A piece of wisdom from
September 18, 2026 · Friday
The quote
“The autotelic personality finds value in doing things for their own sake.”
— Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi · Flow State
The concept
The Tao
The way of effortless action, when to stop pushing, when to begin.
Two thousand five hundred years before "burnout" became a word, Lao Tzu was writing about the cost of forcing. The Tao Te Ching, 81 short verses, is the most translated text in human history after the Bible, and the cleanest counter to mode…
A practice for today
Before bed tonight, name one thing where the lesson of The Tao. The way of effortless action, when to stop pushing, when to begin.
From the Bhagavad Gita
Verse 2.20
न जायते म्रियते वा कदाचिन्नायं भूत्वा भविता वा न भूयः। अजो नित्यः शाश्वतोऽयं पुराणो न हन्यते हन्यमाने शरीरे॥
“The soul is never born, nor does it die. It has not come into being, will not come into being, and will not cease to be. Unborn, eternal, ever-existing, undying, primeval — it is not slain when the body is slain.”
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