What Chinese Philosophy Can Teach Us About Overcoming Struggles
The Coronavirus has no doubt brought a lot of pain and uncertainty to millions of people around the world.
Each day, we’re presented with grim facts about our current reality: Stories about hospitals running out of beds, people struggling to meet rent deadlines, and governments trying their best to fix a problem that only seems to be getting worse every day. For a lot of us, we are inundated by so much negative news that our default attitude becomes one of doom and gloom.
If there is any silver lining in this tumultuous time, it is that we have been here before.
Sure, the world has never faced a global pandemic quite like this, but history has shown that humans have doggedly struggled with existential crises from the very beginning. Crises, according to the Chinese Daoist philosopher Zhuangzi, is part of a natural phenomenon that come and go. In the same manner that winter gives way to spring, crises will soon give way to a golden age of peace and growth. Zhuangzi would refer to this idea as yin and yang, or darkness and light, weakness and strength.
Zhuangzi argued that the constant interplay of yin and yang elements is what creates the process of The Way, or the natural, unfettered rhythm of the universe. We see elements of Yin and Yang everywhere. A blade of grass can grow to be tall and richly green only to decompose into the soil and turn into a meal for worms and bugs. The process continues as the bugs in the ground become food for the birds, and so on.
For Zhuangzi, change was the only constant (Yin and Yang). And the moment we start embracing this powerful idea, the sooner we can ultimately change ourselves and become aligned with The Way.
The only problem is, unlike the blade of grass or the worms and the birds, humans are the only species that don’t spontaneously follow The Way. In fact, we tend to abhor change and flux. That’s due to the fact that we possess a powerful asset that no other species have yet to fully utilize: our minds. We stick with our opinions because we think we’re right and the other person is wrong; we tend to stay in dead-end jobs because we fear change.
In our current crisis, we become hyper risk-proof to any and all activities until we turn into embittered Cassandras who cry doom. There is no doubt that a lot of pain and suffering have resulted from this unfortunate crisis, but Zhuangzi would have suggested that we see this crisis as a result of the unpredictable nature of the world.
So if a crisis is just a part of a natural order, should we stay stoic and just accept our fate?
Zhuangzi would say no.
For Zhuangzi, The Way wasn’t about becoming apathetic to what’s around you. Rather, The Way was about embracing the flux and transformation that’s present in everything and everywhere. Only then can we unleash the creative energy that lies dormant in each and everyone of us.
Zhuangzi believed that once people aligned themselves with The Way, they open themselves up and become interested in the boundless curiosity of the world, all the change and flux that’s happening in front of them. In other words, they experience an explosion of untapped creative energy.
When the Nazi Party was searching every house in The Netherlands for Jews who were hiding out, Anne Frank channeled her energy into writing in her diary about her day-to-day life, giving a detailed account of a life spent in hiding in an otherwise extraordinarily stressful time.
Anne Frank could have worried about her safety and driven herself mad with anxious thoughts; instead, she conjured the energy to remain curious about the world and write about her experience. Anne Frank’s diary serves as an example of our extraordinary ability to transcend ourselves in times of peril.
Today, we face an epidemic unlike any the world has ever seen. We are nearly 8 months into the pandemic and governments around the world are still scrambling to develop a vaccine. In the meantime, unemployment rate is at an all time high and anxiety and fear are unhinging our worst impulses. In times like these, it’s important to remember that we have been here before, one way or another. We must cultivate the ability to accept the constant change of our world. Only then can we conjure up our creative energy and channel it towards projects that we deeply care about. History has shown that we all have the extraordinary ability to do this.
