“Do your work then step back,
The only path to serenity.”
—Stephen Mitchell, Tao Te Ching, Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 1988
This is not the first time Lao Tzu has introduced this idea (Verse 2), and it won’t be the last.
This portion of Verse 9 implies that we all have work, something that is truly and rightfully ours to do, some contribution to make. Once we make it, we must let go of it; let go of the outcome. If it is not received, we should not keep offering it repeatedly, nor force it by insisting, pestering, persuading, or demanding.
“Just put it out there and let go,” I like to say to myself.
Lao Tzu says this is the path to serenity—the letting-go part, the stepping-back part. It will come as no surprise to you who read this that I have not mastered this path and that I have not yet achieved serenity. The temptation to step forward again is so great, so hard to resist. I meddle, remind, rephrase, justify. If I say it differently, perhaps then they will listen, I think.
Might serenity come from knowing I have offered my very best; my truest and most authentic work? Is that knowledge my sole reward? Rather than the reaction of those to whom I have made the offering, or the outcome of what I have proposed or done?
I’m struck that Stephen Mitchell used the metaphor of stepping back in his translation of this text. It conjures for me the image of stepping forward, arms outstretched, to offer a gift and then stepping back, quietly and demurely, to allow the recipient the space, time, and freedom to receive and unwrap the gift in whatever way they wish, or perhaps not at all.
In this metaphor, my work is my offering; the true action that arises from the essence of my authentic self. Lao Tzu knew what a challenge it is to give that—one’s authentic self— and to let go of how it is received. But oh, the serenity if one can meet that challenge!
May I learn how to step back and trust the outcome. May I learn how to put it out there and let go.
