Philosopher Chuang Tzu (about 365-286 B.C.) lived at a time when China struggled with social chaos and political unrest. Unlike Confucius, who believed the country needed strong leaders trained in virtue, Chuang Tzu proposed individual freedom.

Change your mind to change your world, he taught. "I'd rather play in the mud than be harnessed to a ruler."

Chuang Tzu, along with his predecessor Lao Tzu, created the Tao philosophy of yin and yang, the two forces that underlie everything in the universe. They are opposite, yet exist in a delicate balance... mutually dependent, but complementary in their interaction.

Yin, traditionally symbolized by the White Tiger, is negative, feminine, passive, and dark, linked to the earth. Yang, the Green Dragon, is positive, masculine, active, and light, associated with heaven. Each force has some of its counterpart within it. So the dark of night has the light of stars, the hill has a bright side and a shadowed side.

"When there is no more separation between 'this' and 'that,' it is called the still-point of the Tao. At the still point in the center of the circle one can see the infinite in all things," he taught.

For Chuang Tzu the meaning of life could not be described, labeled, or judged. "We cling to our own point of view, as though everything depended on it. Yet our opinions have no permanence; like autumn and winter, they gradually pass away."

Have the courage to look without judgment.