The Master Wood Carver
A treasure-packed story about guarding the spirit and getting to work
Stories represent realities. Actual reality. Possible reality. Stories describe our partly-true-partly-delusional ideas about how the world is. They describe how we hope the world once was or might be one day. Stories help us make sense of boundless complexity. And they can reveal things that are essential and useful for shaping a healthy life.
This week’s song-n-delve is a two and a half thousand year old, wisdom-packed story that I set to music.
Shout-outs to…
Chiang Tzu, ancient Taoist sage, for writing the story way back in the days before search engine hyperlinks existed.
Thomas Merton, for bringing the story into his book ‘The way of Chiang Tzu.’
Parker J Palmer for, having discovered the story in Merton’s book, bringing it into his own book, ‘A Hidden Wholeness’
And thanks to the master woodcarver, who I’m believing actually lived and made astounding pieces of work through an interplay of technical mastery and inner mastery.
Thanks to Princes and people who hang out in royal courts everywhere, funding the arts. Speaking of which:
The Tao
Taoism is a Chinese philosophy-slash-religion generally attributed to Lao-tzu, a Chinese philosopher. Lao Tzu became largely known through writings of Chuang Tzu (who wrote the story I tell in the video above).
Taoism seeks to live in harmony with the Tao- the natural way of the universe- which is essentially very simple, yet practically very hard to discern, because we constantly mistake our descriptions of reality for reality itself. Like say; thinking that the costume we wear is who we really are. We forget that our stories always emphasise one aspect of reality and excludes other aspects, thus potentially imprisoning us in stuck outlooks and actions. We get stuck in stories. Yet, beautifully, strangely, stories can also break us out of prison, transporting us through a portal into the underlying truth of existence, the way.
I love the playfulness of Taoist storytelling. I also love the idea that there is a fundamental structure, a reality that we can access, become grounded in, developing a healthy and harmonious existence.
It’s a long haul journey. Regardless of how far we get, there are many good stories to light the way. That’s what I’m aiming for here. Thanks for supporting song-n-delve.
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