Friend Vichar, to talk of a stone being closer to the Tao is missing the point, for from the Tao itself we can paraphrase...when something is judged as being closer, the concept of further comes into existence!
Whenever a concept is created to represent a perception, simultaneously its complementary opposite comes into being. That is why so long as there is a 'you' seeking the Tao or not seeking the Tao, coming closer to the Tao or going further from the Tao, meditating on the Tao or not meditating on the Tao, the Tao remains obscured, for its the 'you' that obscures the transcendent that is eternally omnipresent.
From the first verse of the Tao Teh Ching, Lao Tzu obseves..."The Tao that is spoken of, is not the eternal Tao",...this reveals the irony that all the words of all the verses that follows are not to be taken as a real, just a selection of salient conceptual representations concerning the real.
Oh and btw, since it seems you are convinced of the extra special closeness of a atone to the Tao, you may or may not resonate with these Sufi pieces...
I have been observing your interaction with
I died as a stone and became a plant;
I died as a plant and rose to animal;
I died as an animal and I was a man.
Why should I fear?
When was I less by dying?
Yet once more I shall die as man to soar...
With angels blest.
But even from an angel I must pass on:
All except God must perish.
When I have sacrificed my angel soul,
I shall become what no mind ever conceived. -Jalaluddin Rumi
and...
God sleeps in the stone,
Dreams in the plant,
Stirs in the animal,
And Awakens in Man.- Al Arabi
Friend ben d, you seem interested in correcting my perception on the Tao. I see what you are trying to point out when you talk about the I that wants things, as well as the relative nature of distance.
But why do we care about the words I am using? You should try to vibe me out and see if I'm really saying those things. I do not think of spirituality as necessarily "closer" and "farther" to spirit (or the Tao) in the same way I might be closer or farther away from my keyboard. I mean it precisely the way I believe you mean it: "farther" from the Tao is more mental, trying with thought and physical action. "Closer" to the Tao is closer to being, of moving in consciousness without movement in thought. If that's not what you mean, that's certainly what I meant.
And yes, hopefully without offending anyone here, I believe we were once a stone before we were human beings. And we were conscious then. If you wish to redefine "conscious" as a certain threshold, as is implied by Al Arabi, then by all means I can go along with that definition as well. But I mean it as somewhat interchangable with "of spirit", which is everything. Tao being everything and nothing. Everything because everything is of the spirit. Nothing because it is nowhere manifest in the illusion of the physical and mental world. Actually, it's not in anything manifested.
But just because it's not manifested doesn't mean it doesn't exist. And just because I put forth effort to get closer to the Tao, doesn't mean that effort is mental or of the ego. Doing without doing is what I'm talking about. Consciousness is individual, just not in the way people are used to
thinking about it. In becoming conscious, or more awakened, we are more aware and closer to the real, and the
lower identity begins to fade. But attaining enlightenment doesn't mean you become part of a homogenized, spiritual soup without differentiation. You retain your individual awareness--it's just not anything like human awareness (it encompasses it, sure).
When Lao Tzu obseves..."The Tao that is spoken of, is not the eternal Tao". He's not telling us that what follows isn't real. He's not going to waste time like that. He's just pointing out that the spiritual experience is not the mental experience. It is on an entirely different plane of existence. But it's not unreachable or unobtainable. To be honest, it's a
more natural state than what we're used to in our individual small "I".
I have been observing your interactions with crossfire and Alceste. I am not posting in the interests of scholarship or academic debate. I do not mind if others attempt to correct me--I welcome any hints along the way on my journey. But I want to strongly stress for others here as well that the Tao Te Ching (in my opinion) is
practical advice. It's a guide to living,
being, and it can be followed
. "I" am not "seeking" the Tao. I wish to simply be, and in doing so I naturally draw "closer" to it. Closer in the sense that the dross separating "me" from "it" is being shed -- since there is not really a me or it, that must mean that I am referring to my own distorted perception being shed, right?