WuWei. What? Wait, Who what?

                Balance.  What is it? I ask this question of myself and of others and I may get many answers. Homeostasis is one possible answer. Another is a central point amidst an ever changing backdrop.  But what is it? Is it a place, a thing? How can one arrive at this place of balance, if it is a place at all?  In the body one may say you are balanced when you are not falling over.  But are you truly?  After all, are you not often creating tension on this muscle against that to maintain your upright position? Is that truly balance, or is it more of holding a state of imbalance so that one does not fall over? And what is the result of this tension?  More tension that builds up in an ever increasing state until entropy over takes the inherent order and break down occurs?  So then balance, even in this simple act of not falling over, is something more.  But what?  Perhaps it is a state where one is not falling over and also not creating a state whereby more actions need be created to rectify the actions made to create the balance in the first place!  (wow, what a thought - full of words! I think however there is something in here.)  Not creating the need for more activity to rectify the actions previously taken to rectify other imbalance situations… hmmm. 

                What is that state?  How do we get there?  Suppose we were to start where we are. (The only option available to us, incidentally and also quite a challenge in and of itself.) Wherever we are is likely in some state of at least minor imbalance. (at least).  But before we can act would it not be prudent to observe first?  And even in the situation of observing something as simple as standing upright we can discover quickly that we have a seemingly endless capacity for not paying attention to all the details so that we are still always compensating for previous activity.  We never truly arrive at a free point of true balance but more of a constant rectifying for a previous habit of over acting (also an interesting point to be explored).

                By this then it correlates that we can never really arrive at a state of balance by doing more, but rather by doing less we may have the possibility of achieving a state of balance (try this with the aforementioned standing still exercise).   In fact I would go so far as to say that in order to achieve balance we must actually first do nothing at all. Perhaps I mean here to give up all doings (at least temporarily) in order to apprehend what a state of balance may feel like.  Of course once we begin doing again we usually will begin by doing as we have always done. And so we will again need to come to a state of non-doing in order to find and re-familiarize ourselves with this state of balance until we can learn how to do while always not doing (or more precisely, not doing anything that will not serve balance). What is this that I am talking about, this doing/not-doing?  WuWei has been used, as has non-doing and a whole host of other phrases.  But all of it comes from this concept. This is exceedingly difficult in my experience, this doing/not doing.  In order to embody this principle it is my experience that one must become intimately familiar with this state of balance (harmony).  So much so that it becomes a natural state of being and that one may follow this feeling of balance through doings, or rather, happenings.  For in this state one may come to realize that all doings are folly but following happenings while maintaining this state of balance is not only possible, it is the only rational choice when held up against the effort and cost of doings.