These 9 Words From the Tao te Ching Will Clarify the Spiritual Path for You (2024)

Table of Contents

It’s all about realizing the conscious self Few achieve it These labels aren’t us My labels The Yale hotshot with a hole inside What should we do? It always comes back to ego Commit, then quiet down inside The takeaway

These 9 Words From the Tao te Ching Will Clarify the Spiritual Path for You (1)

For any of you longtime readers out there, let me apologize in advance for writing a sentence I must have written twenty times before. Which is this:

The Tao te Ching is simply the best, wisest spiritual text ever written.

It was written 2,500 years ago in China by the philosopher Lao Tzu. The story goes that Lao Tzu became so disillusioned with the government that he left China.

He was a well-known philosopher so when the sentry guarding the Hangu Gate at the border recognized Lao Tzu, he insisted he record his wisdom before allowing him to pass.

The result was the Tao.

The subject of this piece comes from Chapter 24. It distills all we need to know in one short sentence. It reads:

“He who defines himself can’t really know who he is.”

Why do I say this is it, the be-all, end-all of all things spiritual?

It’s all about realizing the conscious self

Because in just about every spiritual tradition – Hinduism, Buddhism, Yoga and even Christianity – the central aim is the realization that the essence of who we are is the deep, inner “I” within us.

Some call it simply the consciousness. Hindus call it the Atman. Christians say the kingdom of Heaven is within us. And of course, many refer to it as the G-word…God.

One of my favorite Indian sages, Ramana Maharshi, had only one teaching. He said all we needed to do was realize that we were, at our core, this deep “I.”

Few achieve it

The problem is that few on our globe have achieved that realization.

What does virtually every person on Earth do? We define ourselves in worldly, external ways.

How so? Let me count the ways.

These labels aren’t us

And none of them comes close to defining who we really are. They merely skim the surface.

Which brings us to the central point of this brilliant passage from the Tao: We can’t realize our true selves when we define ourselves in the way of form.

When your entire identity is caught up in, “I’m a kick-ass attorney at a blue-chip law firm with a mansion in Scarsdale and two kids at Yale,” good luck realizing your true essence.

It’s impossible.

My labels

Unfortunately, I know this all too well. I’ve identified myself at various points along the way as:

-Average-looking

-Good athlete

-Decent intelligence

-Overly sensitive

-Funny

-Princeton guy

-Insecure in the Hollywood and Washington, D.C., career arenas

-Nice person

-Depressive

-Relationship-challenged in my twenties and thirties

That was me.

Now my identity derives exclusively from what my 16, 14 and 8 year old kids tell me I am: Fat, bald and not as funny as I think I am. [Sorry, had to throw a little levity into the pot to lighten this heavy subject!]

Society doesn’t help. It loves to tell us what’s “good” and what’s “bad.”

The Yale hotshot with a hole inside

It’s good to go to Yale and have a big house and a prestigious job. Unfortunately, for that hotshot, what often comes with that is anxiety, narcissism, exhaustion and a constant pang in the gut telling him that something is missing. Something big.

What is that missing something? A total lack of connection to or realization of the beautiful conscious self that he is.

What are we mere spiritual mortals to do about this conundrum of misidentifying as all of these external traits?

What should we do?

Let them go. Shed them, for the same reasons a snake sheds its skin – to allow for growth and to remove damaging organisms.

How do we shed these labels we’ve given ourselves? To answer that we need to know what entity within us is creating and perpetuating these labels.

And the answer, of course, is the ego. The ego is what tells us we’re dumb or brilliant. And fuels the fire to run for Congress because the more you achieved as a kid, the more your parents seemed to love you.

It always comes back to ego

Shedding the ego. It always to seems to come back to that, right?

And the how-to of that never changes. It’s about noticing the ego in action.

Watching yourself become insecure. Or defensive. Or angry. Or overly puffed up by your latest gaudy purchase.

You lean away and watch all of this. Why?

Because the watcher is you. It’s your consciousness.

And what this whole spiritual game is about is strengthening that watcher’s ability to watch. Which necessarily comes at the expense of the ego it is watching.

That’s right, folks: When our consciousness strengthens, our ego weakens. That’s the game we’re playing.

But you have to play the game.

Commit, then quiet down inside

What helps us play this game to the best of our ability? Commitment and perseverance, for starters.

Then we set about quieting down inside by meditating and practicing mindfulness. Why? Because the quieter it is in there, the better able our watcher is at watching the egoic drama playing out.

The louder it gets inside, the more apt we are to jump out of our theater seat onto the stage of our inner play. And the key to spiritual growth is watching that play, not acting in it.

The takeaway

This is what it’s all about, people. Realizing who we are at our deepest level.

It’s starts with realizing that our essence is not a lawyer, doctor, neurotic, fat, rich or poor person.

Begin shedding those labels and that deep realization will begin revealing itself.

And when it does, you’ll start feeling better, calmer, lighter and more peaceful.

This is launch week for my paid Substack subscription.

Upgrade to paid by Monday, November 25, and the cost is only $5/month or $50/year. After that, it goes to $7 and $60.

I hope you’ll consider joining my movement to bring sanity to this increasingly crazy world we live in.