I need to split the One for a moment to answer the question…
There is consciousness, the thing we lose when we are knocked unconscious. When we are unconscious we are unaware of what is happening around us. Our body keeps breathing and pumping blood around it, but we, as a person, are not consciously aware of anything.
We then have a concept of Consciousness and we might wonder about the nature of it. We might think that we are part of Consciousness in the way drops of water are parts of the sea - yet we are still splitting the One.
In the above examples, we have the experience that we are conscious; we feel, we sense, we react, we have emotions, we think, we consider, and so on. We may believe that there is greater consciousness.
Neither of the above is what the Tao Te Ching (TTC) is referring to.
TTC is trying to point to One Consciousness. The One Consciousness is unchanged when someone is knocked unconscious. What we see as “someone” is the One Conscious. What we experience as “our” consciousness is the One Conscious experiencing itself as us. In Taoism, it happens to be called Tao.
TTC tries to show that when thoughts subside, and silence and stillness is revealed, here is the Tao. When we are thinking, Tao is quietly present. When we are talking, Tao is presently silent. When we are moving, Tao is utterly still.
And being in silence and stillness may one day lead us to the realisation that there is no us, there is only Tao. The me and the not-me is a single Being. And the Being has no problems, no pain, no suffering, no other than itself. Any problems, pain, and suffering are present, being noticed by Presence. It is what is noticing that the TTC is pointing to.
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