How Meta: An Introduction
This is an inquiry inside an inquiry inside an inquiry. Imagine its form as a spiral, which mirrors the ideas explored. Each twist takes me / you / we deeper into / out of its Cosmic Mystery. Its position, once published, is static. My / your / our position to it changes with every breath, thought, beat of our heart. There is no single truth. There are revelations (when named as such.) Again. And again. And again.
How meta.
Tao Te Ching #1, Stanza 2
"Heaven and earth
"begin in the unnamed:
"name's the mother
"of ten thousand things."
Translated by Ursula K. Le Guin
"The nameless is the beginning of the ten thousand things;
"The named is the mother of the ten thousand things."
Translated by Robert G. Henricks
"As the origin of heaven-and-earth, it is nameless:
"As 'the Mother' of all things, it is nameable."
Translated by John C. H. Wu
"2a. Nameless, the origin of heaven and earth;
"Named, the mother of ten thousand things.
"2b. Non-being to name the origins of heaven and earth;
Being, to name the mother of ten thousand things."
Translated by Ellen M. Chen
"The nameless is the fetal beginnings of everything that is happening,
"While that which is named is their mother."
Translation by Roger T. Ames and David L. Hall
"The unnameable is the eternally real.
"Naming is the origin
"of all particular things."
Translation by Stephen Mitchell
Some Origins of (My) Understanding
I picked up my first copy of the Tao Te Ching when I was 21 in Yellow Springs, Ohio. It was 1997, and I was in a small bookstore on the main street through town. I was attending Antioch College, feeling lost and alone in rural Ohio.
I was searching for a guide, a way to help me find my being in this particular cosmos. I had been introduced to tarot and wicca by close friends, but I couldn't really connect with them. I was trying to leave behind the ritualistic pomp and pageantry of inherited Catholicism. I desired something simpler, more poetic than symbolic.
Stephen Mitchell's translation comes in a petite book that can fit in your back pocket. He is a poet, so I immediately connected with his words, phrasing, and composition. Before getting to the cashier, I was able to read the whole thing in the bookstore. It captivated me right there.
It became a text I turned to whenever I felt disoriented or disconnected. Eventually, reading it from cover to cover became an annual tradition. Each year, I would find a new phrase that struck me a bit differently or a more familiar one would reveal a deeper meaning. I loved the book so much its cover fell off one day from constantly being bent backwards, and I've had to tape it back on multiple times. Stephen Mitchell's text became etched in my being. I had thought it was the Tao.
The trouble with poetry and poetics is that often it can misrepresent that which it is trying to convey / capture / communicate. Or more precisely there can be ample room for misinterpretation or misguided understanding. This is especially true when what is translated is a text that was not originally in the language or even the etymological family of the language you are reading it in. And it is even more so true when the person reading it is doing so through self study and contemplation. Bias from both the writer and the reader tends to amplify itself.
There is one big strength in self contemplation, though. If you to truly want to contemplate, you must always question what you think, believe, and feel over and again. Contemplation is best aided by inquiry and curiosity. Mine asked me to find other translations of the Tao Te Ching and to dig deeper into the origins of other systems of belief (aka religions.)
The first one I bought was a translation by Ursula K. Le Guin. She, too, had a more poetic interpretation style, which I liked. What I found challenging is that she wasn't translating from Chinese. She was composing from English translations. This lead me to search for ones by Chinese-speaking authors.
What I discovered was there were multiple variations of the text that served as the basis for different translations. This further captivated me. Not only was there the distortion from translating Chinese into English, there was another layer of distortion based on which "original" text was used as the source material.
My collection of translations has grown to about ten. They include numerous philosophical and cultural translations by Chinese-speaking authors. None of them, as far I know, are queer (of gender or sexuality.) I read multiple books whenever I sit down to read the Tao Te Ching because it helps me unflatten (thanks Nick Sousanis for the concept) my understanding.
Still, the original text I read is like an old prayer book. It's formation of words deeply courses through my veins. Stephen Mitchell's translation is what I recall while strolling down the street or daydreaming on my couch. And there is one particular passage that I always repeat,
Naming is the origin of all things.
I come back to this particular edited variation over and again. It's ubiquitous in my own psyche, which makes it one of my core tenets and beliefs, guiding almost all of what I do / make / create. I have witnessed its power directly for my contemplation of its meaning has led me to decision-making that has me arriving in this particular moment in time-space, one where I feel the most aligned to my core being as I ever have.
Still, you must unlearn what you think you know about something to truly try and understand what is truth, especially in a cosmic sense. You must be willing to be wrong about what you believe so that you can change in ways that better express the being you desire / want to be / are. And who I want to be is someone that grows from that which I believe to be the Cosmic Mysteries.
A Search for Truth in Unlearning What Is Understood as True
This past Sunday, February 9, 2025, "Naming is the origin of all things," really asserted itself in my consciousness. I couldn't stop thinking about it and its relation to the ways in which other sacred texts begin. In Judeo-Christian-Islamic traditions / texts there is a lot of mention of "In the beginning there was the Word," or references to "the Word made flesh," or God naming all things. In much of philosophy, rhetoric, and politics, words are seen as that which constructs the man-made world. Word is law. In many creation myths or parables or fairy tales, it is words that are the gift of gods or deities, or it is words that enchant, curse, damn, or liberate or one's name must be kept hidden. All of these ideas were swirling in my consciousness that I had to go wander the streets around my house to let them flow and find new connections.
I brought no books with me during my wandering. It was just me, my thoughts, and dawn breaking over the cold, winter horizon. I kept repeating, "Naming is the origin of all things," over and again until it spilled out of my lips like the mantra it is. Headphones with microphone on, an otter recording, I let my stream-of-consciousness take over. In the repetition, a deeper meaning started to form.
I started breaking down each part of the saying, starting with "naming." Naming is more than mere expression. Naming implies an intentionality or a recognition of sorts. There is the thought. And, then, there is the naming of that thought. It is an awareness. In other words, naming is consciousness. It is that which makes humans human.
Next comes, "is the origin...." This implies something other than just these words. They point to creation, or, more precisely, a constant state of being in creation for an origin gives birth. This begs: What does creation birth? What, possibly, could naming bear?
The answer lies in, "of all things." (In my recollection of Stephen Mitchell's translation, I have edited "particular" out, which for this story is interesting information and somewhat inconsequential.) The object of a sentence must be a noun; it must be a thing. While "origin" is the object of the "naming" subject, the modifying "of" gives the reader clarity around what is being originated: All Things, or all objects. In the subject-verb-object grammatical composition of English, this sentence implies that Naming (or consciousness) is the origin (or gives birth to) of all things (or all Objects, aka others or The Other.)
In other words: Consciousness births The Other.
This revelatory insight is both so simple and so profound. I am certainly not the only one who has thought this before, and, in fact, it is by contemplating others' words that led me to my insight. Still, there is something deeply moving about internalizing a revelation rather than simply being told it.
If Consciousness Births The Other, Then...?
What I am learning from it all is that the creation of The Other is a Cosmic Mystery. It is something that "naturally" occurs due to the essence of consciousness. I cannot divorce myself from The Other's creation anymore than I can stop breathing, thinking, being. Put another way, only through non-existence / death does The Other cease to be. This is a wondrous conundrum / contradiction for it reveals who I desire to be.
If my very being contributes to othering, then I desire to be someone who loves, cares for, celebrates, and affirms The Other. There is so much in our (hu)man-made world that constantly shames, punishes, and oppresses The Other. It is the dominant way of being foisted upon us generation after generation by religions, nation-states, oligarchs, corporations, self-appointed rulers. When I fall in line with this status quo, I amplify a self-perpetuating self-hatred, and it causes misalignment, dissonance, and ultimately deep depression and raging anxiety.
An antidote to the status quo is found in the Cosmic Mystery. I can use its truth as an alchemical process that makes me more aware of my contributions to othering. If I know it is happening, I can dream / imagine the possible impacts of The Other's creation. I can then modify my words / actions in this here-now in ways that minimize, undermine, disrupt, or abolish (future) shame, punishment, and / or oppression. I can be / am a force that can / does shift the cosmos. I / You / We are power(ful.)
One skill / tactic / process that continues to guide my being is contemplation. This post is a revelation of its praxis. Its writing is an inquiry of an inquiry from this past Sunday, which is an inquiry begun in 1997. This post, too, is one to which I can come back and contemplate its ripples within and beyond my consciousness / cosmos.
How Meta: An Outro
I am sitting at my computer trying to figure out an ending to this meanderingly meaning-making post. I am fully aware that these thoughts course through my mind, so much so I am able to type them into this virtual space. I am naming what is happening, and, thus, I am birthing this post, which, especially once published, is something other than me. It is a thing representing All Things, another name for The Other.
How meta.