Taoism is Gnostic. They believe that your primary access to the Tao, and experience of the Tao, is through attention to your own nature, to your own behaviour. They believe that human beings are naturally compassionate beings, peace loving, and that other behaviour only arises to the degree that the person learns and begins practising patterns of resistance, self denial. This is why as a rule Taoists don’t stand on big elaborate ceremony. Effusive rules of protocol and concepts of proper role are considered as attitudes that reflect ignorance of the Tao.
And that the way to “know god” is to know yourself, thoroughly.
I’ve always felt that way.
Also, to cultivate humility (one of Taoism’s three virtues, the others being compassion and moderation) is to understand as much as it may be true that you are the Tao, one with the Tao, one with Tao, you are not the first cause, the first or singular source of Tao. You are one of many such examples. This is the basis of Taoism humility. Yes, you are indeed sacred, and so is everyone and everything else. This is why moderation is a virtue. Without moderation you cease to share in the world’s resources and virtues. You instead begin hoarding them and denying those around you of what belongs to them every bit as much as it might belong to you. The flesh of the cow belongs to the cow as much as it belongs to you. The flesh of your body belongs to the maggots or the predator that might eat it as much as it belongs to you, even to the bacteria and viruses it hosts. They have discovered that your body is composed of more “foreign” bacterial cells than it has any cells that are supposedly you. You are more than your body as even our science is now proving. Some bacteria in the soil somewhere could honestly call you mother or father, or even god.
You experience chocolate craving, or have the potential, because of a bacterial colony in your gut. Your thoughts and senses aren’t yours exclusively. There is another bacteria that has evolved a special signal. This signal has only one purpose, to calm humans, to make them feel peaceful so they might linger in contact with the soil and thus play host to and nurture the bacteria. It’s all this does. The bacteria is not toxic, not dangerous in any way. It could be described as chemical petting.
How do we get our hands on these bacteria? Well, humans can get their hands on this bacteria by gardening or walking barefoot as some people are beginning to swear by, and science is looking into culturing them for “medical” applications of course.
Again, we return to the notion of “too pure is not healthy” (too “clean,” either). Indeed. You are exactly right. Too clean environments have been implicated in the increasing trend to autoimmune diseases. Peoples prejudices against the lowly creatures, flies and pigeons and rats, shows nothing more than human ignorance.
Now I know why I’m not keen on housecleaning.
Maggots are considered the height of disgusting, yet without adequate populations of flies and maggots disease would skyrocket. Maggots themselves are even sterile. They sometimes use them to clean wounds in extreme cases of tissue necrosis when normal methods would be too time consuming and even dangerous. The reason they don’t use them more is they are hard to control or clean up when they are done with the procedure.
I’ve heard that some folks are keen on eating dirt. They have even found a specific kind of dirt, specifically what is commonly referred to as “white dirt”, and they have discovered this stuff has amazing properties.
I ate dirt in Peru at a native family home.
I think as strange as it seems, we need to give a place to traditional wisdoms, and restore the role of the traditional wise person, giving them room to function alongside all of our so called advances. They have discovered that the psychedelic substances, mushrooms and herbs specifically, don’t seem to actually have any harmful effect on disease sufferers. They now very much want to research how they could be used in a more “controlled” way to treat depression and anxiety. They are in love with that imagined control.
Take the peyote and don’t necessarily loose your mind. Eat the dirt and rather than become dull witted, actually strengthening your emotional well being and perceptual acuity. If getting high were an absolute evil, jaguars as a species would have gone extinct by their own doing. You can look up a jaguar tripping. They seek out and chew a leaf that makes them hallucinate, and yet they still remain remarkable functional creatures. The South American medicine men even believe that they are as effective as they are because they trip out like that. That they derive strength from their journey into the supposedly hallucinogenic spirit world.
I would not advise people doing this on their own. I do believe it requires a guide as shamans traditionally believed as well.
Does the leaf work as well on humans? It does indeed. Shamans chew it also. They recommend their hunters and warriors use it occasionally.
So have I covered Taoism as it connect with biology adequately?
Your thoughts are welcome. Be well friends.
Travis Saunders
Dragon Intuitive
~science,mysticism,spirituality~