Currently important to me. When is it ok to lie acording to your understanding of Daoist scriptures?

[Starjumper]

2 hours ago, Limahong said:

Hi Steve,

 

Ego protection is also mountainous.

 

First there are mountains then no mountains and then mountains ? There is ego then no ego and then ego.

 

Do you remember what the Taoist Immortal told me about a persons ego?

 

2 hours ago, Limahong said:

 

 

Do you know what they say about people who wear cowboy (or cowgirl) hats indoors?

 

Also, I noticed that the two magically changed sides during their performance

 

https://youtu.be/YHVN21gYm30

Edited July 28, 2018 by Starjumper

[Limahong]

58 minutes ago, dawei said:

If this makes no sense...

 

Of course it makes sense.

 

 

 

 

[Limahong]

36 minutes ago, Starjumper said:

Robin Hood

 

Hi Steve,

 

Robin robbed the rich with falsehoods?

 

Do you remember what the Taoist Immortal told me about a persons ego? No.

 

Do you know what they say about people who wear cowboy (or cowgirl) hats indoors? No - please share.

 

I noticed that the two magically changed sides during their performance - yin <=> yang?

 

 

 

A good weekend.

 

- Anand

 

[Limahong]

2 hours ago, dawei said:

wow almost two years later and no closer to the truth

 

The truth spoken is not the eternalness [of the truth].

[Integrated]

This thread brings to mind the passage about doing too much of anything leaves one damaged.

 

Too much color leaves one blind.

Too much sound leaves one deaf.

Too much lying leaves ones inner compass disoriented.

 

There is a price to pay for lying, just as there is a price to pay for eating candy.

Hence if you feel the need to lie from time to time, then lie.

Then watch as you gain moral weight, and accept that your own moral fitness is your own responsibility,

and that you are the ultimate judge on how healthy you want your own morality to be.

As you pointed out there are times when lying is basically good,

because it is not the logical falsehood in the statement that is at stake,

but your own moral compass that might forever be twisted in the wrong direction.

 

Edited September 9, 2018 by Integrated
Typo

[Kara_mia]

On 09/09/2018 at 7:24 PM, Integrated said:

This thread brings to mind the passage about doing too much of anything leaves one damaged.

 

Too much color leaves one blind.

Too much sound leaves one deaf.

Too much lying leaves ones inner compass disoriented.

 

There is a price to pay for lying, just as there is a price to pay for eating candy.

Hence if you feel the need to lie from time to time, then lie.

Then watch as you gain moral weight, and accept that your own moral fitness is your own responsibility,

and that you are the ultimate judge on how healthy you want your own morality to be.

As you pointed out there are times when lying is basically good,

because it is not the logical falsehood in the statement that is at stake,

but your own moral compass that might forever be twisted in the wrong direction.

 

 

I agree. Lying or not lying is not a simple choice of morality. If practice is genuine, then it should change a person inside, and he or she would not consider anything from the mind, but will think and decide by heart. The more pure heart is, the less person could lie, up to the point when a lie would become uncomfortable physically. 

 

Best regards,

Kara

[inthe5am]

Truth is paramount

[thelerner]

achh, the truth is just more words.

show me your plate

show me your action.

[Marblehead]

17 hours ago, inthe5am said:

Truth is paramount

But we cannot verify our own truths.  Only others can determine their truth for themselves.

 

Yes, as always, show and tell time.  First are the thoughts, next, the words, then the actions.  Truth in all three will not prevent conflict with others but it will prevent inner conflict.

 

(And, of course, there is always the possibility that we are wrong and presenting a false truth.)

 

 

 

 

[sagebrush]

aren't thoughts the same as words?

?

[Marblehead]

Just now, sagebrush said:

aren't thoughts the same as words?

?

Not in my opinion.  Thoughts are internal, words are external.

 

[sagebrush]

soon to turn biblical....

every word spoken......oh you know

becomes a living thing?

best keep to my thoughts inside...

I will say my audio somehow strangely stopped working on my computer.

I am tired of posting video

 

off to work painting over French country yellow wash to soft white paint with light grey glaze.

 

hope everyones day is productive or peaceful and productive.

 

I had begun to sing I love the nightlife. but that is not true. but dancing yes. rhythm 

 

sanding all day cabinets all day

 

what if someone can read your thoughts?

isn't that external then?

[Marblehead]

1 hour ago, sagebrush said:

what if someone can read your thoughts?

isn't that external then?

I don't know about them becoming external but they would present a problem for most of us.

 

Like when you wife keeps pumping on something that has already been agreed to but she just keeps on and on.  You think, "Shut up, Woman!'  She reads your thoughts.  No good times for a couple months.

 

[Stosh]

Scrunched eyebrows , rolling eyes , clenched teeth ,,, these are equivalent to words , not thoughts, they are generalized external indicators of subtler thoughts that prompt them. They are seen and interpreted. They aren't thoughts being read. 

 

If I said , the great artists presented abstract messages in the paint, would you know what that meant , having read them ? 

[Marblehead]

24 minutes ago, Stosh said:

If I said , the great artists presented abstract messages in the paint, would you know what that meant , having read them ? 

No, I would not know what that meant.  I would likely ask for more information.

 

But I agree with you regarding body language.  Same as words in my opinion.

 

[Stosh]

19 minutes ago, Marblehead said:

No, I would not know what that meant.  I would likely ask for more information.

 

But I agree with you regarding body language.  Same as words in my opinion.

 

I saw a thing where a guy was talking about the paintings of Homer , I didn't feel entirely on board with his reading of messages within each work , but it didn't matter I still enjoy the paintings themselves , and as you know one of these weekends I am going to take up Oil painting and produce some museum quality stuff. Sagebrush's post has me thinking in that vein.

(And I would ask him why the fox is turned away from the viewer in Fox hunt,,, if It went that far.) 

[Marblehead]

Well, when a fox is on the run all you see is its back-side.  That probably didn't help.

 

I like landscape paintings.  I have a few in the house.

 

[Marblehead]

BTW  My paintings are Western painters, not Oriental.  I really do admire Chinese landscape paintings though,  I suppose I should let loose some of my money and buy a couple.  Another thing on my bucket list.

 

 

[Stosh]

42 minutes ago, Marblehead said:

BTW  My paintings are Western painters, not Oriental.  I really do admire Chinese landscape paintings though,  I suppose I should let loose some of my money and buy a couple.  Another thing on my bucket list.

 

 

While I like the gardens , I am not big on  eastern paintings , they look more like illustrations to me.

I like old school American painters. 

[sagebrush]

ok I like painting of the big wave with mount Fuji=

the artist did a series with Fuji in all of them. I watched it on documentary called civilization...art history basically

 

well some Asians are on a boat near what looks a tidal wave...maybe the name was katsushika.

I had to look it up.

this conversation seems familiar

 

 

there was a great movie with foxes in it-like a cartoon but not childrens plot

the main character fox was George Clooney very creative and entertaining- foxes outwitting a farmer.

 

watercolors I seem to gravitate about landscape. I like that andy Goldsworthy because he works so hard then nature inadvertently demolishes it-albeit a wind or the tides....

 

found it interesting about some oriental work on scrolls are lapses over time representations.

not just still painting.

 

 

 

 

[Jim D.]

According to my core values, lying is acceptable when there is a higher good that comes out of lying. As was stated earlier, to save another person's life. 

 

Jim D.

[kondensation]

Being honest yields different riches than being cunning.

[Michael Sternbach]

8 minutes ago, kondensation said:

Being honest yields different riches than being cunning.

 

Being honest and being cunning are not necessarily opposites.

[moment]

On 3/14/2016 at 2:12 PM, dawei said:

I tend to look at the two related issues of 'truth' and 'trust'.  If you could only really depend on one, which would it be?

 

I'm one who favors trust over truth because at the end of the day, I can trust there is a reason for non-truth.   How far that trust will extend to the actual person may vary. Meaning, if I have an acceptance that everyone will at some time in their life not want to share something or reveal something or be put in a position to answer something.  I trust that their decision to want to hide or lie is likely their business and reason, even if it was something about me.  But if I feel that sort of action was to such an extent (over time and frequency) that I no longer really felt I could trust them, then I've got my answer too.  I don't accept them less, I just don't need to spend my time around them. 

 

Would they have such trust in you like that?

 

The bigger problem is that you will likely hate yourself more than they will hate you..so it may come down to your inability to handle your decision on the matter.   And that could eat away at you.   This might just mean that your the type which heavily favors truth over trust... not sure, it is just a small working theory I am happy to know which side I like to stand on.

 

And there is nothing to really maintain unless you're the one having the discomfort with it, otherwise you would trust in the decision.

Damn! Sometimes you really do it. Good job.  Thank you.

Edited February 13, 2019 by moment

[moment]

• The Wondering Taoist
•  
• 
• Steward+
•  
• 47,314 posts

• Report post
•  
• Marblehead

Posted June 26, 2017

  On 6/26/2017 at 6:20 AM, Michael Sternbach said:

 

Some say that this is the only kind of lie we should never commit.

Good thing I didn't place any value judgement on what I said.---- Marblehead

 

Edited February 13, 2019 by moment