Tao In You

Thus, one gains by losing,
and loses by gaining.

                                                 – Lao Tzu Tao Te Ching 42

 A challenge of life is making choices.            

To buy a jacket, you have to part with money you meant for a book.  To lose a job, you set youself free to embark on a journey you could not have found time for ……

Making choices in life is difficult.  It is, nevertheless, better than not making one at all.

The trick is to appreciate what you lose for the things you gain, and what you gain for the things you lose.

This will help you to see serenity in life.  

This is the essense of ‘yingyang balance’.

Picture source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cosmic_bandita/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

For those who are new to the Chinese cultureas, they may find the yin and yang symbol, as shown on the left, intimidating.

It is, in fact, a symbol that illustrates a simple state of existence – yin-yang balance.  It can be used to describe all existence, from natural phenomena, social order, to functions of our body.

It is also known as the symbol of ‘Tai Chi’ — the Chinese word that literally means ‘ultimate potentiality’.

The symbol is in the shape of a circle and consists of two colors. The black color represents the yin energy, and the white color represents the yang. They are opposing qualities of dualism.

In the circle, there are two fish-like features. The black fish is yin, and the white fish is yang.

There is a black dot that looks like an eye of the white fish. Similarly, there is a white dot as if an eye of the black fish. Walking through the diameter of the circle, you will not experience pure black or pure white. There is always some black and some white.

This means that yin and yang are rooted in one another. You find yin in yang, and yang in yin. This is, in fact, a reality of life. In life, you hardly find a situation which is pure yin or pure yang. There are seeds of sadness in happiness; and opportunities in every risk.

Yin and yang wax and wane; and can be mutually transformed.

Note that the yin-yang symbol is rounded. This gives a sense of continual movement and interaction of the two energies. Although opposing, they are complementary and interchangeable. Yin can turn into yang and yang turns into yin, causing a new state of yin-yang relationship to establish.