I've been asked what is my favorite page from the book, and this is my favorite illustration -- or at least part of it. It's funny, because when I was taking painting lessons when living in Taipei, my teacher had painted a composition of wilted lotuses as a demonstration for a classmate who happened to be a Buddhist monk. The teacher gave a disclaimer saying normally we wouldn't choose such a subject to give another person, but as a practitioner of Buddhism who appreciates the concept of impermanence, death and rebirth, the student wouldn't mind.

The thing is that in Chinese culture, when giving works of art, one needs to be mindful of the meaning that could be conveyed by the subject. For example, if you give a recently married couple an painting of a pair of a mandarin ducks, which symbolize conjugal happiness, but the birds have clipped wings or are anatomically missing sections of feathers, it might be interpreted as hoping their marriage is short-lived.

Wilting flowers can mean a wish for someone's demise or predict a loss of good fortune, a waning of one's sun. But for me, it can also be beautiful. As Adrienne Maree Brown describes the role of mushrooms and decomposition, what is toxic, broken, decaying, and no longer serving life can still be used. It need not be wasted. It can be processed back into the wholeness of living. And I think of that when I look at this image. Brokenness only looks bad when I see it from a narrow point of view. When I expand my perspective to include the act of processing what's broken back into the whole, it looks beautiful.

One of my favorite lines from the Tao Te Ching highlights the comparison between Nature or the Tao and the human experience. How often do I rush about trying to accomplish everything I set out for myself only to feel disappointment, frustration, and even anger when I don't? What do I feel is so necessary to achieve -- only myself, in this lifetime -- when I am a part of a continuous oneness that accomplishes all things within an infinite and unknowable arc of time?

A confident person isn't necessarily confident because they are beautiful, powerful, intelligent, popular, or kind. Those traits might help establish their sense of self worth, but in the end, it's about how readily they have accepted themselves (faults and all) and no longer depend so heavily on validation from others. ⁠

When illustrating this quote, I imagined it as a piece of advice from an adult to a child. Growing up, we are compelled to depend on others -- parents, teachers, and peers -- to feel accepted and loved. It becomes a habit that is difficult to break. But, if we can learn to know, accept, and love ourselves, then we pave the way for our own freedom. And that freedom in turn allows us to know, accept, and love others as well.⁠

In any social setting with expectations of proper behavior, there are demands on our ability to hide that the negative qualities while only displaying the positive. Sometimes that can reach a level that forces one to reckon with what kind of life to continue leading, what kind of relationship to continue pursuing.

That reckoning poses then, a most difficult choice -- does one choose to be seen honestly or does one choose to be acceptable?

To me, Dr. Jaiya John's poetic proclamation "Daughter Drink This Water" read as an invitation to a celebration of womanhood, an embracing of everything from the bitterness of birth to the weight of expectation to the complex joy we carry through life, it called to that part of me that yearns to simply be and live free. But why women in particular?

Having been denied equal rights to men for so long, women in countless societies have long held the necessity of using marriage as a means to meeting basic needs, like food, housing, security. From this basic dynamic stemmed the burgeoning expectation for women to look, act, dress, think, and speak a certain way in order to be considered suitable for marriage. The more a woman conformed to the highest standards of these expectations, the greater the chances of a comfortable position for her later in life. Fast forward several generations, humanity has made significant progress in these areas, but we still grapple with the question of how to be a woman.

Every year, we dedicate billions of dollars on industries that thrive by creating, changing, and recycling standards about how a woman ought to look in any given season. For instance, in the 1950s, only 7% of women in the US dyed their hair. After an aggressive marketing campaign by Clairol, that percentage jumped to 40% by 1970. Hair removal is another instance in which the fashion and commercial industry started attacking the appearance of hair in women's underarms in 1915, which extended over the years to legs and bikini lines, as unsightly and decidedly unfeminine. By the 1980s, 80% of women under the age of 35 removed some of their body hair to improve their looks. The most mind-boggling of all is the constant push and pull of whether our skin is too dark (in many Eastern cultures) or too light (in many Western cultures) to be considered beautiful, and the associated creams, oils, gels, and treatments to achieve the ideal skin tone. Additionally, keeping up with the rapid pace of women's fashion has led to a consistent need for us to change our wardrobe with every season, leading to highly detrimental "fast fashion" practices that are wreaking havoc on the environment.

What's unfortunate to me is not just that so many of us spend our lives living with the inheritance of our disenfranchised past, but that instead of lifting women up and scaling back standards and expectations of our appearance, men are also being targeted in greater and greater droves. Fashion and beauty products for men have found mainstream purchase, likely as a rebellion against that other expectation of what "real men" ought to be like as well.

It's my hope that someday there will be a meeting in the middle, that it becomes more about choice and self expression in beauty and fashion, rather than a fear of looking too masculine, too feminine, or too whatever to be accepted, attractive, and loved that drives our desire to look a certain way. I go back to the original quote and its intent: Daughters (and sons), we already are Love. Just as the ocean is water, we need not go elsewhere to find Love.

This line is the first of a poem written by Song Dynasty poet Lu You, who uses the metaphor of a plum blossom to laud integrity and authenticity over flattery and favor in a bid for influence and power:

无意苦争春， I have no intention of holding onto Spring, 
一任群芳妒。 I leave jealousy to myriad other flowers.
零落成泥碾作尘， As my blossoms fall and turn to dust,
只有香如故。 Only their fragrance remains unchanged.

Plum blossoms appear often in the final, coldest days of winter, before other flowers bloom. However, they don't stick around, vying for attention or jostling to be the most beautiful in the spring. They fall to the mud, crushed into dust, having done their duty and whose fragrance (or in the case of man, whose legacy) is all that remains for future generations.

I feel this to be especially relevant in a time where influence, especially digital influence, is considered valuable social currency. Having found my beginnings in social media and continuing to rely on it to share messages that have helped me and maybe can help you as well, I think it's useful to recognize whether I am "holding onto Spring" and remind myself to let go at the right time.

Albert Camus said, "Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is."

There is always something else to do, some other way to act or talk or dress or think, that we struggle with in order to be "better." So isn't it funny that we have such impossible standards for ourselves and a completely different standard for animals -- like dogs, for instance -- a standard that is based on universal generosity?

From my understanding, there is no real competition on whether someone's dog is better than another's. When someone says, "My dog is the best!" does anyone actually feel threatened by those claims? For the most part, we smile. We delight at the relationship they have with their dog. We curiously ask for more details. We share in their joy. But turn that around and when someone says, "I'm the best!" or "My boyfriend is the best!" or "My mom is the best!" we find ourselves balking at such boastful claims or end up comparing our own lives and relationships, worrying that we somehow fall short.

I wonder: What does it take for a dog to be the best dog to his owner? Maybe a dog only has to be himself, be with his owner. Maybe a dog only has to accompany his owner in life. A dog needs only to be present to be the best.

I also wonder: Wouldn't it be so much kinder if we believed that to be the best person is to do the same? If all we needed to do to be our best is to show up and just be there for ourselves and the people in our lives with complete presence of mind without thinking we need to be different or be somewhere else or doing something else?

For instance, when I ask myself what my son might remember in years to come as things that made me the "best mom," I doubt he will recall that I mended his school uniforms or kept the house clean or arranged the classiest Christmas decorations. My guess is he'll remember that I sat with him everyday as he worked on his homework, showing me proudly how to write a certain character in Mandarin. Or he'll remember our water fight as he rinsed dishes with me after dinner. Or maybe, he'll remember playing make believe, pretending to be Santa placing pretend presents under the tree while Mom and Dad acted as little children sleeping away on Christmas Eve.

The demands of being "the best" can feel never ending, and so I have to decide where to draw the line. I have to decide what the ending looks like. For right now, it's about being there for my family when we are together and not longing for something different. Maybe the ending looks different for you, because of other demands on your time and energy, because of circumstances out of your control. And that's OK.

Let's leave comparison behind. We can all be "the best" and not take away from each other's glory. In fact, I believe that by being our best, we add to our collective contentment -- when I am my best, and you're your best, we are all better off together.

Life often feels like a continuous step-wise act between feeling grounded and balanced, and being thrown completely off. It doesn't have to be a completely life-changing event -- though those obviously can and do happen -- but even within the space of an hour, I could be feeling in command and control preparing dinner one moment and then completely blind-sided by a violent tantrum the next.

The issue is that the more I hold onto what I should be, or maybe (more accurately) how I would prefer to be, it's impossible to flow with life. Like a caterpillar that fears the end of what it knows as its existence, holding myself back from what the situation is asking of me really only creates more conflict and denies the potential of what I could become.

To live, a snake must continuously outgrow itself. If it doesn't shed its old skin, it will perish.

We are no different. We grow not only physically from childhood to old age, but with every new stage in life, with every new experience and new perspective. It doesn't do to stay within the limits of our old selves. We, too, must shed them and leave them behind when they—as they inevitably will—no longer serve us.

Moreover, like a snake whose new skin takes time to harden, we find ourselves feeling uncertain and vulnerable until we become comfortable and confident in the new self. And then, the process starts over again, and again, in a continuous cycle of outgrowing.

If you feel like you're breaking, I hope you won't be afraid. Breaking creates the necessary space for things to become whole again. Wonder, instead, at who you will be next.

What's in our nature can't be changed. Like water that has to follow the law of gravity, flowing downward and seeking the lowest point, we're also subject to forces beyond our control.

But what could be considered a limitation also becomes an opportunity. Flowing water goes around obstacles, forging its own path rather than tackling the immovable head on. Water reaches its destination by yielding. I hope you find your way, too, despite what stands in your path.

If you've ever wondered whether individuality is incompatible with the Taoist idea of oneness, I turn to this line from the Chuang Tzu:

An ancient gnarled tree: too fibrous for a logger's saw, too twisted to fit a carpenter's square, outlasts the whole forest.

While all things exist in oneness, one gives rise to two, and two to three, until infinite things come to be -- each with its own qualities and potential to fulfill. A tree that grows straight is cut to make timber. A tree with medicinal bark is stripped of its skin. The advantage to being useless is that it comes harder to be roped in to fulfilling the other people's purposes or desires.

A tree that lives for no other reason than to to fulfill its own existence the one that lives the longest, growing stranger and more unique every year. 

Cicadas can spend seventeen years underground and emerge for only one month in the summer.

Like the cicada, our time on earth is limited. We emerge like a wave from the sea to experience life. But just as a cicada doesn't know about spring or fall, we don't know the wonders that have come before or after we are gone.

Our lives are only one season in the symphony of the universe — both precious and fleeting, and part of an infinite song.