Return to the Root
In autumn the leaves turn and fall, and lie at the foot of the tree.
By spring they are gone into the soil, and the soil is feeding the tree.
Nothing went far. It all went home.
致虛極，守靜篤。
zhì xū jí, shǒu jìng dǔ.
Reach the furthest emptiness; keep a steady stillness.
萬物並作，吾以觀復。
wàn wù bìng zuò, wú yǐ guān fù.
The ten thousand things rise together, and I watch them return.
夫物芸芸，各復歸其根。
fū wù yún yún, gè fù guī qí gēn.
Things grow and flourish, and each goes back again to its root.
歸根曰靜，是謂復命。
guī gēn yuē jìng, shì wèi fù mìng.
Going back to the root is called stillness; this is called returning to what is given.
復命曰常，知常曰明。
fù mìng yuē cháng, zhī cháng yuē míng.
Returning to what is given is called the constant; knowing the constant is called light.
不知常，妄作凶。
bù zhī cháng, wàng zuò xiōng.
Not knowing the constant, you act blindly, and it goes badly.
知常容，容乃公，
zhī cháng róng, róng nǎi gōng,
Knowing the constant, you can hold everything; holding everything, you are fair;
公乃全，全乃天，
gōng nǎi quán, quán nǎi tiān,
fair, you are whole; whole, you are like heaven;
天乃道，道乃久，
tiān nǎi dào, dào nǎi jiǔ,
like heaven, you are with the Way; with the Way, you last;
沒身不殆。
mò shēn bù dài.
and to the end of your life you are in no danger.
The words
to return, to go back; again
Three times in four lines: 觀復, 復歸, 復命. A path (彳) and a foot coming back along it. This is the movement of chapter 40, now seen up close, in every leaf and every living thing.
what is given; a command; life, fate
A mouth (口) giving an order to someone kneeling: what is commanded, what you have been given. It came to mean your life itself, and your fate. 復命, "returning to what is given", is going back to what you were before anything was added.
bright; clear seeing; light
The sun (日) and the moon (月) side by side. Not cleverness: the light by which you see. In this book, 明 is the clarity that comes from knowing the constant, from seeing the return.
Sitting with it
The chapter opens with two instructions, the only ones like them in the book. Reach the furthest emptiness. Keep a steady stillness. For many readers over the centuries, these two lines have been a meditation in themselves.
Then: from that still place, watch. Everything rises. Plants push up, people hurry, plans and worries come and go, the whole world busy at once. And if you are still enough, you begin to see that all of it is going home. Each thing, after its flourishing, returns to its root.
Think of a wave. It rises, it is very much a wave, it curls and breaks and makes a great noise. Then it slides back and is the sea again. It was never anything but the sea. The chapter calls this going back stillness, and returning to what is given.
Knowing this, it says, is light. Not knowing it, you act blindly. And you can see what that looks like: someone who thinks the rising never ends. Who treats a good year as if it were forever, or a bad one as if it were. Who can't let a season end.
Then a staircase of seven steps. If you know the constant, you can hold everything, the way the sea holds every wave. If you can hold everything, you don't take sides against any of it: you are fair. Fair, you are whole. Whole, you are like heaven, wide over everything. Like heaven, you are with the Way. And with the Way, you last. Even when the body goes, the chapter says, there is nothing left to fear. It has gone back to the root.
A practice
Sit for five minutes today, somewhere you won't be disturbed.
Let things rise: sounds, thoughts, feelings. Don't follow them and don't push them away. Just watch each one, and see that each one, by itself, goes.
That is all the chapter asks. Watch them return.
To carry
各復歸其根
gè fù guī qí gēn
Each goes back again to its root.