Sunday 28 October 2007

Taoism - a philosophical shield

In life, there are two types of people. 
  1. Warriors - People who possess force. They are strong people who work hard to cover their own weaknesses, search for their opponents weaknesses and strike at them. 
  2. Sages - People who have power. They discover themselves, give themselves up and therefore have no weaknesses.
I reckon most people are warriors. Warriors have an air of invincibility to keep up. They have an image to uphold. Conflicts arise when their circumstances threaten their image.
There are precious few sages. They have no need of weapons, because they know themselves. For if you master others, you will merely possess force. If you master yourself, you have true power. 
The monks demonstrating in Burma were not behaving like sages. They broke their spiritual progress to threaten the government with protests. This was a warrior attack, and the warriors in the Burma government retaliated in kind. In the circumstances, the repercussions were to be expected. 
It does not remove the fact that those monks are heroes in my heart. To me, they not only demonstrated. Their actions
The true path to longevity, strength and power is to know and master yourself completely. The burma government will soon learn that their fortress is built on fear, which will one day collapse like a house of cards.

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