Today is October 30 and the Navigate the Chaos question to consider is “How often do you just go along not bothering?”
People who navigate the chaos have learned not to be bothered by much.
To help explain this Benjamin Hoff wrote his bestselling book The Tao of Pooh at night on weekends while working as a tree pruner in the Portland Japanese Garden in Washington Park.
The book is intended as an introduction to the Eastern belief system of Taoism for Westerners. It allegorically employs the fictional characters of A. A. Milne's Winnie-the-Pooh stories to explain the basic principles of philosophical Taoism. Hoff later wrote The Te of Piglet, a companion book.
Hoff uses many of Milne's characters to symbolize ideas that differ from or accentuate Taoist tenets. Winnie-the-Pooh himself, for example, personifies the principles of wei wu wei, the Taoist concept of "effortless doing," and pu, the concept of being open to but unburdened by experience, and it is also a metaphor for natural human nature. In contrast, characters like Owl and Rabbit over-complicate problems, often over-thinking to the point of confusion, and Eeyore pessimistically complains and frets about existence, unable to just be.
Hoff regards Pooh's simpleminded nature, unsophisticated worldview and instinctive problem-solving methods as conveniently representative of the Taoist philosophical foundation.
The book also incorporates translated excerpts from various prominent Taoist texts, from authors such as Laozi and Zhuangzi.
As Winnie the Pooh said “Don't underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can't hear, and not bothering.”
How often are you like Winnie the Pooh? Can you just go along not bothering?