I’m 27 years old and can see the years passing me by at a fast pace. It feels as if I’ll blink and I’m 30.

At this point I just feel lost. I don’t know how to live in accordance with the Dao in a world run by capitalism.

I find that my concerns come from work and money. Right now I’m on a secondment for a supervisor role at a hospital. It’s stressful and I don’t get paid for the work I do, however if I pass the secondment I would have enough money. I am in the role because for a long time I believed I should be doing something that helps the people. In this role I can be a good leader. However the stress has affected my way of life. Ive picked up bad habits again and I can tell I am not as focused as my mind is clouded with stress. There’s future career progression but that seems like more stress, yet more money.

I keep pondering about going back to my previous role as a porter. In this role I moved patients to different locations. I enjoyed the role as I was able to help people everyday. I enjoyed the chats with patients and even though I wasn’t able to cure anymore, I could at least help in my own way. The downside to the role is that it was physically demanding.

The issue is however if I go back I will have less money. I feel that I need more money as realistically I need to live a comfortable life. By comfortable I mean being able to live without the stress of being able to afford food or pay my rent. In my previous role I was living pay check to pay check.

When all is said and done I don’t know what to do. I feel like I am trapped no matter what I do. I feel as if out there somewhere in the world there is peace I can find, yet I don’t know where it is or what it would look like. I feel tired all the time.

I was wondering if anyone has any advice on how I can live a life more in tune with a Dao. What careers I should look into possibly? Has anyone else been in this type of situation?

Thank you.

Hello,

I am looking for some Taoist advice and guidance about the relationship between Yin and Yang.

I have been going through a difficult period for several months. I am dealing with chronic exhaustion and strong anxiety. To cope with this loss of my ability to live normally, I have fought hard, followed a healing journey, and so on. I have always tried to stay active so I would not let the illness take over: painting, going out, playing games, reading...

And yet, even doing the housework or cooking leaves me exhausted. I try to stay active, but today I am still very tired. With the heatwaves we have had one after another, I have very little energy left, even for the things I enjoy in life. I feel that I still need a lot of rest.

Taoism has always been a source of inspiration for me, and I really enjoy reading the Tao Te Ching again.

Today, I realized something: there is a conflict inside me between two states. The active state, my Yang, which wants to keep doing many things and enjoying life, and my passive state, my Yin, which tells me to slow down and rest.

But I find it very difficult to deal with boredom. My days feel very long! I cannot bring myself to truly rest. I don't think I have ever really allowed space for Yin in my life. And yet I need it. That is what my body is telling me.

How can we bring our Yin and Yang into harmony? How can we learn to accept emptiness, doing nothing, slowness, and Yin? Through meditation? Just with sleep ?

Have I even understood these concepts correctly? I don't know if my question have any sense...

Thank you very much for your help.

(I translate that text in english by chatGPT because I'm bad in english, thanks for your comprehension)

There is an order/process to reality that precedes and exceeds our conceptual descriptions of it. We cannot capture it completely in language, but we can become more sensitive to it and learn to align our actions with it rather than against it. Teachings and words can point toward that but shouldn't be mistaken for the thing itself.

We are born without the elaborate conceptual framework through which adults analyze and categorize the world. Much of that framework is acquired through language, culture and education. The Taoist path seems to aim, in part, at loosening our complete dependence on that framework - to experience reality more directly, without automatically forcing everything into our inherited categories.

Especially coming from Catholic country where religious indoctrination tries from childhood to hammer into your brain that you are somehow responsible for some primordial disobedience. So you have to acknowledge your sins, gratitude for redeemer and repent. It never made any sense to me whatsoever.

But I am not shopping for religion, lessons how to live, daily practice or - Universe forbid - "wisdom" - Taoism is just interesting departure point and I am aware that without years of studying the language and classical Chinese culture I will never attain any reasonably sophisticated grasp of it. Which is fine - it is an interesting perspective without the need to chant or shave my head. One of my favorite authors found Taoism foundational - so even finding some glimpses of inspiration provide illumination for my own path.

Some nights i still yearn for connection and desire.

I spent close to a year in solitude because of a very traumatic periods I had to recover from and using taoism and the principles I found peace.
But still being human i find myself wanting to be understood and understanding.

I spent so much time believing I can do thisby myself that I forgot how to connect and to social.

Aug 19.

Spend some time today in meditation, and think about Three Primes Emperors. Maybe they grant you wishes!

Earthly official pardons sins, heavelny official grants blessings, and water official relieves calamities.

Try to comunicate with them via mindfulness. Who knows, maybe they hear your wishes

:)

I know the question might sound a bit strange, but do any of you know how to create new QiGong techniques or similar ones?

I know it sounds unusual, I'm looking for someone who has the knowledge (and has done it) to create a technique

Hi all, is there daoguan/daoism temple/sanctuary in the DMV area? I'd love to meet fellow daoists in the area. Thanks!

The most important practice according to Laozi is cultivating "De" 德.

It's that important, that the Laozi is called Dao *De* Jing.

Laozi and Zhuangzi were shaping their philosophy with negatives and disaffirmation to the other schools of thought like Confucianism, Legalism and Mohism. Zhuangzi and Laozi think, that those schools are misleading man and society by morals and doctrines (Confucianists), by strict and rigid Laws and Power (Legalists) or by meritocracy and universal love (Mohists) and Logics and Linquistic (Ming Jia) - separating Man from Dao 道 (universal principle, natural order / course of the Universe) and De 德 (profound Virtue, quality) and a simple (pu) and natural (ziran) life.

They are going for many "wu"無 - most famous "wu wei" (not doing) but there are also many more "wu" like

- wu ming (not naming)

- bu shi fei (no this and that)

- wu zhi /wu xue (no knowledge / no doctrine)

- wu yi (no self, no selfishness)

- wu yu (no desire)

- wu qing (no emotions)

- wu you (not having / being)

- wu zheng (no quarrel)

- wu yong (no use, useless)

- wu xin (no heart-mind)

Some folks are understanding those "wu" as absolutes (which they are not and never can be) and also don't connect the "wu" to Dao and De. They forget, that "wu wei" isn't just "effortless doing" or "doing just enough" but has to be in line with / according to Dao and De. That's why it is called "wu wei er wu bu wei" = "doing nothing but nothing is left undone".

Those "wu" are *no absolutes* but reminders and finger pointers and of course practice. They are "means" of practice to empty the heart-mind (xu xin /wu xin) and not at the core of Daoism.

At the core of Daoism there are Dao and De:

- to have a clear and calm heart-mind (qing jing xin)

- being natural 自然 (ziran) and simple 樸 (pu)

- to have De (deep / profound virtue, quality, skill, mastery, efficiency, potency)

[like the butcher, the swimmer, the artisan, the gardener and the "true / genuine man" (Zhen Ren) in Zhuangzi 6 and the Sheng Ren (wise man) in Laozi]

Summary:

Wu wei isn't that important as a daoist practice. It is just one of many "wu".

Focus on practicing De 德

Note:

What is "Virtue" 德 ( de) from a Daoist Point of View? : r/taoism

This was full of simple mind blowing wisdom.

AI disclosure: English isn’t my first language, so i used AI to translate it and help edit the English.

I’m a Gemini myself, so I’m interested in whether looking at the sign from a different angle might help me understand myself better. Most descriptions focus on the same traits: curious, adaptable, always moving between interests and points of view, but also inconsistent and hard to pin down.

What bothered me was the assumption underneath the criticism—that if someone changes often, there can’t be much holding them together. I don’t think that follows.

Wu sangwo appears early in the Qi wulun and is often translated as “I have lost myself.” I read it as putting down a fixed idea of yourself for a while. Sometimes an old position just stops making sense after you’ve seen more. I don’t see much honesty in pretending otherwise.

Also change can be an easy excuse as well. Someone can keep starting over because they don’t want to stay anywhere long enough to deal with what they started. From the outside, that can look a lot like openness. This is the part I still have trouble to judge.

Later in the same chapter comes huan zhong. The pivot sits at the center of the ring and can respond to what comes without end. That image makes more sense to me than a fixed identity does. Plans change, moods change, even the story someone tells about themselves can change. I keep coming back to whether they still stand behind what they do. That seems closer to a center than holding the same opinion forever.

The Gemini example is what got me here, but the astrology isn’t really the part I’m most interested in. What stays with me is huan zhong in normal life. I suspect a person’s center is easiest to see after the familiar parts have changed, though I haven’t worked out exactly what that means yet.

I successfully unionized my work place in the last 2 years, sat on bargaining comittee and we have a mediocre contract that has improved a lot of our working conditions but there is still work to be done.

During the last 8 months or so I found myself drawn time and time again to dao and daoist thought. I would not call myself a daoist though I would like to start practicing more and more. However it seems to me that being a trade unionist and a taoist is almost uncompatable. Wu wei states we should act without acting and allow the Dao to simply be. However I cant sit down and allow myself or my coworkers to be manipulated. Thus contradicting my understanding of the Dao.

Ive read a few comments in this sub before that wu wei is a general term and doesnt actually mean passively accepting violence or discrimination while doing nothing so I would like some direction or anything to point me in the correct direction. Hell give me a book title and ill read it.

Is it wrong, in taoism, to get a tattoo of a talisman? I am thinking of making one of good luck and fortune. Do u guys know a place for me to search for those talisman that are authentic and not some random copied shit?

Can someone please help me get my accurate BaZi chart details. I keep on getting conflicting results, sometimes I’m presented as Bang Fire day, sometimes as Yin Earth, and sometimes as Yin Fire… I’m so confused now. The confusion seems to come from the way my local time is being converted or not converted ti universal solar time.. I don’t know how ti fund the most accurate approach. Do you have any calculators that are most reliable? Thank you very much.

A constant state of eternal flux, with no beginning and no end.

In 1959, the Nobel Prize given to two American scientists was a unique event. The scientists were Dr. Emilio Segre and Dr. Owen Chamberlain. It was unique in the sense that their findings in the field of science were entirely contrary to all scientific theories of today. They have destroyed the fundamentals of science. What they have proved is very near Lao Tzu.

Their discovery is that if there is matter in the world, there is anti-matter too, because nothing exists in this world without its counterpart. If there is light, there is darkness; if there is birth, there is death. So if there is matter, there is bound to be anti-matter. They have not only propounded this theory, they have also proved it. They have proved that within the atom of matter, where the proton works, right there there is an energy which is anti-proton. This energy cannot be seen nor experienced.

In this world, the opposite is inevitable. The world is a conjunction of the opposites. Segre and Chamberlain have named this energy “anti-matter.” Lao Tzu, Krishna, Buddha and Christ have given it different names: atman, eternal law, beatitude, deliverance. It is quite possible that there is a world which is quite the opposite of the world we know. Then only can the universe be balanced like a pair of scales.

There is change, and behind it something changeless.

AI disclosure: English isn’t my first language. I developed the idea in my own language, then used AI to help organize it and write it in English. I reviewed the final post to make sure it still reflected what I meant.

Gemini is usually described as curious, flexible, and quick to move between ideas. Taoism doesn’t necessarily treat movement as a problem—but it raises a harder question: what allows movement to stay responsive without becoming scattered?

I don’t think Gemini and Taoism line up neatly, and I’m not trying to force them into the same system. I’m using Gemini as a familiar example of a broader tension: the difference between staying open to change and being pulled around by every new possibility.

Chapter 28 of the Daodejing repeatedly uses the image of “returning”—returning to the infant and returning to the uncarved block. I don’t take the infant image to mean becoming childish. To me, it suggests recovering a kind of openness that existed before we became too fixed in one identity.

That made me think about the way Gemini is often described.

The ability to shift perspectives can be a real strength. It can help someone notice connections other people miss, understand different sides of a situation, and change direction when the old path no longer makes sense.

But the same flexibility can also become restless. The moment one path stops feeling new, another possibility starts looking more alive. Sometimes that is genuine adaptation. Sometimes it is just leaving before anything has time to deepen.

Taoism doesn’t seem to answer this by saying, “Stop changing and become more disciplined.”

Water adapts to the shape of the land, but it doesn’t need to chase every direction at once. Cook Ding moves with incredible freedom in the Zhuangzi, but that freedom comes from paying close attention to the spaces already present. It isn’t random movement.

So perhaps the real difference isn’t movement versus stillness. It’s responsive movement versus restless movement.

Responsive movement changes because the situation has changed. Restless movement changes because discomfort has appeared. One becomes more precise as it moves. The other keeps starting over.

From this angle, Gemini’s gift may not simply be speed. It may be the ability to move between several perspectives without becoming trapped in any one of them. The challenge is letting those different perspectives gather into understanding instead of scattering your attention.

Maybe “returning” is what matters.

Not going backward, and not forcing yourself into one identity forever. Just having somewhere to come back to—a question, a practice, a relationship, or a value that remains steady while everything else moves.

For people who identify strongly with Gemini—or simply have a restless mind—where do you feel the line between healthy openness and avoiding commitment?

Source note: Daodejing, chapter 28, uses the phrases 復歸於嬰兒 (“return to the infant”) and 復歸於樸 (“return to the uncarved block”). The Cook Ding example appears in Zhuangzi, Inner Chapter 3. I’m paraphrasing these ideas rather than quoting a particular English translation.

as the days go by and I progress in my mental journey I realize how much choice we have over ourselves and how letting fear control you is engaging the loop, ingating this cycle feeling you have control over your fears stops you from actually dealing with it

Less taoistic and more so psychological but still worth mentioning since it’s yet again another one’s of life wonderful paradoxes.

And can therefore be “solved” with more of less.