TOO MUCH THINKING HARMS MY LIFE

I found this in my personal journal and thought I'd share it. This comes from my world literature course last semester, which was one of the best classes I took while attending Auburn University. The professor I had, Matt Klauza, was extremely motivating. He encouraged us to think beyond the obvious and to appreciate each piece of literature for what it meant in time period. One of my favorite authors we studied was T'ao Ch'ien (375- 427 C.E.). He was a Chinese writer that believed in simplicity and how important it was to be who you were created to be. He came to believe this because he saw unhappy people all around him who simply did things because it made then rich or brought them fame. This is an excerpt from his poem Spirit's Solution:

Doing good is always a joyous thing

But no one has to praise you for it.

Too much thinking harms my life;

Just surrender to the cycle of things,

Give yourself to the waves of the Great Change

Neither happy nor yet afraid.

And when it is time to go, then simply go

Without any unnecessary fuss.

I hope this brings comfort to people who are stressed about what the next step in life is supposed to be, as I have been. I recommend meditation and prayer as well.

P.S.-I have also decided to start using correct punctuation when posting. I feel like it's a bit annoying for the reader to have everything in lower case. You readers tell me what you think.