Seed

The whole is in the seed.

A whole plant is contained in the seed.
An entire person is contained in an egg.
Every living thing in the world comes from seed.
And every living thing in the world dies and falls to the earth.
Bodies rot, only to feed the earth and release the seed.
That is true rebirth.

Tao is infinite.
It is a seed of unlimited circumference,
With its center any point in its boundless eternity.
Tao is a tiny seed,
Containing unlimited universes in its dimensionless center.

The seed is the whole of what we want to know.
The seed is the center.
The seed is the source.
And the source is the whole of Tao.

Deng Ming Dao, Everyday Tao

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There’s not really any word to describe having children other than miraculous. If you think about them being your seeds, yet becoming so fully their own person, it is an amazing thing. Out of all the thousands of eggs, the millions of sperm, two little bits collided and joined and became this wonderful person.

That’s how I see my kids, how I wish other people would see theirs. If we looked at it the right way, they would all be too precious and wonderful to waste in wars or allow to live in poverty. We would care for them all as best we possibly could.

If Tao is the seed for everything, then all that comes from Tao is miraculous as well. How does something emerge from what seems to be nothing, and live and grow and reproduce itself? Life is an amazing thing, and all its creations are miraculous. We can study life scientifically and find out how some things work, but that fundamental life force eludes us, and that is Tao.

We get lost in our own little piece of the world, in the things that seem important to us from day to day. Yet in the long run, most of them are trivial. Does it matter if a report is done on time or not, really? Of course not. What matters is that moment spent watching a child, the moment spent admiring a flower, the moment spent gazing into the eyes of someone you love and seeing yourself reflected in their gaze. Those are the things of real value, the things that lead us to wonder and awe and understanding of Tao.

Look for the seed, and discover the entire beauty of what is around you, encompassing you, within you, is you yourself and everyone around you. Namaste.

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4 Responses

  1. I am astounded, daily, by the life in and the life of my Babycakes. I, too, wish everyone could focus on what is important, and wish I could do it more consistently and more often.

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