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Welcome!
“Tao means the ‘natural way’ and te means ‘virtue’. Together, they indicate that the path of Taoism is about following what is natural and embodying what is virtuous.”
~Eva Wong, “Being Taoist”
“I understood at a very early age that in nature, I felt everything I should feel in church but never did. Walking in the woods, I felt in touch with the universe and with the spirit of the universe.”
~Alice Walker
“I take refuge in the Great Dao.”
If Dao is the natural way or path, how can one take refuge in it? What is taking refuge?
“Take/find/seek refuge: to go to or into a place for shelter or protection from danger or trouble.” -Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary
Through this site, I hope to offer perspectives, resources, reviews and ideas for how one could explore going to the Great Dao for shelter, especially when navigating life in the current Western culture. I also use this page as my online journal, for those interested in my own personal pathwalk as a seeker and lover of the Sacred / Great Dao.
The Three Treasured Virtues of Daoism
“…I have three treasures to maintain and preserve: The first is compassion. The second is frugality. The third is not presuming to be first under heaven…”
Tao Te Ching, Lao-Tzu: Excerpt from Chapter 67 (Addiss & Lombardo translation)
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Simpler, dangit. Simpler!
The more I absorb different writings and ideas about the Great Mother Dao, the more I want to cut through a lot of the excess that seems to exist in it. My current Priestess teacher said something powerful in our last one-on-one, about how at the end, it’s being a Goddess/Spirit worshipper… and the practices are generally the same things people have been doing for thousands of years to attend to that worship.
I also recently heard a quote about how rituals turn habits into something beautiful… and beauty is important to me. Rituals can change perception, sometimes for a lifetime. So I certainly see the value in them. Ceremony, without the labels. Without the hard requirements that just ego-fulfilling show and pretense. -
November Retreat 2024
This retreat has been a powerful one. At a Franciscan retreat center about two hours (of a very pretty) drive from my current home, I had managed to secure three nights in a single room. There were some wonderful synchronicities… like the fact that I arrived just as a major group was finishing their silent retreat weekend, and that the door to my room is next to the especially large painting of St. Francis and the wolf of Gubbio. (I pathwalked with an Order of Ecumenical Franciscans years ago, and the ‘Wolf of Gubbio’ was always the one Franciscan story that stuck with me. At the time I took my novice vows with that lovely group, I was even writing a blog called ‘A She-wolf of Gubbio’).
The wooded retreat center is gorgeous, with a main building that holds 20 or so rooms for guests, an indoor chapel that looks out into the woods, a small library, little bookstore, lounging and meditation areas, a dining hall, and some larger meeting rooms. Outside, they have a few cabins for smaller groups, a beautiful labyrinth, walking trails, and an outdoor chapel in the trees that is mostly glass. This is my third visit to this place, and it almost seems even more charming each time I come. I only realized yesterday that they have a columbarium that I have never seen.
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Upcoming New Harvest Moon 2024
The next New Moon will be a ‘Harvest Supermoon’, and what a time to be breaking down old things, and preparing to begin anew! We are in the midst of cleaning out and packing up ahead of our sale of our coastal home… for a move towards mountains in mid-October. At the same time, I continue addressing chronic health issues, and not the least – my goal of assessing and culling practices in my spiritual life.
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New Flower / Plum Moon 2024
This coming Tues/Weds brings us the New Flower (or, in Chinese – Plum) Moon, and begins the ‘Plum Flower Month’ according to the Chinese Lunar calendar. I am certainly excited for a chance to practice some Cha Dao for this occasion, but even more pleased to be turning towards renewal.
This is also the time of the Chinese calendar node of ‘Start of Summer’ or ‘Summer Begins’, which is certainly true where I am currently living on the coast. We were all breaking out the shorts this weekend! Dragonflies have reappeared, and so much is really in bloom!I believe that adherence to a seasonal calendar brings us that much closer to Nature/Dao. And a New Moon purification is a traditional time of renewal for me. Wishing everyone a wonderful Plum Flower Month!
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Upcoming Full Harvest Moon – Culling
“Just meditate on this fact. If the past is not there, who are you?“
– Osho. Tao: The Pathless Path (p. 146). Kindle Edition.At the age of 48, the Daoist (and future Master) Sun Bu’er met Wang Chongyang, the Daoist teacher she would eventually follow. She was exasperated and outraged by Master Chongyang in the beginning. However, by the age of 51, she was a Master in her own right, and left every part of her prior identity and life behind, striking out alone to continue furthering her Daoist cultivation. Sun Bu’er felt it necessary to destroy her own beauty and behave as if mad to safely do so. Eventually, she developed a lineage of her own, teaching other women to strive for oneness with the Dao.
I have no plans to leave my wonderful family behind in the future, but in many other ways, I take Sun Bu’er as a major role model. As I approach my 48th birthday, I am inviting a spirit of culling similar to hers into my life. I am so grateful for the presence of the teachers/Shifus in my current spiritual path, so I am not aspiring for that change; I feel as though I have already recently had a lifestyle upheaval on the scale of what Sun Bu’er experienced at 48.
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Red Pine Returns to Visit Chinese Hermits
Red Pine’s wonderful book, “Road to Heaven” has been, and continues to be, inspirational to me. Getting to see some of these locations and interviews on his return trip is fantastic!
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Inward Bound
I am thinking quite a bit about the Osho quote I noted in my last post. A number of other spiritual concepts have since surfaced (one that was rather starkly predicted in a card reading before the new moon). I am willing myself to be open, and to follow the Dao / Spirit wherever she leads me. At this juncture, I am inclined to turn inward in my spiritual life, and return to a more eremitic/monastic lifestyle.
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The Lotus Moon 2023
The incoming lunar phase of this period, according to Chinese Daoist tradition, (Deng Ming-Dao, The Lunar Tao), is the Lotus Moon. It is known primarily in the USA in its fullness as the Buck or Thunder Moon, and the latter certainly makes the most sense for my region: this is usually a time of some wild storms here on the Southeastern Coast!
For this 2023 Lotus Moon period, I hope to spend time evaluating my lifestyle and practices to see if they are really in alignment with the three Daoist treasures of Simplicity, Compassion and Humility. Am I ‘following nature’ and ’embracing virtue’? I fear that I have been responding to my health issues by engaging in massive distractions, escapism, and easy dopamine hits online. Many bad habits.
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Web Update: Feb. 25, 2023
Updates to the web page include:
Updated and added a link to the page: The Great Mother Dao
