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theologians, by the politicians, murdered by the so-called saints, the so-called holy people. The word "God" is as beautiful as "Tao" if it can be taken out of these ugly hands in which it has fallen.
Tao never became part of any priesthood. No temple was made for Tao, no statue was carved. The followers, the lovers of Tao remained very alert -- no prayer, no worship, no ritual. That's how they have saved its purity, its innocence, its beauty. It is still virgin.
CHAO CHOU ASKED NAN CHUAN, "WHAT IS THE TAO?"
NAN CHUAN ANSWERED, "THE ORDINARY MIND IS TAO."
Don't try to be extraordinary in any way -- and everybody does that. We are brought up in such a way, we have been told again and again by parents, teachers, everybody that, "Be the first, be special, be outstanding!"
I loved my father for many reasons. One of the reasons was this: that he never told me or my other brothers and sisters to be competitive. Never I can remember him saying to us that, "You should come first, that you should make every effort to top the class." In fact, he was never certain in what class I am reading in the school. Whenever somebody will ask, "In what class your son is reading?" he will ask me, "In what class you are reading?" He never asked after the examinations and the results, whether you have passed or you have failed, as if that was not his concern at all.
He had many beautiful qualities, but this quality I loved in him most. He was not poisoning our minds by becoming competitive.
If my teachers will come to him and they will say, "Your son is not attending the schools, is mischievous, creates trouble, is never attentive, always goes on looking outside the window, is continuously punished but never learns anything... Out of seven days at least five days he is standing outside the class because he is being punished to stand outside -- he enjoys it there!
If we give him any punishment, we say to him, 'Go and run around the school building for seven times,' he goes around seventeen times. We look foolish, and if we say to him that, 'This is a punishment,' he says, 'For you it may be, but today I have not done any exercise so
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