The Power Of Being Useless
Zhuangzi, the ancient Taoist philosopher, is useless. He’d take that as a compliment. His friend Huizi starts by unleashing what seems to be this sick burn on him, saying,
“I have a huge tree which people call the Stink Tree. The trunk is swollen and gnarled, impossible to align with any level or ruler. The branches are twisted and bent, impossible to align to any T-square or carpenter’s arc. Even if it were growing right in the road, a carpenter would not give it so much as a second glance. And your words are similarly big but useless, which is why they are rejected by everyone who hears them.”I find Chinese philosophy hilarious to read for this reason. They’re constantly dunking on each other and subtweeting the rulers of the day. In this case Huizi is saying what we all think, which is that uselessness is useless. Of course right, that’s what the word means.
Zhuangzi, however, is not so dualistic. As Laozi said, “The Way is like an empty vessel; No use could ever fill it up”. To Zhuangzi, filling oneself with ‘useful’ activity is about as helpful as filling a guitar with cement. How on earth would you hear The Way?
Hence he responds to Huizi, in an ode to slackers everywhere,
“You have this big tree, and…