Category: Retreats

When we try to break a habit or make a change in our lives, we all make the same mistake. Do you often wonder why you can never stick to the diet for long? Or why you can’t seem to stop the negative thinking for good? It is not your fault.

Stop focusing on changing your behavior and discover what you should be focusing on instead for powerful, positive change that lasts.

In Daoist philosophy, dark and light, yin and yang, arrive in the Tao Te Ching at chapter 42.^[23]  It becomes sensible from an initial quiescence or emptiness (wuji, sometimes symbolized by an empty circle), and continues moving until quiescence is reached again. For instance, dropping a stone in a calm pool of water will simultaneously raise waves and lower troughs between them, and this alternation of high and low points in the water will radiate outward until the movement dissipates and the pool is calm once more. Yin and yang thus are always opposite and equal qualities. Further, whenever one quality reaches its peak, it will naturally begin to transform into the opposite quality: for example, grain that reaches its full height in summer (fully yang) will produce seeds and die back in winter (fully yin) in an endless cycle.

It is impossible to talk about yin or yang without some reference to the opposite, since yin and yang are bound together as parts of a mutual whole (for example, there cannot be the bottom of the foot without the top). A way to illustrate this idea is^{[citation needed]} to postulate the notion of a race with only women or only men; this race would disappear in a single generation. Yet, women and men together create new generations that allow the race they mutually create (and mutually come from) to survive. The interaction of the two gives birth to things, like manhood.^[24] Yin and yang transform each other: like an undertow in the ocean, every advance is complemented by a retreat, and every rise transforms into a fall. Thus, a seed will sprout from the earth and grow upwards towards the sky—an intrinsically yang movement. Then, when it reaches its full potential height, it will fall. Also, the growth of the top seeks light, while roots grow in darkness.

Certain catchphrases have been used to express yin and yang complementarity:^[25]

• The bigger the front, the bigger the back.
• Illness is the doorway to health.
• Tragedy turns to comedy.
• Disasters turn out to be blessings.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Yin_and_yang.svg