Reviews

I read this book as an introduction to the ideas of Taoism, a philosophy or belief system centered around following the Tao or the Way. The Tao can be defined as the natural order and flow of the universe (this is a very basic definition). The book discusses Taoism and relies heavily on its source material the Tao Te Ching and the Chuang-tzu, both ancient Chinese texts that are used to create the basis for Taoism. The overall concept is to live your life in harmony with the rest of your surroundings and with the understanding that you and everything around are so intimately interconnected that in reality only one entire whole exists, not a multitude of many separate things interacting together. Taoist concepts such as "wu-wei" and "te" are also introduced, along with context for and discourse about these principles provided to help the reader better understand these somewhat ineffable concepts. Overall I found Taoism to be incredibly engaging and similar to my own personal beliefs. The book has made incredibly interested in Taoism and I plan on reading the Tao Te Ching.