Weapons of war
Are instruments of fear,
A spread of plague,
Hateful to living things.
Therefore the wise shun them.

Weapons are not auspicious tools,
And should be used only when no choice,
Then with only a calm, still mind
That doesn’t rejoice at victory.

To rejoice at victory
Is to enjoy killing people.
And to enjoy killing people
Is to lose share in the common good
And the possibility for worldly success.

The death of so many
Is cause for mourning.
Victory in war should be received
With funeral ceremonies.

Many blame bad luck for their own folly, for not choosing wisely. Doing this creates a contagious disease of disinformation while preventing solutions to prevent the mistakes. It opens a door to deeper, more dangerous problems. As in a card game where the greatest skill comes from knowing when and what to throw away, our lives turn on recognizing unlucky directions and changing course before they take over and destroy our reputations. When unsure, follow the lead of those with the most integrity and wisdom—sooner or later, they will prevail.

Uncontrived awareness goes on forever,
Undefined and nameless.
Small and like uncut wood in primal simplicity,
No one can control or manipulate it.

When rulers follow this Tao,
The world becomes like a guest,
Heaven and Earth harmonize,
Life becomes like the freshness of rain,
People become good for each other,
And all things take their natural course.

For practical wisdom,
Experience must be defined and ordered.
But when definitions proliferate,
It’s time to stop and understand more deeply.
If people know when to stop,
Danger dissolves.
True wisdom in the world
Is like a river flowing home to the sea.

For the wise, the greatest advantage of power, wealth, and fame becomes the ability to do more good than others. This creates a powerful reputation for graciousness and opportunities to conquer with universal good will. Making friends arises from being a friend and engaging in friendly activity. Those who corrupt their advantages with a lack of graciousness, with indulged nastiness and bad disposition can expect no true friends or authentic support.

Those who know others are clever,
Those who know themselves are wise.
Those who conquer others are briefly powerful,
Those who conquer themselves are always strong.
Those who know they have enough are rich,
Ambition wanders blind.
Those who stay where they have found their true home flourish.
Our bodies disappear
But the eternal present goes on and on.

One of the greatest lessons in life revolves around learning to refuse negative influences and external demands, to cut through sidetracks, to disengage from unimportant activities that steal precious time, and to disinvolve ourselves from people and affairs that don't directly concern us. This preserves goodwill, esteem, and the freedom to always choose the best course of action. The cultivation of this discipline also gives us insight and skill in preventing others from inappropriate involvement in our own affairs, inhibits the taking advantage of friendships, avoids the great failing of excess which always creates a vice, and promotes the important quality of moderation that keeps us in the good graces of others without having to abandon ourselves.

Awareness floats and drifts
Like an unmoored boat
Making no distinction between
Going this way and going that way.

Everything lives in its grace
And it denies nothing to anyone
Making no claims,
Having no desires.
Because it lacks the dualistic twist,
It’s considered insignificant
Though it gives birth to all things
Like the wind creating movement,
Water creating waves.

Because the wise never try to be great
They accomplish great things.

Everyone excels at something but few know what it is. Even less both know and cultivate their strongest quality; most do violence to it by status quo obsequiousness, conformity, and constant attempts to be someone else. The successful in life both see and understand their true strengths and weaknesses. They propagate and grow their good qualities leaving less and less space for the weaknesses.

Stabilize awareness
And the world will arise
Safe, serene, and at peace.

Music, fancy food, and entertainment
Make wayfarers briefly pause
While the Tao
Seems flat and insipid,
Without substance or flavor.
It looks like nothing much,
It sounds like nothing much,
We look but don’t see it,
We listen but don’t hear it.

The most foolish fail because of not thinking things through at all. The less but still foolish think about their lives and goals but lose focus and easily get distracted by the superficial but flashy, by the unimportant but entertaining. The wise quickly recognize the consequential, see which courses of action lead to gain and which to loss, and prioritize their most diligent concentration and highest skill to the most important issues. For most however, "common sense is not so common" and they never lose their common sense because they didn't have any to lose. They make a big deal about things that don't matter and ignore the most important issues. The wise apprehend life's hidden and obscure treasures, deeply root them in their minds, and apply their most diligent and focused attention.

Every rapid collapse
Was once a bubble.
Those who feel unarmed
Once carried weapons.
Every failure in weakness
Was once puffed up with pseudo strength.
Those who feel belittled
Were once arrogant.
Those who feel deprived
Once had unearned privilege.

The wise hide their light,
Never advance unless under cover,
Never disclose the source of pain or joy.
The soft and weak prevail
Over the hard and strong.

When planning ahead and making decisions, most only consider the opportunity, the resources, the marketplace; few recognize their "luck," even think of luck as superstition. Another way of understanding luck could be the commingling of environmental challenges, cultural momentum, political environment, personal skill and—most importantly— timing. Seneca defined luck as preparation meeting opportunity, bad luck arising from reaching for the opportunity without the preparation. For example, waiting to take care of our health until we're older and having problems becomes a way of creating our own bad luck. On the other hand, cultivating patience, forethought, and unbiased awareness create the kind of luck that seizes realistic opportunity while quickly withdrawing when fortune turns unfavorable.

The wise do nothing through acting,
They do everything through being.
Never making a big deal about anything,
They accomplish everything.

When leaders follow this way,
All things grow naturally
And the world’s passion
To stray from goodness
Is checked at its core
In Nameless Simplicity.

When desires are stilled,
Grasping and fixation dissolve,
Peace reigns,
And in not wanting,
All the world spontaneously
Rests in appreciation.

Learn how to use the subtle art of insinuation, innuendo, and veiled remarks. One of the most sophisticated and nuanced activities of human communication, using this kind of tactfulness spans the range from malicious envy to the most skillful accomplishment. It can help us understand the people we deal with, probe their hearts, and test their integrity; but it can also cause great harm, quickly destroy solid reputations, and destroy the good will of old friends, colleagues, supervisors, and subordinates. Understanding this dynamic also helps inoculate us from the skillful manipulation of others. A foreseen attack is most easily defended against. While an unforeseen intrusion has the power of an ambush, anticipating an attack gives the defense great strength.

The highest goodness,
Not revealing or clinging to goodness
Has true goodness.
Lesser goodness tries to hold onto it
And therefore loses it.
The highest goodness involves no effort
Or the thought of effort.
Lesser goodness does nothing
But always has an end in view.

The good the truly good do
Has no end in view.
The good the righteous do
Always has a goal.

When those who act
in conventional obedience to the law
Don’t get their way,
They angrily roll up their sleeves
And try to control, threatening and compelling.

When we lose the Way,
We seek the power of goodness.
When we lose this,
We look to kindness.
When we lose kindness,
We look for justice.
When we lose justice,
We look to opinion: conventional wisdom,
Ritual & obedience to the law.

Opinion is the beginning of ignorance.
Belief is the beginning of delusion
Thinking of our delusion as wisdom
Is the beginning of mental illness
In an individual and a sick society
In politics and culture.

For these reasons,
The wise choose this over that,
The fruit over the flower,
Substance over surface,
The sense over the words,
This over that.

While the extremes of "honor" require an attitude of never surrendering, skillful strategies respect and frequently use subtleties of strategic withdrawal. Gallant retreats often surpass courageous attacks. The higher fortune heaps for us success, good fortune, and luck; the more likely that the luck will end, the success become failure. And so, don't expect luck to last long, quit while still winning, store and hide your resources when you have enough—even when not enough. Fortune often balances the intensity of her favors with the shortness of their time span.

The oneness of life
Displays itself in its parts:
Clarity expresses oneness in the sky,
Stillness expresses oneness in the earth,
Purity express oneness in spirit.
Valleys express oneness when they flow with rivers,
When the 10,000 creatures realize oneness,
They flourish,
When leaders realize oneness,
They bring peace to the world.

Without clarity, heaven would crack;
Without stillness, the earth would crumble;
Without purity, spirit would dissolve;
Without fullness, valleys would dry up;
Without humility, leaders would fall.

Because the high is built on the foundation of the low,
And humility is the root of greatness,
Good leaders call themselves
Orphaned, widowed, destitute.
Who will keep chasing after the clink of treasure
After they have heard stone growing on a cliff?

Works of nature mature to a point of ripeness and then degrade. But recognizing and harvesting at this point requires both rare insight and uncommon skill. A similar kind of ripening occurs in the realm of understanding and wisdom; but in the world of art, such points of perfection beyond potential improvement are rare or non-existent.

The Tao is counter-intuitive,
Unconventional, a paradox.
It goes back and back, returning to the root.
Its strength is weakness.
Everything comes from something
But something comes from nothing.

We often mistake admiration for affection, expect that the first leads to the second, and too often sacrifice the second for the first. Our natural talents, good fortunes, and inspirations can become a source of jealousy and resentments against us; or, they can become a foundation for tremendous goodwill when—instead of getting lazy resting on our accomplishments—we work hard doing good with both hands, being generous with both words and deeds, and being loved because of loving. In the social realm; courtesy, good manners, and grace become a kind of potent political magic. This nobility of spirit easily transmits through the years of history through the blessings of biographers.