Open Up to the Unknown

Have you ever observed how you feel and respond when you are in a situation of uncertainty?  You totally have no idea what you should do and how you should respond, and that is really uncomfortable! We know that the old no longer works for us, but then, the old still makes us feel cozy and comfortable. Somehow we are trapped in the old and unwilling to open up to the future, and we are certainly scared.

Does this problem resonate with you? Observe how you feel stuck in your current life. You probably will complain about how painful and how awful your life has become. However, you don’t have that courage to walk away and start a new journey because you are so scared of the unknown. You want a quick answer and want someone to just take this pain away from you.

Be patient with yourself and the situation you are in. Life will nudge you in the right direction and a solution will present itself. Life happens, grass grows and wind blows…all these things happen without our agreement and effort.  When you join the flow of life, suddenly, all the answers are given to you. Life is always full of opportunities.

Center yourself and wait; life's script unfolds right in front of you and through you. When a new opportunity unfolds, you will know exactly how to respond. The trick is to think of the future like a puzzle. Would it be fun to buy a puzzle fully assembled? The joy is in tackling the picture one piece at a time and seeing the vision come together as you work with it. One day this "scary" future will be the well-familiar past, so why don't you go and discover it already today. Whatever happens, you are safe and sound. With the Tao next to you, how can you be harmed?

By Christian and Su Zhen

The Veil

Has it ever happened to you that you opened your eyes and saw, seemingly for the first time, stunning beauty in front of you? You are asking yourself, "Why didn't I see this before?" Could it be that your thoughts, you worries, your expectations prevented you from seeing the world as it is? We Tao folks advise you to keep an eye on what lies in front of you and deal with each situation as it comes. Well, actually this advice is pretty meaningless. Either you see the world as it is or you see the veil, a world interpreted through your thoughts, worries and expectations.

 So what can you do? Learn how to fall in love with the Now, the world as it is. Everyone has satori moments - the moment in time when the world stands still - but to make this experience a lasting one you first have your job to do. Burn your passions by creating the stuff you were born to do. Transform the raging fire inside and transform this energy into lasting serenity. Face your fears and worries to the best of your abilities. Step towards the sea with an army of adversaries closing in from behind and say, "Sea, in the name of Moses part now", and if it doesn't, laugh heartedly and jump right in. We can't promise you that you will get what you want, but we can promise that a world beyond expectation is waiting for you if you open up to it. Follow your life's mission, keep your eyes open and the veil is lifted for you.

What, Me Worry?

The Lord is my shepherd. I lack nothing.
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
he refreshes my soul.
He guides me along the right paths
for His name's sake.
Even though I walk
through the darkest valley,
I will fear no evil,
for You are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
Surely Your goodness and love will follow me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
(Psalm 23)

I devoted a chapter to Psalm 23 in my book "The Magnificent Experiment". I would guess that all spiritual path travelers have felt this amazing feeling of peace and serenity at some point during their journey. When I feel stress at work, home or anywhere really, I just look up and without fail see Her handwriting in front of me.  The other day I saw a report in Ian Robertson's excellent book, "The  Winner Effect", that claims that if you believe that you are in control you can single-handedly reduce the stress hormones that otherwise would torment your system. Well, I  can't say that I am always in control, but I can definitely say that "I Am" is always in control. Once you have discovered this secret, peace will always be at the fingertips. What, me worry?

The Other Side of Limiting Beliefs

I would say everyone has experienced limiting beliefs. I have many. I have given up thinking much about them. I just let them run in the background like a broken record. Certainly, I never let them get in the way of what I am doing. Of course I know that they are not true, so I demonstrate myself over and over that they aren't. At one point in my life they might go away, or they never may, but I know who I am in spite of them.

The other side of the limiting beliefs I only discovered yesterday. I wonder why - the connection is so easy to see. When you run after an idol you in fact try to compensate for the limited belief you have about yourself. When Moses came down after 40 days of fasting at Mount Sinai with the 10 Commandments in his hands he was flabbergasted to see his people running naked around the golden calf. "God rescued you from slavery and from sure death. He showed you how to find bread and water in the desert and this is all you can do, worship a dead piece of gold?"

Grandeur is the other side as well. Since you deep down inside believe you have a flaw, you compensate for it by conquering the world and proving to everyone that you are the best. A daughter of god doesn't need to prove anything to anyone. What is there to prove anyway? We all are children of God. Everyone stands out in her unique way.

The other side of a limiting belief is addictive. The ego tells you want that piece of happiness, but it always turns out to be a temporary high. No matter how much you consume, no matter how intense it gets, there is always a sadness inside that keeps coming back. There is a misery imbedded in you that you just can't shake off. If anything, the more you run after this idol, the more you part from life.

So where does this leave us? Observe the yin and yang of the limiting beliefs. The gold on the horizon is as fake as the limiting beliefs that run as dead programs in your head. You can shake both off by either being still or by engaging with life. The Tao shows you moment by moment who you and your siblings really are.  Embrace life to the fullest and the voice in your head will have a tough time breaking through. God created this fantastic virtual reality show called life to remind you who you truly are. All you have to do is to show up today and play.

The Tao Makes You Whole

Why do you go out and conquer the world? Is it because you were once humiliated by a coach when you wanted to make it into the college basketball team? Now you are minting money at work, you have objectively made it, but you still push yourself hard and you objectively walk over others - you simply can't stop. Why?

Why do you stay away from success? Why don’t you join the world? Why don’t you get a meaningful job and manifest the material abundance the Tao has prepared for you? Is it because your mom's value system has become part of you?Marry somebody rich and be good at ordering your domestic help around, wasn't that how she always pictured "having made it"?

Why do you have these violent images inside of you? Is it because your domicile nature encourages others to walk all over you, while you have internalized the Lord's mandate that if someone slaps you, you need to offer the other cheek?

Why do you constantly worry? Is it because your father screamed at you whenever something quite didn't work out? Is it that you are now reliving the fears he never could handle himself?

A spiritual path is a soul searching journey. It is a path towards knowing yourself, a journey towards overcoming your past with the goal of reaching wholeness. When you reflect on the four characters we have presented to you, none of them are completely happy. All of them are restless deep inside because they can feel that something is missing and unless they manage to heal this psychological wound they once incurred, they will never truly experience who they were truly born to be.

The Tao leads you on a path of discovering who you truly are. Along the Tao you will learn how to uninstall everything that is artificial and external to you. You will stop doing things based on other's expectations and you will transcend the little psychological cuts from the past.

If you look carefully you can observe that everything that drives you is a result of your upbringing, your conditioning, the expectations of your parents and society and the belief systems that you have created for yourself. So many of us have chosen careers to live out the dreams of our parents. And then are the rebels who do exactly the opposite, but they have a chip on their shoulder too. You probably have reached mid-life as we have. Well, today is a perfect opportunity to turn this boat around and start sailing in a direction that will make you whole. Do not regret the journey that got you here. Everything that has happened thus far in your life prepares you beautifully for the spiritual journey home.

Knowing why you are wired the way you are is an important psychological break-through, but it is not an be all and end all. Your drives are still "you", whether you head agrees with them or not. That's where the Tao comes in. If you want to change, the Tao will show you how. The aggressive executive from above is given opportunity after opportunity to be kind to those he cares for, while the spiritual aspirant is encouraged to become a little more assertive in his day-to-day interactions. The stay-home mom is gently pushed to become more entrepreneurial, while the worry-ridden business woman is shown how to feel the fear and do it anyway. The Tao has already mapped out how to bring you home on the fastest route possible, all you really have to do is to show up in life and put your best foot forward.

The Tao shows you step by step how to get back your natural freedom. We all come from different starting points, but along the Tao we all join life, live our life to the biggest possibility and make ourselves a present to the world. Were we walk there is joy, love, abundance and serenity. If this is what you want to experience, please join us in our journey! It is lots of fun. Be curious about yourself. Ask how you have come here and how to proceed and all the answers will be given to you. That's what the Tao does, day-in, day-out. All you have to do is to join.

By Christian and Su Zhen

Trust or Worry, Either Way You Will be Right

 Have you ever observed how different the world looks like dependent on whether you approach it with an attitude of trust or suspicion? We have discovered that when you trust, you work with Tao. The whole universe is going to cooperate with you and you are able to progress steadily towards what you believe deep down inside you already have. It is like if you hand over a wish list to a higher authority and She gets it for you in a way that works for everyone.

The same insight applies for all your relationships with colleagues, friends and family. When you trust in the people who are in your life you give them wings to fly. See how you can empower people just as the Tao has empowered you before.  Your trust boosts their confidence and brings out the best out of them.  They may have worried before, but in your presence they believe in themselves. Your trust is just like the light house in the dark stormy night, guiding the way for all the ships to return to the harbor safely.

On the contrary, when you don't really trust others they will constantly fall short of your already low expectation. Fact of the matter is, they can't achieve their true potential if you approach them with a suspicious mind. Observe for yourself, people who trust themselves trust others as well, while people who don't have faith in their own abilities also don't trust others very much.  It is very simple, either you know that you already have or otherwise even the little that you think you have will be taken away from you. Your mind set determines everything.  Either you figure that everyone is in one way or another out to get you, or you know that everyone is working hard to make you realize who you truly are. There is little in- between.

We call that trust in others the Christian Power of Positive Thinking. Anyone who has children knows that this is true. Yet, in the end it is the same circular thinking as the Power of Positive Thinking is. Believe and succeed, worry and run into difficulties. The choice is up to you. But sometimes when the going is hard it is difficult to keep this positive frame of mind. You probably already have read books on the power of positive thinking and you still struggle from time to time. So you still ask yourself so how do I do it exactly? Well, that's where the Tao comes  in. Discover that people are here for you independent of whether the going is tough or easy. Realize that if you raise others your Self guides the way. Recognize the truth in the saying that every dark cloud has a silver lining. The Tao is there for you always and with hat insight there comes a magnificent trust in everything that comes your way.

When the spiritual community tells you that we are all one you may think it is a beautiful, yet pretty meaningless phrase. The Tao can in fact prove it to you. Where you saw a friend and a foe before you now only perceive friends who help you find yourself. Sure, some "friends" can be a little annoying, but your mindset changes, you still only see people who are in their own special way lifting you up. Once you realize this, it will be quite easy to repeat this feat in others. The same is true for all challenges that you will face. The German poet Goethe once said, "Even with stones that someone put in your way you can build something nice." Discover this wisdom for yourself and you cannot help looking forward to everything that comes your way.

Your trust is a vision. This universe was created to get you back Home. Your trust decides how the movie will end. Don't worry, even if you were to keep on doing what you have been doing, your life will have a meaningful ending. But just imagine how far you can come if you let the Tao teach you the power of positive thinking. With the Tao guiding you and your soul siblings surrounding you, why would you ever worry?


By Christian and Su Zhen

Do Not Engage with Your Demon

A friend once asked me how she can deal with excessive worrying. I told her to make a list of all the stuff that is circulating in her head. Her job prospects, her husbands job prospects, the health concerns for herself and her family, the academic prospects for her children, the money worries, etc., etc. It turned out that the list was quite long but in the end she managed to cram 95 percent of all the stuff that constantly popped up to the surface into a number of categories. I gave her the advice to never ever engage with any of these voices. How can you? Say if you are worried about cancer you can take all the exams in the world today and tomorrow you might get the illness nevertheless. As a matter of fact, cancer is a perfect example of a disease that probably will show up one day if you keep on worrying about it. Do not engage with your demon, instead say "Very interesting, you might be right, but here is what I am doing about this concern right now". So when the devil's advocate speaks up, just keep on doing what you have been doing. Only if you have nothing creative to do, chances are your mind will be the devil's workshop.

Never engage with your demon. Your demon is nothing but hot air if you engage with the now, but he is real when you engage with him. Do not engage, but do monitor. Be mindful of the voice of the endless chatter of the mind without condoning or condemning. How does it make sense to criticize your demon, it would be you talking to yourself. When you monitor what is going on beneath the surface you will shine away the darkness. My friend ended up being surprised about how circular her mental attacks on herself were. And when she ended up taking constructive actions for each and every concern she ended up being able to sleep much better and her mood got visibly better. Perhaps one day she will be worry-free, perhaps she never will, but not engaging with her demon put her into contact with a joy and calm she hadn't experienced in quite a while.

The Worry List

Two old guys sit at a bar drinking, says the one to the other,'Number 12', to which he starts bursting out with laughter and responds with 'Number 47', to which the first guy laughs heartedly in return. The point is that the two gentlemen have been telling each other jokes for so many decades that at this point they can just refer to the number in the joke repertoire.

A friend once asked me what she could do about excessive worrying and I told her that unfortunately she can't really do anything about it. What I recommended though was to put together a worry list similar to the joke catalogue from our two friends. While there is no limit to the ingenuity of the ego to come up with cancerous thoughts, they nevertheless all fall into general areas such as 1) Worries about my child's health, 2) Worries about my child's education, 3) Worries that I am neglecting my child, 4) Worries about my own health, 5) Worries about my financial well-being, 6) Worries about my job, ...

List them all and be specific enough to capture them all, but be general enough not to drown in them and then memorize the list very much as our two friends did. What it will do for you, it will allow you to distance yourself from the voice in your head and will show you how much of your time is spent on this cancerous activity of questioning everything without any underlying reason. This little trick will also reveal to you that none of these concerns are real. All your mind does it to play back these fears like a tired old record. Most importantly, when you have mastered your worry list, you can actually track the worry train before it leaves the station just because you will not engage with it. Just imagine what energy boost you will get from this feat.  You will simply tell yourself, 'oh, it is 57 again', and then you will move on with your life. How amazing is that!