Dizzy, into the dreamland, it seems that their own feather Xian Deng, hazy, saw Zhuangzi, I realized that this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, just to discuss the natural way with him.

So I interviewed Zhuang Zhou as a reporter.

I: Zhuang Zhou, you are the greatest philosopher in my heart, the greatest sage.

Zhuang Zhou: Bing, you flatter me, I prefer not to be a saint, not to be a philosopher, in fact, you know me, I am a nature, life, the Great Way of the transcendent, people think I died thousands of years ago, in fact, my life has not disappeared, so the reason why you now feel my existence, because it has been integrated into all things, into the Great Way.

Me: Yes, from the beginning of the birth of mankind, I'm afraid you are the first person in the world who has been transformed into the Great Dao, the first one to get away with it.

Zhuang Zhou: Haha, very good, I'm very happy, accept your interview, let's sit down and talk about the Tao, I think you are carefully and seriously read the works I wrote, then, I will talk to you again today about the Tao.

I: then, we talk frankly today, do not have to be so formal and formal, just as the usual chat.

Zhuang Zhou: Haha, very good, this is in line with my personality, let nature take its course, daquan free.

Me: I want to introduce you to more people to know, or please introduce yourself?

Zhuang Zhou: Well, I will briefly introduce my life, and the social environment at that time, why I have such thoughts, and how I understand life, nature, the Great Dao.

People call me Zhuangzi, in fact, my last name is Zhuang name Zhou, is the period of the Warring States period Song Mengdi people, that place is now Henan Shangqiu. I was about the same time as Mencius, that is, at the same time as King Hui of Liang and King Xuan of Qi.

Because my family has always been very low status, there has not been any celebrity, so there is no record in the history books, I myself have been a lacquer garden official, that is, the management of lacquer tree garden small official, is a very low level of management.

This errand didn't last long, because of Song's weak and difficult to survive, then I didn't hold any official position, I've been living in poverty, living in the streets and alleys, rely on haystacks to maintain their livelihoods, sometimes I'm starving and thin, wearing clothes with patches, shoes are worn out holes, with a rope to tie the shoes to the feet, because of the family's poverty, I borrowed from others, that's the state of my life at that time. I was in the middle of my life, and I had to borrow food from other people.

I: I remember you once said, you have many opportunities to become a big official, you can get rid of this poor situation, why don't you go?

Zhuang Zhou: In fact, you know my personality, I like freedom, do not like the official kind of fighting environment. I despise the powerful and the rich, I hate the officialdom, and I don't want to be an official.

The king of Chu once sent someone with a very thick gift to ask me to be an official, but I was not willing to do, I said to the person who came to ask me, have you heard that, in the south of Chu, there is a big tortoise, which crawls around inside the mud, and then it was enshrined in the temple, so that it is dead.

It was put in a big box, and the box was lined with silk and enshrined, so would it be better for me to be enshrined on top of the temple, or to crawl around inside the mud?

I said, "I would rather crawl around in the mud. I would rather lose my life than be enshrined in a temple. So, I am not willing to be an official precisely because the officialdom is treacherous yet.

I have great contempt for doing whatever it takes to make a living for the sake of fame and fortune.

There was a man named Cao Shang in the state of Song, who went on a mission to the state of Qin, and the king of Qin rewarded him with a hundred cars, which he flaunted in front of me.

I was very contemptuous and said, "I heard that the king of Qin was sick and was looking for someone to cure him, and anyone who cured him of carbuncles and acne was given a car, and anyone who cured him of hemorrhoids was given five cars, and the lower and dirtier the disease, the more he rewarded, so you probably cured him of hemorrhoids. The more you do it, the more you will be rewarded.

Ha ha, said this Cao Shang face red and red, fled.

I think that those who are officials, those who get the fame and fortune, they are all using these dirty tricks to get it.

Of course, although I don't want to be an official, I have never been far from reality. I was not willing to be lonely, I recruited disciples, I wrote books, I criticized the times, I gained insight into life, and I followed the natural way, so that people regarded me as a representative of the middle period of Taoism.

I: so is this ah, said quite reasonable, then, please talk about the source of your ideas?

Zhuang Zhou: Well, first of all, let's introduce the era in which I live.

I am a representative of the Taoist school of thought in the early Warring States period, and I mainly inherited the doctrine of the Tao from Laozi, but I developed it greatly on the basis of Laozi, and I extended the theory of the Tao to the aspect of life, because I was not interested in governing the country, and I was very averse to being an official.

But I cherish life and pursue freedom, so I mainly think about how people can settle down in reality and live a better life?

Why do I think this way?

Because I saw the people, the events of the time, and the difficulties people faced in reality, such as the brutal rulers who made people suffer and die in large numbers. At that time, there were so many deaths that they were stacked one on top of the other, and those who died after them used those who died first as pillows, and those with torture instruments pushed each other from one to another, and those who were tortured and slaughtered were pushed one on top of the other.

It was this irrational reality of the time that caused a large number of deaths of people, which made me realize the dangers of living in reality under authority, and in addition, as I advanced in my life, I liberalized my vision even further.

I realized that everyone's life as an individual is very short, and that no matter how long a person lives, he or she will live to be more than a hundred years old at most, which is too short when compared to the universe and the heavens and the earth. In this short life, people will be harmed by society and all kinds of things, in this case, how to face all kinds of survival dilemmas, in reality, to obtain spiritual relief, I have been thinking about this problem.

I: Oh, that's right, no wonder I think there are a lot of realistic factors in your thinking, in the end, how do you think about it, or you focus on which aspects of the thinking?

Zhuang Zhou: from the big picture, I think about four aspects of the problem.

1. Advocating the natural life of the rate of love and willfulness.

2. To practise the doctrine of the whole nature of the noble life.

3. Adopting a life attitude of peace and harmony.

4. Pursuing the spiritual realm of transcendence and freedom.

I: these four points look, are profound ah, can you specifically give me all the meaning of what is the first question, advocate the rate of natural life is what is the meaning of capricious?

Zhuang Zhou: Well.

The first question is what does it mean to advocate for a natural life?

We Taoist advocate nature, the so-called nature, is to refer to the natural, free from the self, without external interference in the state.

It is the opposite of man-made. I once said, what is man and what is heaven?

The sky is natural, the cow and horse have four legs, this is the sky, to the cow's nose up to wear a rope, to the horse with a cage, this is man-made, it is a man added to the cow and the horse's bondage. This man-made thing is against nature.

Then, taking this view of mine into the context of social life, I believe that the most ideal state of human life is one that is in accordance with nature.

For example, use the analogy of a horse.

Horses live in the wild, hungry to eat grass, thirsty to drink water, happy to squeeze each other together, gnawing on each other's necks, to each other to relieve the itch, angry, on the over to put pouting, kicking each other, which is their ideal state of being, once they were caught up, training, training them to pull the car with a cage, camel, but also to give them the body of the branding, so that the horse is subject to great restraints. The horse is greatly bound, therefore, the horse will be a large number of deaths and injuries, it is against its natural state.

In fact, the same is true of man.

People have common sense, natural nature, their own labor, and then get the source of food and clothing, people should also, between everyone, not divided into high and low, near and far, close and distant, the relationship is naturally harmonious, which is called the sky release.

The ancient supreme virtues, the most ideal era, is this, people are muddled, pure and simple nature, that time, there is no road on the mountain, there is no boat and bridge in the water, everything grows in abundance, beasts and fowl in flocks, grass and trees, people live among the beasts and fowl, beasts and fowl can be with the people in peace **** at the same time, in such a situation, the people and all things live in harmony, equal exchange, between human beings is more completely equal, without distinction between the little man and the gentleman.

There is no social hierarchy, there is no high and low, of course, there will be no ruler and ministers, the state, and there is no resulting moral concepts, which is the ideal society in my mind.

On this point, I strongly disagree with Confucianism. I think nature is human nature, and a state of life that conforms to nature is the most ideal state of life for human beings.

So I use nature to fight against society's binding and killing of people, and I nearly violently attacked the Confucian advocated benevolence, righteousness, propriety and music, I think that benevolence, righteousness, propriety and music, such things, are imposed on people by society, he is just like the extra fingers that grow out of the hands of the people, or a tumor that grows out of the people's body, it is completely redundant.

So, in terms of society, I hope that society will return to the so-called "world of virtue", where there is no such thing as a ruler and ministers, and as an individual, I advocate transcending the norms of society, and living a life of spontaneity, doing whatever I want to do, and ignoring all the rules, laws, morals, and customs of the world, and living in accordance with my own nature.

I: I'm convinced, you this thought is really profound, let me benefit a lot, then, what is practicing the whole nature of the real Guishengism?

Zhuang Zhou: Haha, this question is really about how to understand people, and how people deal with society.

This is how I understand people and society. Sex and truth both refer to the natural state of man, that is, human life itself. The so-called noble body is to value the life of an individual, to cherish life to avoid being harmed, so what is the thing that makes the life of a human being to be harmed?

It is society.

Since the Xia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties, the world has used things to change human nature, and people have pursued external things to cause the loss of nature, and the so-called external things are the fame, fortune, wealth, and so on in the society.

The people above had different careers and different reputations, but all of them lost their lives for the sake of something, the little man for the sake of profit, the scholar for the sake of fame, the great man for the sake of his own fiefdom, and the saint for the sake of the whole world.

Like Yao, Shun and Yu, people like that, Confucianism holds them in very high esteem, thinking that they worked for the benefit of the world, sacrificed themselves, and toiled themselves, and I don't think it's worth it for people like that. They did good to others but harmed their own lives, so I think these people are essentially the same as those who seek fame and fortune and hurt themselves.

Therefore, I advocate that people should live in reality, not to pursue those things, and to be free of pursuits, free of addictions, and with an inner peace and tranquility, so as to take care of their spirit.

Of course, we also need to adopt the attitude of "use nothing for use".

What does it mean to be useful?

"Usefulness for usefulness" means not seeking to contribute to society and others, but only seeking to be able to preserve oneself, such as the example I mentioned in the article "The World of Man", a big tree, because of its usefulness, was cut down, grease, because of its ability to light lamps, was burned, cinnamon, because of its edible bark, was shoveled down, lacquer, and so on, and so on. so it was shoveled down, and the lacquer tree was cut up because it could cut lacquer.

All of these are useful because they are useful, and only to people, but they are harmful to themselves.

So I am against this kind of behavior that is useful to others but harmful to oneself, so of course how to protect oneself from harm should be the first major issue to pay attention to in real life.

For people's desires, don't be too much too high, or you will easily hurt yourself.

Yao wanted to give the position of governing the world to Xuyue, Xuyue said, "Mole goes to the Yellow River to drink water, only to drink a bellyful of water is enough, the bird builds a nest in the big forest, only to stand on a branch is enough, you go back, I don't need the world, what is the purpose of governing the world? I don't need the world to rule it. I just need a place to live on earth.

These words, does not represent my thoughts, I do not want to be an official, to a large extent, is not willing to endure the shackles of the official labor, is to see the dangers of the officialdom, so I want to protect themselves.

I have this story in my book. Someone went to see the King of Song, who rewarded him with ten cars, and he bragged about it in front of me.

I said to him, there was a family on the river who lived by weaving reeds, and were very poor, and once his son dived under the water, and found a pearl worth a thousand pieces of gold, and showed it to his father, who said to his son, hasten to break it with a stone, and never keep it, and why?

He said, such a valuable thing must be under the nine layers of the abyss, under the neck of a severe dragon, you can get it, it must be that this dragon is asleep, once this dragon wakes up, and realizes that the pearl is no longer there, it will be angry, then you will not be able to live at that time.

So I said to the man, "Now the situation in Song, the king of Song is much more brutal than the black dragon, you can get his reward, it must be that he is asleep, if he wakes up, you will be shattered like the son who picked up the pearl.

This is a realization of the reality of my life, I feel that the reality is so dangerous, so I do not want to be in the vortex of the struggle of that reality, in the reality of the environment is full of dangers, so I stay away from the officialdom, to take the "useless for the use of" approach to protect themselves. The first thing I'd like to say is that I don't want to be a part of it.

Of course, this is the reality of my existence, that is, I have to be like this.

I: I understand, your thinking is closely related to the time and environment you are in, maybe people in different times, may not think like you do.

Zhuang Zhou: maybe so, maybe I encountered a good time, may not think like that, but the key is, from the historical point of view, in addition to our forefathers, after our China simply did not have any good times, so my this thought, you are not as good as you want to think about it, this may be in the critical time, to save your life.

I: Yes, history is a poisonous snake with blood, one is not careful, it was bitten, it is worth thinking about, that adopts the life of peace and Qi things of the human attitude, what does this mean?

Zhuang Zhou: the so-called life, is to rest in the fate of the arrangement, in front of the fate of the heart, I am the reality of the unexplainable, but can not be relieved of the pain as "fate".

Here, fate is an irrational thing, you can't resist it, there is no way to avoid it, there is a story in my book, there are people who have a lot of strange diseases, I think this is the arrangement of the fate, you can't do anything about it, so you just accept it.

So I say, knowing that there is nothing you can do about it, and that it is bound to happen, then you should be at peace with it as an arrangement of fate, and accept it, and that is virtue.

Then, of course, some people think that this idea of mine is that everything is subject to the arrangement of fate, which excludes the subjective efforts of people, so that they can do nothing in front of the objective reality, which seems to be very negative.

But what I am saying is that a situation where people know that calamities are unavoidable, you have to take an attitude of taking things easy, and in the case of misfortunes, take the initiative to free yourself from the pain, and think a little bit more openly in the spirit, even though it is a self-congratulation, I am telling you that this is also a way to get rid of the pain from the spirit.

So, to do this, you have to do Qi things. What is the Qi thing?

In terms of the Great Way, the values high and low turn to each other. High to low, low to high, so-called back and forth. If your thoughts are in line with the Way, you won't cling to old ideas. With the point of view of the Avenue, the size of the form of mutual change. Big becomes small, small becomes big, so-called addition and subtraction. Behavior is in line with the way, will not be hard to move the old experience. Look at the way of the Taoist, just like a king, just and honorable, not selling favors; Transcendent like a social god, serious and prudent, do not open the back door; Swinging like a space, everywhere equal, no border. His bosom is tolerant of all kinds of things, not letting anyone suffer, and not giving anyone preferential, the so-called omni-directional.

All things are not the same he Qiqi view, equal to the high and low know the short. The dispute between right and wrong, he does not want to manage. Avenue eternal, life is short, boast what great cause, small garden blip. Prominent position, rented rooms, full and go empty, empty and live full. Three days a change of travelers, a hundred years the same hotel. The years come and go, they can't be pushed away. The time leaves us and refuses to wait. What is good becomes bad, what is good becomes bad, what is weak becomes strong, and what is bad becomes good. The end is the beginning again, and the old play begins anew. I'll only tell you the truth of the Tao, the truth of the matter. Ah, life rode a fast horse, four hooves Tengtap, there is no step is not in the change, there is not a second is not flying across, not to the end can not be down, you should do what, you should not do what, why should I come back to answer? You may as well wait and see the changes.

That is to say, Qi thing is a little more complicated than the peace of life. The so-called Qi things, is to see all things as themselves, that is, to deny and erase the differences between things, and of course, to erase the differences between things and people, and to oppose man-made value judgments.

Confusion, right and wrong, beauty and ugliness, size, and even life and death are all things that I see as the same, so how can I unite things?

First of all, it is from the relativity of things to negate their differences. Things have a relative aspect, they exist under certain conditions, and without certain conditions and fixed perspectives and fixed standards, the conclusions will be different.

For example, the size of things, noble and low, etc., are relative, I have said, from the perspective of the Tao, things do not have noble and low, from the point of view of the object itself, are their own view of themselves as noble, and look down on things outside of themselves, with the world's eyes, noble and low are not in their own, are determined by the external conditions.

From the point of view of difference, if you look at an object as big, if you look at it from a big point of view, all things are big; if you look at it from a small point of view, all things are small again.

That is, if you look at everything from a very small standpoint, then everything is big.

The hair of a cow or a horse seems small to a human being, but from another point of view, if you compare it with something smaller, it is also big.

Heaven and earth are very big, but if you look at it from a larger scope, if you look at heaven and earth from the perspective of the universe, then it is also small, as small as a grain of rice, and this is to look at things from the perspective of relativity.

This obliterates their differences, size, nobility, are not absolute, so that, from a different point of view, the human liver and gallbladder, the distance between them, it is like the moon, the liver and gallbladder were originally connected, but from a different point of view, they can be very far apart.

If you look at it from the same point of view, everything is one, everything is the same, this view of mine denies the difference between things, denies the objectivity of value judgment, such as right and wrong, beauty and ugliness, good and evil, and there is no objective standard, I think there is not, this is the human subjective view, so it is all relative.

This point of view, of course, people will think it is ridiculous, but I want to tell you a new way of thinking, to break the perspective of the unchanging, not to be confined to the world's preconceptions, that a thing, good is absolutely good, that is, the big is absolutely big, people do not use such a rigid vision to look at things.

In addition, there is another layer of meaning in Qi, which is to use the sameness of all things to negate the differences between them.

I think that all things in the world, although they are very different, but then, they all have the total source of things, the total source is the Tao, the Tao is angry, and all things in the world are united in the gas, and is the product of the gas changes gathered and dispersed, including human life is also so, human life is the result of the gas gathered together, the gas is dispersed once the person's life is gone, and the body decomposed from this point of view, people with the world of the world, and the world's life, the world's life and the world's life. In this way, the human being is essentially the same as everything else in the world.

This is my point of view, according to this point of view, there is no difference between the high and the low, they are the sons of the universe and nature, they are all produced by the great Tao, they are all the manifestation of the qi aggregation, dispersion and separation.

And according to such a point of view, the loss of the individual's life gain is not worthy of joy or pain, because the gas gathered together to form a person, dispersed him back to the universe to go back to the universe, are in other forms back to the universe of the great life, to participate in the cosmic changes of life.

I have this story in my article, my wife died, my friend Hui Shi went to offer condolences, I did not expect to see me knocking on the tile pots and singing, Hui Shi is very incomprehensible, so he criticized me, said, "Look at your wife and your wife and you *** with the same life, she died, you do not grieve, why do you have to sing it, this is too much, right?

I said, she just died, I have not not felt the pain, but later turned to think, originally ah, there is no her person, no her life, she is a cloud of gas in the sky and the earth, and then the gas cohesion together, there is her form, there is her life, she later became my wife.

Now her life is over, and her form is going to decompose, and she is going to turn into qi again, and go back to the universe, and participate in the changes of the universe, and form other forms, and she is changing there, and turning into other beings, and I am unknowingly guarding the corpse and crying, and that's just too much ignorance.

So then I stopped crying.

It is with this conception of human life that I look at death as the beginning of a new life, and so in the presence of the death of a concrete human being, I am going to let out a song and sing about the beginning of a new life, and the basis of this viewpoint is the view of the Qibla.

All things are generated by the change of qi, and a person is qi, and after qi is dispersed, it will go back to the universe and generate new life.

This is the way to look at everything in reality, look at human life, look at human glory, disgrace, happiness, gain and loss, then it will be very transcendent, will bring optimism to look at everything.

Therefore, I put forward, "Heaven and earth are born with me, and all things are one with me".

I: you this thought, novel and bold, after reading, but also can not help but let me have a feeling of solidarity, since the understanding of this idea of yours, my life is also alive, the mind seems to be able to encompass all the world, the heart of the world to the universe.

Zhuangzi: Haha, very good, it seems to be in my way.

I: Then, your last thought point, the pursuit of transcendence and freedom of the spiritual realm, and what do you mean?

Zhuangzi: This spiritual realm is a spiritual realm of absolute freedom, free from all things, and I call this spiritual realm "swimming".

In my book, there are many places where I use the word "swim". The first one, for example, is called "The Easy Journey".

"Swimming" is to be with the founder of the universe, the Great Tao, and to swim in the boundless universe, so this kind of swimming is actually a kind of spiritual realm, which is to get rid of all kinds of limitations, to transcend the concrete conditions of life and the reality of relations, and finally to achieve the spirit, and the supreme Great Tao to be one.

At this time, people will experience a sense of freedom without constraints, because the Great Tao is eternal and infinite, and if you go to realize it spiritually, you yourself have gained that quality of the Great Tao, as if you and the Great Tao have become one, and you are spiritually eternal and infinite.

You completely forget all kinds of real relationships, and even forget your own existence, and only your spirit and the Great Tao are in the universe, traveling together, so you enter the state of absolute freedom.

I suggest a number of specific paths, such as sitting in oblivion and mindfulness.

What is sitting in oblivion and mindfulness of fasting?

After a certain amount of practice, to keep quiet in the heart, and then focus the spirit, start to get rid of distractions, and start to make themselves forget everything around them, first forgetting benevolence and righteousness, forgetting rituals and music, forgetting the world, forgetting everything around them, all kinds of complicated relationships in society, all kinds of benevolence, morality, and legal system, and even the whole world, all of them, and not wanting to think about them in their minds, and then forgetting about everything, and then they have to degenerate their limbs, deputize, and forget about their own existence. Intelligence, forgetting their own existence.

Intelligence and Ming are all the sense organs of the human body, that is, hearing and vision, all kinds of feelings, to forget these things, the ears do not listen to the outside world, the eyes do not look at the outside world image, the body does not feel the outside world of all the information, as if they do not have it, does not exist.

In this case, you should not listen with your ears, but with your mind; not with your mind, but with your qi; use your own qi to feel the existence of the Cosmic Great Dao, so that you can reach the realm of being one with the Great Dao spiritually.

It is as if you are traveling with the Great Dao in the boundless universe, and you can then be one with all things, one with the universe.

So the way to achieve this kind of "free travel", it is first of all a kind of rational understanding, you first need to recognize the existence of the Great Dao, and then carry out this kind of cultivation, then this kind of realm, in fact, is a kind of freedom of the spirit, he is not really the freedom of human action, indistinct, but also fantastical and colorful.

In my opinion, when one reaches such a state, one obtains liberation of body and mind, and one obtains unlimited freedom and happiness.

Me: Yes, sitting in oblivion and mindfulness, your kind of realm is really so blissful, and this kind of realm is a great inspiration to future generations of literati. Future generations of literati are often inspired by you to pursue this kind of transcendental freedom of body and mind, and even more so as the artistic pursuit of literary works, which is really wonderful, I really want to thank you ah, Mr. Zhuang Zhou.

Zhuang Zhou: Haha, you are welcome. I talked to you so much, I think you must now be wondering whether you are dreaming, or in reality? Are you a butterfly, or is the butterfly you?

So let me talk to you again about a dream I had earlier about a butterfly?

I dreamed last night that I became a phoenix butterfly, with a black shirt and a flowery dress, and I was playing around. I feel so cozy, forget about the earth that a painful Zhuangzhou. Suddenly woke up, remembered that his name is Zhuang Zhou, is a small official in charge of the lacquer garden of the Song Dynasty, I was surprised and confused. I was surprised and confused. Was it really Zhuang Zhou's dream that he changed into a phoenix butterfly? Or did the phoenix butterfly change into Zhuang Zhou in his dream? Zhuang Zhou, Feng Die, who is me? This is a difficult question, but it is also a difficult question.

I: time is not early, next time to talk about it, I still have questions and you *** with the discussion it.

Zhuang Zhou: Okay, let nature take its course, do your nature, da Sheng free. Looking forward to the next exchange.

In the dream, I pondered for a long time, in the end I dreamed of Zhuangzi, Zhuangzi dreamed of butterflies, butterflies and dreamed of Zhuangzi, I, Zhuangzi, butterflies, are they all dreaming?

The Orient is white, there are birds chirping, the morning wind is blowing quietly, the daylight is bright, I opened my eyes, the body if the dream, or reality?