I have been fascinated by Chinese philosophy ever since I read Lin Yu Tang and Bertrand Russell in my early twenties. The Chinese were isolated from Europe and the rest of the world for many centuries and thus they had to and did come up with independent responses to the challenges of human life. Theirs is a unique and peculiar genius.
Nothing illustrates this unique genius more than the Daoist view on being useless. Please go through the story below:
The Story of a Useless Tree
In his work The Inner Chapters, the Daoist philosopher Zhuangzi tells the story of a tree which enjoys being useless. This tree has grown to a vast size and is worshipped in the village. Its branches are “too twisted and gnarled to be used for beams or pillars”, while its trunk is “too splotched and split to be used for a coffin” (translated by Brook Ziporyn in his Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings). So one day when a carpenter encounters the tree, he believes the tree to be “worthless lumber”. Yet, the tree responds to the carpenter’s criticism by appearing to him in a dream and asking him:
“What do you want to compare me to, one of those cultivated trees? The hawthorn, the pear, the orange, the rest of those fructiferous trees and shrubs – when their fruit is ripe they get plucked, and that is an insult…Thus do their abilities embitter their lives. That’s why they die young…They batter themselves with the vulgar conventions of the world.” (Ziporyn’s translation)
In this story, the carpenter’s view is in modern western terms utilitarian. Regardless of the size of the tree or its being worshipped, to the carpenter the tree is nothing more than a waste of space. The existence of the tree serves no purpose. However, the tree feels blessed by its uselessness: it survives, while other “useful” trees are cut down, to be used as wood, or damaged by such violence.
In a quirky and humorous manner, Zhuangzi conveys the basic point that the tree’s very life is saved by its being useless, while its fellow trees that produce things of use are destroyed. In other words, in viewing something simply in terms of its usefulness, we have denied its right to be.
Sourced from:
https://iai.tv/articles/uselessness-as-life-affirmation-a-daoist-reflection-auid-1217
There is the example of Michael Jackson, the musician, who died young. His life was destroyed due to the fact that people used him.
Yet there is in all of us a desire to be needed by family and society. Most of us need a purpose in life and to know that society values us and we have made a difference in other people’s life. This is I think a deep-rooted instinct. To be regarded as completely useless by society is not pleasant. That is why many people suffer from depression when they retire from their career and their children move on to live their lives independently.
Lin Yu Tang therefore advocates the philosophy of Half and Half. Quoting from his book, The Importance of Living:
The happiest man is still the man of the middle class who has earned a slight means of economic independence, who has done a little, but just a little, for mankind, and who is slightly distinguished in his community, but not too distinguished. It is only in this milieu of well known obscurity and financial competence with a pinch, when life is fairly carefree and yet not altogether carefree, that the human spirit is happiest and succeeds best. After all, we have to get on in this life, and so we must bring philosophy down from heaven to earth.
Sourced from:
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