As a manager of people, you have a role in UCO’s commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging. Part of that role requires you to administer a workplace that is unhostile and upholds the legal requirements of a manager. When considering how to be a strong supervisor, those requirements are only the starting point. Inclusive supervisors . . .  read more

The Zhuangzi was a text written by a man named Zhuangzi. He was in direct opposition to Confucian philosophy which is very important in Chinese history. His works were the second most important work in the Daoism philosophy which was a philosophy that said that the followers should follow, “the natural Way.” In today’s time Zhuangzi would have been the friend to live the van life. Through his works you can see his fun care free personality show through and his intense criticism of the Confucianist thought of working to get to higher class and then working to stay in that class. He wrote his stories which often times read a bit like he might have been on something.

The Butterfly Dream, by Chinese painter Lu Zhi (c.1550)
Summary of his works:
In his works he will use different characters to represent different perspectives of his day. Not only are they used for different perspectives, but they also all have in common asking about how they should live their life and what his view of what success looks like. The work I am going to focus on is Chapter Two of his works, Discussion on Making All Things Equal. I chose to focus on this one specifically because I feel like we can learn the most from it. It starts as a conversation between a man named Ziqi and a man named Yan Cheng Ziyou. Ziqi is having an existential crisis. He goes onto talk with his friend about it who then asks him to explain his reasoning and wants to listen to what he has to say. At this point it cuts in and Zhuangzi goes into the more serious part of the story. For the next few pages he goes through and explains many things. He talks about the striving of men and its uselessness. He explains that even if a man goes about doing everything he can to do to leave a mark on the world or if he tries to stave off death it is utterly useless because from the moment we are born we begin to die. Zhuangzi thinks that we should just except that not everything is meant to be understood and working yourself into the ground is insane. He goes onto to state the importance of words, but also that each word can have a different meaning than the face value definition one person has given it. He talks of the best way to avoid to many questions is to speak clearly. He speaks, “their dividedness is their completeness; their completeness is their impairment. No thing is either complete or impaired, but all are made into one again (Puchner, p.1378).” I use this quote because I think it does a nice job of explaining the beauty of things being different. In this story he does a fantastic job of speaking in circles and if he was a cartoon character, he would be master Ugwei off of Kung Fu Panda. He makes his own statement by starting off with he isn’t sure if it fits in a category that someone has already created, but that there are categories everywhere and it will fit somewhere. He then goes onto to talk about beginnings and nonbeing vs being. He ends with the equivalent of, I don’t know I could have heard this from somewhere and be misquoting too kind of an attitude and that whatever the want to make of it they can because there are many different views, and each person can live their own truth in connection with nature. He then talks about how at the start the Way or nature, has no boundaries and speech is not constant. But then man came in and created the boundaries, which are, “there is left, there is right, there are theories, there are debates, there are divisions, there are discriminations, there are emulations, and there are contentions (Puchner, p.1379).” The way it is described is these things were added after the beginning and were not present all the time. This entire story jumps around to different people all talking about how can they understand everything and have ultimate control, but Zhuangzi is trying to get them to understand that life is so much better if you are not always trying to come up with a why for everything and that some times it is okay to just let things happen. At the end he speaks of a character named Zhuang Zhou who dreamed he was a butterfly and woke up wandering which one was reality and then deciding which ever was real it did not matter and he could be both a human and a butterfly.
Conclusion:
In conclusion Zhuangzi was a whimsical wise man who was content to let the world revolve and not doing anything more than he absolutely had too. Many people today would not be able to accept that as a valid way of living, but how many times have we maybe found ourselves just wishing that we could just kick our feet up and not worry about anything. Zhuangzi did exactly that, he let things flow around him and just accepted that not everything needed to have to be labor intensive and was happy to live the life he wanted regardless of what those around him said. We can learn a lot about letting go through his teachings. Not only that but we can also learn about living in harmony with the things around us. Everything has a purpose and that purpose does not have to be grand or life changing, but it is a purpose and everyone has one. We have a tendency to want to judge someone if they are not doing a lot with their live, but Zhuangzi would tell us that person is fulfilling their purpose.
I would encourage you to investigate his teachings and read more of his texts. Not only are they great stories there is so much hidden knowledge in them and it really is things we should integrate into our lives.

An age of Innovation 

When speaking of the Tang Dynasty, one cannot fail to regard the inscrease of cultural confidence and expansion that spread: from the innovation of freshly printed books due to the openness of cultural intermingiling; which brought many new invetions much like that of the printing press, to the clashing of new religions such as the rise of Buhhdism against the old Confucious traditions, and most importnatly an age of literary diversity. Moreover, within this age of innovation, none can top the importance at which the Tang period became most famous for: poetry. As the Norton anthology states,
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The Office of High-Impact Practices (OHIP) is pleased to announce UCO student Ainsley Martinez has been selected as a Finalist for the 2023 Truman Scholars. Ms. Martinez is a Journalism major from Edmond, Oklahoma, and plans to pursue a degree in Journalism from Columbia University.

Truman Scholars demonstrate outstanding leadership potential, a commitment . . .  read more

 

Finish What You Started! 

Complete your college degree 100% online through the Reach Higher – Organizational Leadership program at the University of Central Oklahoma. Reach Higher: FlexFinish is a program for BUSY ADULTS that uses your existing college credits to develop a personalized degree completion program at an AFFORDABLE TUITION rate.

2023 Reach Higher: Reconnect Week –

April 7 – April 14, 2022

Join program representatives at the OKC Dodgers game on April 14 at 7:05 PM. This will be a great time to spend time together and bring your families!

Upcoming Lunch and Learns

3/9: Making Better Decisions as a Leader

4/20: Critical Thinking in Leadership

Location: Downtown Campus: 131 Dean A McGee Ave, OKC.

Here, you will get to build relationships with organizations and continue to learn and grow as leaders. When you attend, you get a free meal and practical leadership tools and invite others at your workplaces to do the same. It is a great way to network with other leaders, continue to develop as a leader, and even introduce people to what we do in the Organizational Leadership degree.

On March 6, Trevor Cox, Ph.D., will be presenting on “Making Better Decisions as Leaders.”

On April 20, Bucky Dodd, Ph.D., will offer thoughts you will recognize from the Critical Thinking for Leaders class.

If you don’t work downtown, we can also cover parking at the Santa Fe parking lot for alumni and students.

Please register using the link below:

https://uco.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_6EBNt9mjdMT3jEy

GET ENROLLED – receive tickets to an OKC Dodgers baseball game!

The first five students to meet with an advisor and enroll in the Reach Higher – Organizational Leadership program during Reach Higher Week will receive two tickets to the April 14th OKC Dodgers game.

Sign up here for more information about Reach Higher Week!