LIFE moves according to the flow of its natural gravity. People come and go, events take place, thoughts and ideas intersect and intertwine forming new concepts and modifying previous understanding. Feelings of joy, depression, anger or happiness at one’s achievements, rewards, parents, siblings, wife, husband, son and cat are integral parts of his journey. Without them, the process will never be what it is.
The book tells a personal story into the profundity of nothingness and the art of doing nothing. It is about a journey in life that finally comes to the realisation that in the end, spirituality is the essence of our soul and that the most important thing in life is to remain in the presence of God. It is about movement in stillness, going by staying, knowing through unlearning.
The author Sorajjakool makes it clear in the beginning itself that this book is not intended as an exegesis of Chuang Tzu, who, according to the Records of the Historian was called Chou and served as “an official in the lacquer garden” at Meng and once declines an invitation to serve as a prime minister. The book reads like a travelogue comprising conversation between personal narratives of the author and the text, presenting a new perspective on life and new insights into the meaning and understanding of spirituality. The author reflects on Chuang Tzu’s explanation of nothingness and tie critiques of our tendency towards discrimination and categorisation in order to explain who we are or the meaning of “being”.
The world tells us to seek, accumulate, acquire and obtain in our path towards the ultimate, but Chuang Tzu believes that when you think you know the way, you should not follow it. They discuss the art of doing nothing, the nothing of love and some more practical and ethical implications of nothing. The unknown path of Chuang Tzu is paradoxical.
(Templeton Foundation Press, c/o Macmillan Publishers India Ltd, 2/10, Ansari Road, Daryaganj, New Delhi-110 002.)
