We live in a constant state of @risK! So we should make it a Tao shouldn't we?
We wake up and who the hell knows what's going to happen today! So, we learn to control as much as we can: we go to school (usually out of our control), we get a job (usually at the bottom or near-bottom of a ladder), we find a place to live, we figure out how to get from here to there, we usually pursue a relationship and usually want some sex, coffee, phones, and other stuff... maybe a kid shows up... maybe a pandemic shows up and things turn to various shades of shit, maybe this maybe that: but through it all, we try to control as much as we can... We usually even define victims as people who failed at control, even if we don't use that particular word-thought...
How much, in this, is something that you would define as "sagely"?
To then infer or conclude that Lao Tzu had it in his mind to teach how to go with the flow and somehow "make harmony" seems silly to me. And, okay, well he wrote, what, three thousand years ago? So maybe (it had to be) way different back then, right? No doubt you are right! So exchange "car" with water buffalo, "watch" with observing the sun, and "pandemic" with, what would you say, small-pox? Starvation? An invading army? Thirteen kids? But still sex...!
The Tao is the humble realization that to exist at all is to be conditioned by constant and endless risk. And the Tao is also the learned condition of taking risk for a dance! Lacking both the grace and enthusiasm of Michelle, I have learned (am learning) the Taoist way of virtue: accept the challenge and movement like a leaf in the wind: cling to the "branch" of tranquility regardless of the severity of the storm: and release the fear that inevitably seeks to control and dominate... In short, the Tao is a course in daily risk management!
Remember though, risk management is a dance with life: it is not another method for "advancement". Consider, that the atoms that make up your body, the consciousness that in-fills your mind, and the "luck" that brought you into this world did not come with any specific agenda: rather, the you that is reading this, is always, in every second of your life, an exploration into possibility... Precisely this is the Tao, this is the Wisdom Teaching of Yeshua and the Sages of the World: yes, you are @risK every moment of the only-too-brief-life that you have been given... but yes as well to the wonder of your possibilities! So take your life on an adventure! Accept. Cling. And release the fear that would control you! You have been invited to this dance so get the hell up and live extraordinarily! Climb that mountain! Travel the Planet! Pick up that worm on the sidewalk and put it back in soil. Fall in love and rise in bliss!
Lao Tzu says that you are going to die anyway. Nothing is riskier than that. So between now and then, everything that you do should matter...