Before you send
A jar of muddy water offers a useful question about the reply you are about to send.
A short message arrives: ‘Can we talk about the changes?’ In the minute before you answer, it acquires a tone of voice, a motive and a whole conversation that hasn’t happened.
Chapter 15 of the Daodejing describes muddy water becoming clear when given time. Its image comes from an account of the old practitioners. This note borrows the image for one small decision; a pause is no promise that all the facts will appear.
Write two lines on a piece of paper. On one, put the words that actually arrived. On the other, put the meaning you supplied. Sometimes the second line is useful experience. Sometimes it tells you what to ask next.
Reading note
Source: Daodejing, chapter 15 (James Legge edition). The everyday scene and experiment are DAOEVER’s interpretation.