Careful Reading Tao Te Ching

By Bai Yansong

Careful Reading Tao Te Ching

By Bai Yansong

W hen I was reading the 17th chapter of Lao Tse’s Tao Te Ching,I was inspired. The lines go as:“The best leaders are in harmony with their followers.The next best are those who are respected. Then come those who are feared.The worst are those who are despised.”

These lines divide leaders into four classes and comment on them.Lao Tse says the best leader is a kind of existence.He leads his team in a natural way.He does not have to hold meetings day by day,and everybody plays their strengths and works hard and actively.Everything goes smoothly and effectively.The best leader is that his followers cannot feel his existence.How can anybody disagree? This is really the highest art of leading.Leaders of the 2nd class are those respected by his team members.3rd class leaders are those who their workers are afraid of.And the worst onesare those criti cized by his followers every day.

This kind of classification leaves much for us to think about.To the end of the Cultural Revolution teaching orders had been returned to normal even in a remote area like Hulunbuir of In nerMongoliaAutonomousRegion. My mother was a teacher in a school there.She once said:“Factually our teaching order is quite fine.Everybody works by the bellman’s ring even if the head master is away.”Then she was criticized of disobeying principles of the Communist Party and weakening organizational discipline.

Years later when my mother’s classmates got together,they always repeated these sentences for fun.These honest words described an ideal state of school orders.It meant that the school master was good at managing. He did not have to teach his staff how and what to do and everybody worked hard on his own post.Every thing ran smoothly.

I have my own point of view which I named the Bai’s Theory.When a company,aschool,agovernment, whatever stresses on work attendance, it is most probably on the way down. If a company is upward,its workers do their best.They may attend two hours late for work,but they may work up to 3 o’clock next morning.They need no supervision.

During the initial stage of CCTV’s column Oriental Horizon we never punched for work,nobody urged us to work.We worked self-consciously and effectively.We devoted so much so that we lived in the office day by day. When the director mentioned discipline time and again,the influence of the column began weakening.

The classification does not just comment on leaders and officials,it also reveals a kind of order and realm of life.

The 36th chapter of Tao Te Ching says:“When he is going to despoil another,he will first have made gifts to him.”It means one must give you something when he wants to take something from you.

This Book recorded deep explorations into materials and human nature.In a narrow sense it says that gentlemen love wealth and take it in proper way.The more of this you have,the more of others you lose.In a broad sense a country’s position in the world and its rises and falls of the past dynasties obeys its specific rules.Empire in which the sun never sets will see its sunset one day.

Every single life,me included,ex periences its ups and downs cyclically. When I am frustrated,I sleep very sweet,because I do not know what else I can lose.But when I am very satisfactory,I feel nervous.I am afraid that I will go downhill.

In the year 2000 I was very popular. I was chosen national top 10 youth.I broadcast the Sydney Olympic Game lively,and was granted an audience withstateleadersafterreturning. Coaches of world champions shook hands with me positively.God knows how happy I was!

Writer Liu Heng warned me:“Bai, you are now in the full flush of success,but the sun may set.”I answered him:“Do not worry,brother.The sun will rise again on a new horizon.”Thereafter about one year’s time I switched off my mobile phone and thought over a new program.This year was very important for me.It restarted the engine of my work.

The day ahead of my birthday in 2003 I resigned from producers for three movies.My resignation brought my colleagues a lot of opportunities. Three vice-producers were promoted toproducers.Adozenofeditors-in-chiefbecamevice-producers. And many new editors-in-chief were named.

Tao Te Ching expresses a philosophy which is very valuable to us. When a cup is filled with water,what you should do is to splash some of them.Only by doing this will you be able to fill the cup with water again. That was the right reason I chose to resign from producers.

Someone asked,why don’t you refuse all(money,reputation,etc) when you are given?This is not correct.You should receive that belongs to you,no more,no less.You should feel contented.Tao Te Ching says:“He who is satisfied with his lot is rich,and he who dies and yet does not perish,has longevity.”

Nowadays,a number of officials were arrested and put into jell for corruption.They might have not read Tao Te Ching before.If you give one to each of them,they may regret to die that they did not know the real meaning of satisfaction.Yet how can they read Tao Te Ching carefully and follow the philosophy when they are on a high-power career track?Who knows.

(Fr omBai’s Speechespublished by Changjiang Literature and Art Publishing House and produced by Changjiang New Era.Illustration:Niu Li)