Beautiful swan. I chose you to represent gentleness, knowing full well that swans are supposed to have a tough
temperament. I know what it’s like. I have been called a bully, too, for
defending or to pretending to defend my opinions strongly. So yes, selecting a
swan may have two readings – they look gentle and may personify calmness and
kindness, but they may also be heavy-handed, or heavy-winged, and can deliver a
blow with their heavy wings that knocks out their natural enemies, of which
there are few. So maybe choosing the swan was a sign for me to be as gentle
as they look, but to watch out for cruelty, teasing, criticising and unpleasantries
in general. I was a teaser when I was a kid, and at times I still indulge in
wry humour, which some people sometimes find difficult to understand. But I
know I am also kind and gentle, and I love animals – swans included – so this
Virtue is not that unknown to me, I just have to apply it to people as well. Gentleness
is kindheartedness, so here it is apropos to quote a verse by one of the most
erudite of historical figures, Lao Tzu:
“Thus it is said:
The path into the light seems dark,
the path forward seems to go back,
the direct path seems long,
true power seems weak,
true purity seems tarnished,
true steadfastness seems changeable,
true clarity seems obscure,
the greatest seem unsophisticated,
the greatest love seems indifferent,
the greatest wisdom seems childish.
The Tao is nowhere to be found.
Yet it nourishes and completes all things.”
― Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
We could paraphrase the sage and say that
“great gentleness often seems harsh”, as often a solution from deep within, and
not just addressing the subjective field of human opinions, may seem difficult
to digest, but it can also be as gentle as it is true. Take death. Death is the
ultimate solution to all our troubles. So much suffering, so much pain, so much
stress and anxiety – it is all totally levelled and solved by death. The
suffering personality ceases to suffer, it is free. It dissolves into its
constituent elements and floats away like a cloud. Now, think on this: the
cessation of thinking is like death. “I think I am right; I think they are
wrong; how could they have done this to me? Can’t you see that I don’t
deserve to be treated like that? They are so bad to me, they don’t understand
me. Yes it is they who don’t really appreciate me…because really I am
the centre of the universe, not them!” And so on. All these puny human thoughts
are solved by not thinking them, by the death of thought. What is left?
Emotions? No, those are also produced by thoughts. Instinct? Not much of that
left – it’s mostly social conditioning that remains. What remains is your
Awareness, your inner perception, your wonder that there can be a perceiver. And
you perceive that thoughts are mere regurgitations of past memories, opinions
you have, vague wanderings of the mind, or poignant expectations for the future.
Cease all this, and gentleness automatically flows in when harsh thoughts (against
others and yourself) are stilled. Breathing is gentle. And there is a little death if you
stop after each in-breath and wait, or as each out-breath subsides. It’s a
gentle death, a sensation of dying to each moment and being reborn again in
the next. That promotes gentleness, and we should try it sometimes...
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