Tao Te Ching 1-12

Until now, the Tao Te Ching has been an incredible text. There are so many passages that I would like to write about, but I ended up choosing the one which made me reflect the most.

Passage 11 says the following:

Thirty spokes share the wheels hub;
It is the center hole that makes it useful.
Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.
Therefore benefit comes from what is there;
Usefulness comes from what is not there.

The lesson that these words contain is amazing. I’m not even sure, but I think it’s telling us to feel good about the things we have, but there is much more to gain from what we don’t. I began thinking of every situation possible in which this is applied. For a human, accomplishments are already there, of course it is a benefit to have them, but the question is; why should you ever put an end to it? The things that are not there are your thrusts in life, use them to realize how long the way is compared to what you have done. Emptiness is useful because it makes you want to fill it, but there is nothing left to do from a task already accomplished.