As many know, Tao is a concept found in ancient Chinese philosophy. While the Chinese calligraphic character itself translates as way or path, or more loosely as doctrine or principle, it is often used philosophically to symbolise the fundamental or true nature of the world. Whilst Taoism holds that Tao cannot be expressed, it holds that it can be known and its principles can be followed. Taoist writing also focuses on the value of following the Tao, which is called Te, or virtue.

The Tao is like a well:
used but never used up.
It is like the eternal void:
filled with infinite possibilities.
It is hidden but always present.
I don’t know who gave birth to it.
It is older than God.
– Tao Te Ching, Ch. 4

In religious Taoism, Tao is understood in terms of these constituents:
• Jing, corresponding to energy;
• Qi, or flow of energy and
• Shen, or the Spirit.

Jing Qi Shen — the triad Jing Qi Shen constitutes the Tao of all that is, and are represented as deities in the Three Pure Ones.

There are characteristics of Tao that are often used to describe its nature.

Tao is undifferentiated

All distinctions are relative comparisons bound together by their mutual reference. Hence there is no such thing as long except by comparison to short, and vice versa; there is no such thing as non-being except by comparison to being. Because Tao itself has no defined shape or defined size, all comparisons fall within it. There can never be ‘real’ differences.

Tao returns

This concept is often used to describe that Tao will flow back, circumvent, and eventually undo any and every attempt to force it into a particular path.

Tao is subtle and quiet

The most important aspects of Tao are its subtle, unnoticed, everyday workings. The softest thing in the world overcomes the hardest. Many places in the Tao Te Ching underline that dramatic, alluring or extraordinary events may catch the eye and assume significance, but it is the slow, slight, unobserved and continuous movement of the manifestations of Tao that actually accomplish things.

Tao is simultaneously dispassionate and nurturing

Because all beings are manifestations of Tao, Tao gives itself completely to everything and everyone. However, by the same expression Tao is believed to be indifferent to the character of manifestations. Birth and death, happiness and sorrow, and life itself, from the perspective of Tao, are only movements and transformations.

Gems of Tao Te Ching

According to tradition, “Old Master” or Lao Tse (Lao Tzu), a record-keeper at the Zhou Dynasty court, composed Tao Te Ching. Text is essential to the philosophical Taoism and Chinese religion in general, and strongly influenced other schools, including Chinese Buddhism. Many artists, including poets, painters, calligraphers, gardeners have used the Tao Te Ching as a source of inspiration. Its influence has also spread widely outside East Asia, succored by hundreds of translations of Tao Te Ching into Western languages.

The Tao that can be expressed is not the eternal Tao;
The name that can be defined is not the unchanging name.

The Tao is called the Great Mother:
empty yet inexhaustible, it gives birth to infinite worlds.

Since before time and space were, the Tao is. It is beyond ‘is’ and ‘is not’.
How do I know this is true? I look inside myself and see.

Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom.
Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.

A leader is best when people barely know that he exists …

The Master (teacher) has no possessions.
The more he does for others, the happier he is.
The more he gives to others, the wealthier he is.

The Tao nourishes by not forcing.
By not dominating, the Master (teacher) leads.

A journey of a thousand miles started with a first step.

Scholars of the highest class, when they hear about the Tao, take it and practice it earnestly.
Scholars of the middle class, when they hear of it, take it half earnestly.
Scholars of the lowest class, when they hear of it, laugh at it.
Without the laughter, there would be no Tao.

Tao of Universalist Radha-Krishnaism

Although sourcing from progressive Christianity its outlook on dynamics of personal revelation, and from Gaudiya Vaishnavism its enchantment with all-attractive God-dess, in its heart and mind Universalist Radha-Krishnaism is closest to ancient wisdom of Taoism than to either Gaudiya Vaishnavism or Christianity, for it refuses to share their predominantly outdated worldviews (or flow against the Tao).

It doesn’t seek followers yet it gives itself to all who would like to follow the Tao, or God-dess.
As a good traveler it has no fixed plans, and is not hurrying upon arriving.
As a good artist it let its intuition lead it wherever it wants.
Knowing the mark of a moderate man is freedom from his own ideas, it tries to best express itself but also lets go of all those ideas. All ideas eventually fail to describe the indescribable, all-beautiful God-dess.
Knowing the more laws and regulations are made prominent, the more misconceptions, thieves and robbers of truth there will be. Thus it follows no rules, and asks for no rules.

We live our best moments when adaptable, aware of our surroundings and what we need to do to go forward — flowing with the Tao, or God-dess.

It flows effortlessly between different philosophical, existential and scientific ideas, for flow is what Tao is. Tao is ever new. It is able to be experienced in different cultures and different times.

Following the footsteps of Lao Tse, we call Tao also Tao. We call it God-dess. Also Radha-Krishna. We call it God-dess for the sake of mutual understanding with all others who are more familiar with the term God. History made people imagine God as a masculine absolute, dispassionate ruler detached from this world, and have personified that fear from God, ruthlessness and senselessness into wider society. As a consequence world suffers in male dominance, discrimination, wars, crisis and misery.

We desire to walk the path of Tao, the path of understanding and balance. World has had enough suffering and we want it to enjoy itself better. Find a new sensibility and meaning. Hence we emphasise love for the feminine aspect of Tao and its integral part in our lives. God-dess thus describes both masculine and feminine, both Yin and Yang. By observing history we can conclude it existed before God and God-dess, which means, it’s older even than man’s dreams of God, or God-dess, or any other name.

We dub it personally Radha-Krishna, a beautiful name for otherwise indeterminate Yin and Yang, because as persons we’re immensely in love with it. Our earnest desire is to see the embraces and kisses of Radha and Krishna in groves of our hearts; eternal God-dess, Tao, its happiness beyond limits.

– Zvonimir Tosic

It is the realm of gods and goddesses, heros and heroines, the archetypes, ideals, paradigmatic individuals, Braj. However, it also has its dark side where the monsters, demons, nightmares, repressed contents of the conscious mind, etc. live. It’s amazing to me how much of what is considered good literature, art, or film dwells in these dark realms as does much of what we read in the daily news. Things evolve from subtle to gross.

While, the processes may be similar, the subject matter is different. As I recreate and experience Radha-Krishna’s pastimes in my heart, I reject all dross, negative emotions and experiences. I don’t need any more drama or horror in my life. I seek beauty and love in their purest forms. That’s what it means to be a paramhansa, we learn to separate the pure essence from the dross and live in that essential nature which is Braj, the eternal idealized reality my heart longs for most intensely.

Lalita Prasad Thakur (1972)

NEW ❦ “How I Learned This Process” (PDF): is a 65 page draft section from my second book, Universalist Radha-Krishnaism: A Spirituality of Natural Devotion. It is an except from my autobiography, Full Circle. It portrays the years 1971–1974 when I became the first Westerner of my generation to receive initiation into the process of creating yourself as a girlfriend of Radha in the eternal Braj. It describes my experiences in India and my relationship with A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami and Lalita Prasad Thakur. I just posted it on my other web site’s Writings Page.

If you care to comment on it, please do so here. I am interested in friendly, constructive, criticism, especially–what you would like to hear more or less of and what you particularly liked or disliked. Thank you and aloha.

Meanwhile, it feels really good to be working as a writer on my new book titled Experiencing Radha-Krishna: A Guide for Entering Into Their Play. My energy is up. I feel enthused and invigorated anew. Universalist Radha-Krishnaism was work–writing philosophy, making sure everything fit together right, and makes logical sense. Of course, it had to be done for me to be able to move on to the next step.

When I moved here and began seriously meditating on the eternal play a few years ago, the old Gaudiya Vaishnav way of understanding things no longer worked for me. My understanding had grown since Lalita Prasad Thakur taught me, and his teachings needed to be put in a contemporary philosophical context in order for me to be able to immerse myself in them convincingly. Now that I handled that to my satisfaction with confirmation from respected others, I can get on to the real work which is not work but play.

Experiencing Radha-Krishna will be a guidebook modeled on earlier guidebooks such as Ujjval Nilmani, Sri Krishnahnika Kaumudi, and Bhavanasara Sangraha. It will provide the structural framework of character, setting, and plot for us to enter the play of Radha-Krishna using a process similar to that of a method actor. I really look forward to immersing myself in this new project.

We will focus on developing an erotic loving relationship with Radha-Krishna based on the teachings of Rupa Goswami, Kavi Karnapur, and others. However, like our previous book, we will give these teachings a contemporary facelift. We will specifically focus on developing the relationship of Radha’s girlfriend.

I am writing this book primarily for myself–as is true of the previous one too. It will help me focus on this practice more deeply than I have been able to up to now. I hope it will benefit you as well. What would you like to see included in it?

Just as the Orissa devotees moved from loud kirtans to more personal, inner manjari bhav after the disappearance of Chaitanya and the overthrow of Maharaj Pratap-rudra, I think a more private inner cultivation of love for Radha-Krishna is more appropriate under my current situation. There is no need to try forcing our views on others through public sankirtan demonstrations and aggressive evangelism as many Western devotees engage in.

Rather cultivating the inner aesthetic sense to appreciate Radha-Krishna’s sports and the desire to enter into them is more effective.

What do you think?

God-dess is perfect, without wants, and all his-her acts are without motive or conscious effort. They arise from overflowing intrinsic bliss. Called sport, play, or pastimes, they manifest in the hearts, minds, and lives of devotees.

God-dess’ names, forms, abodes, associates, and sports exist within us, along with everything else we can imagine. There are different planes of existence, and consciousness pervades everything. Devotional practices help us attain the plane of consciousness where God-dess lives and enacts eternal pastimes with his-her dear friends.

Radha-Krishna embody the highest, most concentrated bliss known to us, and it is quite different from ordinary happiness. Ordinary happiness is material, while bliss is spiritual. Ordinary happiness is transient and limited, while bliss is eternal and unlimited. Spiritual bliss is quantitatively and qualitatively vastly superior to our everyday happiness. Transcendental bliss is unique and indescribable.

Radha-Krishna embody bliss and enjoyment as the object enjoyed and the enjoyer. Their transcendental enjoyment is astonishingly wonderful, and it totally absorbs the mind and senses. God-dess entails infinite variety and newness along with embodying all enjoyment.

Chaitanya’s philosophy says God-dess’ blissful energy increases a thousand-fold when implanted in the heart of a devotee. Devotees develop a passionate desire to serve God-dess according to their different moods. The love of devotees aware of God-dess’ power and majesty is enjoyable, but divine love remains shy before opulent majesty. The more awareness of majesty, the less intense the spontaneous love.

Devotees who, unaware of God-dess’ power and majesty, serve Radha-Krishna as a sweet, loving couple with ordinary human wants and weaknesses, give them the highest enjoyment. Radha-Krishna enjoy such divine love more than anything else. This highest development of divine love occurs only when neither God-dess nor devotee is conscious of divinity.

Rupa Goswami was a learned playwright and poet, well versed in classical Indian aesthetics. He used the Tenth Canto of the Bhagavat to elaborate the play of Radha-Krishna, and he hierarchically systematized the various forms of God-dess, moods of devotion, devotional symptoms of love, forms of sport, and how to enter into those sports. His brother, Sanatan, and nephew, Jiva, philosophically systematized those concepts.

Thus, we arrive at a point where the highest human conception of God-dess and the highest service one can render them is for them to be a loving young couple, with us as their friends and lovers, totally unaware of their divinity. Deep, intense love remains the key element. If we apply the principle “as above, so below,” see ourselves created in the image of God-dess, and understand this world as a temporary, imperfect reflection of the spiritual world, then we understand God-dess and the transcendental abode must bear some resemblance to the highest, most enjoyable aspects of human life.