A message from the Tao:
it's funny how the certain books have always seemed to find my at just the right time, synchronistic, as if guided to my hands. I recall everyone of these magical events, where I was when their message became clear, the immediacy of their impact, and how my life so completely changed after reading. Born to Run by Christopher McDougall was such a book, an impulse buy while in line to make a completely different purchase and simply opening it to pass the time. It was the opening epigraph quoted from the Tao Te Ching that caught my eye and caused to read further, how the best runners leave no trace behind, and being in the midst of studying and writing of the Tao it captured my imagination. So I bought the book and after a few pages in I became an ultra runner.
just like that.
I had always loved to run, but for fitness, condition for other sports that I competed in, but I was never what I would have considered an actual runner, at least not to that extreme. Until a message from the Tao and an extremely talented, passionate author showed me otherwise. So for a decade I ran almost every race available, over 100 ultra events, a love affair that consumed my life and training.
all from a reading a chance few words while waiting in line at a bookstore.
a message from the Tao.
in the early 2000's I bought Wayne Dyer's book Change Your Thought, Change Your Life, a reflex purchases as I've always enjoyed his books. Yet for whatever reason I couldn't bring myself to ready, it was the authors interpretation of the Tao and at the time I felt more called to immerse myself in the actual words of Lao Tzu, experiencing it through what felt like someone else's mind didn't appeal to me. So the book set on a shelf for almost two decades, occasionally a halfhearted attempt was made to read it, but it never seemed to capture my imagination for very long.
until it did.
just like that.
a message from the Tao.
and now I find that I love reading this expression of the Tao, an interpretation with suggestions on how to open myself to this magical way of living. I have no idea why, it's a mystery this way, and I absolutely love when it happens.
for whatever reason...
I'm ready.
another subtle message from the Tao.
~
Peace, Eric