to him and said: "what does a state do, for a human being to become as evolved as possible? " Then the master says, "it's the same thing a person does for a bird to fly.
" Then he puts a bird in his hand. He says: "you know that without holding this bird tight, if I don't want it to fly, it won't fly? " Every time the bird was preparing to fly, he lowered his hand and the bird could not get impulse.
Have you thoght about it? He needs to lean on something hard for him to leverage and lift the fly. Every time the bird tried, he lowered his hand and the bird didn't fly.
And without touching the bird, he made it stuck in his hand. Then he said, "now I want it to fly, I give it a solid, firm, safe base. " Then he pushes it and it flies.
A State can do this for the man. Don't be taking the ground off of people so they don't fly. "I didn't even touch them, it's not my fault.
They didn't fly because they didn't want to. " But you're taking the ground off of them. Feeding desires, selfishness, violence between them, competitions.
Employee of the month, with a picture, and then they're expecting: "next month it will be my picture. " In other words, all types of competition, separatism, selfish desires, you're taking the ground off of people. "It was not my fault.
"I didn't even touch the bird, you saw? "I didn't touch it. " It lowers every time it leverages.
It doesn't go up. Do you understand that? In other words, an ideal state has to give a firm ground for the bird to support itself.
And then it flies. It depends on its wings. But I have my part in it.
And firm ground means not letting it lose its vital energy all in stupid intranscendent desires, which will make no difference in the end. Make it realize what's really important. Give it conditions to realize.
And the rest is with it. It's with its wings, because it has. But will it fly?
I don't know, it depends on it. But I did provided it ground. Do you understand?
See how the Indians were right. How an image speaks more than a million words. A tale, a myth, a story.
I think it's very beautiful. "That's why the wise governs in the following way. "Empty the hearts and fill the stomachs.
"Weakens the desires and revigors the bones. "And makes the people without knowledge and without desires. "And provides so that the schollars don't dare to act.
"He practice 'non-action', and in everything reigns the order. " What a crazy man, Lao Tse. Is this something to be said?
But that's exactly what he does. Heart, Taoist Glossary. For every tradition, the heart means something different.
For Taoism, it's down there. The concept of heart is the seat of desires. It's an emotional heart.
Empty the man of desires. For those who have read the book, which I've said a million times, Plato's Republic. Plato is setting up an ideal state.
So he gets to a stage where people have all their needs fulfilled. They're dialoguing, there was a man in the dialogue, named Glauco. He says: "but this is a state of pigs".
"How so, of pigs, Glauco? " "Doesn't it have everything man needs? " "There's no comfort at all.
This is a pig's life. " "Ah, you're wanting luxury. " "Yes, luxury I want.
" "Okay, so I'll put luxury in this state. But then the vices will come. " You see?
Then you start looking for things you don't need. Energy and life are limited. You're taking energy from other things that you had to look for now.
We have a limited system, which is the amount of years of life they gave you. I spend it all desiring things that I don't need at all. Where am I going to get wisdom?
Where am I going to get my identity? Where am I developing a fraternal sight of the world? There's no more energy.
That is, from the moment you fill what you really needed to survive with dignity, you have to start looking for what you need to live as a human being. "I don't do it. "They gave me a lot of other things to do first.
" "First I have to have this, have that, go to such and such place, "have such a diploma, have such a title. "Time will never come. " It won't ever be time.
There's no way. Maybe I don't even realize that this is necessary. So he says, look, fill the needs, strengthen the bones, but empty the heart, don't fill desires in human beings.
If you walk down the street, for those who watched Kybalion, It's in the mental gender, the suggestion, wherever you look, they're offering. "Do you want this? Look, you're missing this.
" It's an outdoor, it's a sign, it's everywhere. "You can't be happy without having this. " That is, in 500 meters you walk, you have 500 new desires.
An unusual environmental suggestion. That is, you went out on the street thinking you had energy left over, when you came back you think you need a lot of things. I have a friend who is very peculiar, some know him, he says he goes to a supermarket with a dogmatic list, 10 items.
He leaves there with 10 items. The world may be ending, the apocalypse is coming. He doesn't buy anything other than those 10 items that are written, so as not to be suggested, to invent the need he doesn't have.
I think it's funny. If we had more or less fixed what we want from life, maybe it would not be so suggestible. It would not have to be so dogmatic, but have a little more evaluation of what we really lack to be happy.
And this in all plans. Don't think the supermarket's suggestion is the most serious. The most serious are the suggestions of thoughts, of concepts, of behaviors, that fill our time, overflow.
The subtle ones are always more serious. Well, then, he makes people lose knowledge of what they don't need know. It's an extensive knowledge, but not deep.
He doesn't create names of things that don't exist. He will soon speak of names. From the moment I start to invent names of needs that you don't have, They create names that don't correspond to anything real.
Then you run after shadows, like the myth of the cave of Plato. He makes you meet things that are not real. Meeting's different from knowing.
Knowledge's different of wisdom. Knowledge as extension, wisdom as verticality. Then you run after a lot of names that turn to dust, because that was not real.
And there goes your energy, your whole life. "And don't let the schollars act". That is, those who have some ability, that don't use them to project their personal self.
Otherwise they will generate envy. And this is a concept that I think is beautiful to Lao Tse. He says that when you do something and you're envied, it's not just the fault of those who envy you.
It's about how you showed off your abilities and your successes. Becausethere's those who are so good, who benefit everyone, and no one remembers that they exist. Their merits don't offend.
Their qualities don't hurt. If you're envied, it's because you have showed off some merit with vanity. This is pointy, it hurts others.
It causes desires. They want to have what you have. Inside you, deep down, you thought, "I am better than you".
This is very sensitive, very subtle. A very virtuous person doesn't cause envy. On the contrary, people feel welcomed, well received.
Who was envious of Lao Tse? Everyone felt benefited because he existed. Or from Confucius, or whoever you want.
It's a privilege they existed. People didn't say, "I want to have what he has. " No, how good he exists and can help me grow.
This has to do with the way you have your qualities and practice them. If you have selfishness behind, somehow what you're hurts others. And envy would be a reaction to this aggression that people have received.
Have you ever thought about this possibility? At a certain point, we will see, he will say, the wise of old were so good, that the only thing people know about them is that they existed. No one speaks anything about them, no one envious them, no one speaks anything, they had no need.
They didn't need publicity. They didn't need likes on Facebook. So they didn't care if people didn't talk about them.
They were satisfied with their role. You must have heard of companies that when someone decide to retire, on the day they retire, everyone realizes that they existed, because it opens such a big void, people say, he did a lot of things. But when he was there, no one saw him.
It's kind of invisible. Unlike those who see too much. But maybe it's not so lacking.
Have you noticed that? It may seem strange, but behind it there's a very Taoist reasoning. Well, closing then, "non-action would be not to run after shadows.
And that brings peace, order and wisdom to the world. " Don't run after illusory things, don't waste your energy and life. Sublimate it for real things.
I put it here for you as a curiosity, for those who have read "The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas", Machado de Assis, a Brazilian, a philosopher. At the beginning of "Brás Cubas", he sees the nature of Pandora. All men running after their desires, being destroyed.
Then she takes him, looks into his eyes, he sees those cold eyes. That's too Taoist, it's Buddhist, it's all. Machado de Assis was a philosopher.
Read this introduction, this beginning of "The Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas". And he looking at life, nature, Pandora. And men being destroyed.
Not because nature is cold or cruel. Destroyed by their desire to possess what doesn't exist. Wasting all their energy and life.
It's very interesting that we learn to recognize and value what we have. Machado de Assis is fantastic. He is a philosopher.
Much more than a writer.
