It's worthwhile to read many translations of this book. I find this really helps to "triangulate" the nuance and depth of the original. Inevitably, you come acr

It's worthwhile to read many translations of this book. I find this really helps to "triangulate" the nuance and depth of the original. Inevitably, you come across translations that you like more, and others that you like less. I was attracted to the Dao De Jing at a fairly young age. It took over a decade, though (as I was reading a related text—I can't remember which one, maybe the Zhuangzi), for it to suddenly dawn on me how alien this was from the way of reasoning that's been ingrained in me through the culture I was brought up in. I had been able to extract tons of enjoyment (and, hopefully, insight) from them already at that point. But from then on, the daoist classics suddenly looked very different to me. They took on a depth that I hadn't seen in them before. A related book I would recommend is Edward Slingerland's Trying Not to Try[1]. A very interesting dive into the concept of Wu Wei. His interpretations of the old texts get a little one/two dimensional at times, but he also brings along a lot of insight. 1: https://eslingerland.arts.ubc.ca/tryingnottotry/ https://eslingerland.arts.ubc.ca/tryingnottotry/