Laozi uses water as a metaphor for the Dao for their shared characteristics. Water has no fixed shape, conforming to its container. This mirrors the Dao’s formless nature.
By avoiding direct confrontation when weak (e.g., flowing around obstacles), water remains unharmed even by the hardest materials. Water appears gentle yet holds immense force (e.g., eroding rock over time or generating tsunamis), embodying the paradox of “ultimate softness uniting with ultimate strength. The Dao is formless, yet governs all tangible beings in the world.
There is nothing in the world more soft and weak than water, and yet for attacking things that are firm and strong there is nothing that can take precedence of it; – for there is nothing (so effectual) for which it can be changed.
Every one in the world knows that the soft overcomes the hard, and the weak the strong, but no one is able to carry it out in practice.Therefore a sage has said,
‘He who accepts his state’s reproach,
Is hailed therefore its altars’ lord;
To him who bears men’s direful woes
They all the name of King accord.’Words that are strictly true seem to be paradoxical.
Laozi’s revelation that “the weak overcome the strong, the soft conquer the hard” embodies counterintuitive wisdom rooted in paradoxical natural laws. Ordinary minds fixate on superficial dominance, oblivious to the latent power within adaptability and endurance.
Human instinct drives direct confrontation in conflicts—resisting criticism, battling pressures head-on—rather than emulating water’s strategy of “dispersing force through alignment”. True strength mirrors Tai Chi mastery: redirecting force from solid to void, transforming external pressures into strategic advantages.
Similarly, rulers who hold supreme glory and power must simultaneously endure immense criticism and existential dangers.
“Those who bear the nation’s disgrace are called its masters; those who bear its calamities are called its kings.”
This reflects Lao Tzu’s teaching: Reversal is the movement of the Tao. All things inevitably transform into their opposites.
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