The sage in the Tao Te Ching is someone who is a leader. It’s natural for a Sage to be an influencer or a leader. They use these traits to pass down their own beliefs to other people. Even though they do that, they don’t seek attention. Instead of seeking attention, all a Sage wants to do is influence everyone to be better. In this context, the Sage wants to influence everyone to follow the Tao. Following the Tao includes the Te and acting rightly. A Sage has mastered the Te and mastered living well and acting rightly. This consists of being humble which you must be in order to be a Sage. With this, he’s able to be a Sage because mastering those allows him to pass them down to other people. Not only does he pass down his beliefs, but he doesn’t leave anyone behind no matter what happens. According to Passage 27, a sage abandons nothing and he takes care of everything. Not only that, but the Sage has a good understanding of life and how it’s just not something he can hold entirely. However, no matter what he will never lose faith nor trust. Passage 49 supports this when it says that a sage understands that life is bigger than himself. It also says that he will always have faith and trust.
Even though a Sage will do all of this, a Sage doesn’t really know that they really are a Sage. It’s because of that humble nature of a Sage. They don’t aim to be that figure that gets the most attention.
Save your time!
We can take care of your essay
- Proper editing and formatting
- Free revision, title page, and bibliography
- Flexible prices and money-back guarantee
From what I’ve seen, my parents are good examples of Sages. They don’t try to seek attention when passing down their own beliefs to children including myself. Parents in general are mostly humble and my parents are no exception to that. My parents never was aiming for me to praise them for teaching me everything when I’m all grown up because that’s not what they wanted. They wanted to pass down what they knew unto me.
Not only that, but they never abandoned me no matter what I did. If I did anything bad, I would get scolded for it, but they wouldn’t throw me away like it’s nothing. It’s that unconditional love that makes them not abandon me which fits the description of Sage rather well. My parents don’t boast nor do they really try to be a Sage. They don’t try to tell everyone that they have an amazing child in order to benefit their own ego.
My parents being influencers who are humble proves that they are good examples of Sages. Not only that, but not abandoning me whenever my grades were bad or I just did something bad in general is something a Sage would do.
I have a few traits that a Sage would have. For example, I want to influence people to become better and I want to pass down what I think is good to have. I want to make everyone happy and seeing people smile from what I’ve done makes me happy myself. I don’t like to boast to other people because I think it doesn’t really benefit anyone. That’s also a trait that a Sage would have.
Knowing what I know about Sage’s however, I don’t think that I would notice too much if I was a Sage. I could be considered one myself, but if I think that I’m a Sage, that really wouldn’t make me a Sage because it’s not humble to see yourself above everyone.
In conclusion, I think some of the traits that I have are very Sage-like but I don’t think I have all of the traits to be a Sage according to the Tao Te Ching. The need to pass down my own beliefs to make people enjoy themselves more and my strive to be humble is what makes me seem like a Sage but in reality, I don’t think that it’s enough.
Stuck on your essay?
