Lakes and rivers are lords of the hundred valleys. Why? Because they’ll go lower. So they’re the lords of the hundred valleys.

Just so, a wise soul, wanting to be above other people, talks to them from below and to guide them follows them.

And so the wise soul predominates without dominating, and leads without misleading. And people don’t get tired of enjoying and praising one who, not competing, has in all the world no competitor.

Note UKLG: One of the things I love in Lao Tzu is his good cheer, as in this poem, which while giving good counsel is itself a praise and enjoyment of the spirit of yin, the water-soul that yields, follows, eludes, and leads on, dancing in the hundred valleys.