11/06/2026
𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐏𝐫𝐢𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐍𝐨𝐭𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐖𝐚𝐲: 𝐂𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐑𝐞𝐟𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐓𝐚𝐨 𝐓𝐞 𝐂𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠
There is a book that has sat on my desk for years.
I return to it often — not because it gives me answers, but because it asks better questions.
It doesn't lecture or instruct.
It simply holds up a quiet mirror and waits for you to look.
That book is the 𝐓𝐚𝐨 𝐓𝐞 𝐂𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠.
Over the past several weeks, I've been drawing on its verses as a framework for exploring some of the deepest themes in human psychology — the anxious need to arrive somewhere, the courage it takes to remain still, the wisdom of unlearning, and the profound relief of stopping the endless project of fixing yourself.
If any of those ideas landed for you, they didn't originate with me.
They are 2,500 years old.
𝐖𝐡𝐨 𝐖𝐫𝐨𝐭𝐞 𝐈𝐭 — 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐖𝐡𝐲 𝐈𝐭 𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬
The Tao Te Ching is attributed to Lao Tzu, a figure whose biography is more legend than history.
He may have been a keeper of archives in ancient China.
He may have been several people.
He may never have existed at all.
What survives, regardless of who wrote it, is a text of 81 short verses — some no longer than a paragraph — that map the nature of existence with extraordinary precision and economy.
It is one of the most translated books in human history, second only to the Bible.
It is not a religious text, though many have treated it as one.
It is not a self-help book, though it will quietly rearrange the way you see yourself.
It is, at its core, an observation about how things work — the natural world, the human mind, the relationship between effort and outcome, stillness and movement, holding on and letting go.
𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐓𝐚𝐨 𝐇𝐚𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐒𝐚𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐌𝐨𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐧 𝐏𝐬𝐲𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲
What strikes me most, returning to these verses through the lens of my work as a counsellor, is how precisely they anticipate what modern psychology has spent decades trying to articulate.
The image of muddy water that clears when you stop stirring — that is Radical Acceptance.
The invitation to travel without being intent on arriving — that is the shift from outcome-focused anxiety to process-oriented living that sits at the heart of so much therapeutic work.
The heaviness that roots you when everything around you moves — that is grounding.
The uncarved block — that resembles the Core Self that Internal Family Systems therapy invites us to reconnect with.
Lao Tzu didn't have the vocabulary of CBT or DBT or IFS.
But he understood the terrain.
Again and again, the Tao returns to the same essential insight:
𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘮𝘰𝘴𝘵 𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘯 𝘴𝘶𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘦 𝘪𝘵𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘧, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘪𝘵.
Our need to control, to fix, to force, to arrive.
And that relief — real relief — comes not from effort, but from a quality of presence that effort often gets in the way of.
In my experience, both as a person navigating the inevitable difficulties of a human life and as a counsellor sitting with others in theirs, this is not a philosophical abstraction.
It is something you can feel in your body the moment you stop fighting what is.
𝐀𝐧 𝐈𝐧𝐯𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧
If these ideas have resonated with you over the past few weeks, I want to encourage you to go to the source.
The Tao Te Ching is a short book.
You can read it in an afternoon.
But you will find yourself returning to it for years.
My personal recommendation is the 𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐩𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐌𝐢𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐥𝐥 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧.
Mitchell doesn't just translate the words — he translates the feeling.
His version is spare, modern, and quietly alive in a way that makes the ancient feel immediate.
https://tinyurl.com/TTC-SMitchell
This book has shaped the way I think, the way I work, and the way I try to live.
I hope it offers you something of the same.
