Lydia

Tao isn't a metaphysical principle, or even a philosophy. Ultimately all definitions fall by the Wayside. Lydia is a bit like this.

If we really want, we can well describe Lydia in time – the waves and pulses, echoes and beats, ethereal voices and horns. We can divide up the chromatic elements that interweave and undulate. We can even step out of the music and witness a mental image, like projections on a screen. It could be sunlit concentric circles mingling on a pond surface, an elaborate interference pattern, a Moiré-like illusion of movement. There Lydia takes form, ready for filing as just another experience, an already fading memory. We thought the music, inside out.

The problem with descriptions is that they separate us from Lydia. So just listen. Hear how one chord has far-flung effects, hear how the silence manifests – the sound of silence. Cease to remember or anticipate, feel each note reverberate as quiescence in motion, in endless transformation. When rest and no rest cease to be, then even oneness disappears. It cannot be had by effort of will. So just listen.

Lydia isn't anything but Lydia. There's no meaning in the rhythm – the meaning is the rhythm. Even ersatz is suchness. And if that sounds meaningless, the thing has been grasped. It was nothing special after all.

“The named Tao is not the real Tao.” Lydia is a bit like this. Just listen.