9thousandthings

Tea with Lao Tzu - 81 Days on IG

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( I copied this from a post I made on reddit's /r/taoism in case it looks familiar to you  ;) Also, since it was dealing with Instagram, and a project elsewhere, I wasn't sure I should put it in Textual Studies - besides it didn't seem quite a "Study" enough...more fun oriented...)

 

Greetings Tao and Tea lovers (and anyone else interested)! I just wanted to invite any Tea lovers and Instagram users to this little enjoyment of the Tao Te Ching.

 

It started with a user in the IG tea world, @augustmoontea, as she began posting the chapters with her daily tea photos.  Each day, the next section with tea.  

 

I've joined in and posted a different translation, maybe a bit of commentary from other writers, or our own.  We're on chapter 4 as of today, so still plenty of time to join in if you'd like.  

 

Add some commentary, or thoughts on existing posts.  Or join in and post on your own page a different translation, version, interpretation, language, etc of that day's chapter with your Tea photo and tag it with #TeaWithLaoTzu and #TeaWithLaoTzuDay4 (where 4 is replaced by chapter / day).

 

It's not the best platform (that's probably here) for discussion, but we're making do.  It's more about the "spirit" of sharing...

 

Anyhow, check it out if you like!


 

yours in the way,

9thousandthings

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Lovely - I'm into Taoism and teaism too.

 

Is there a Tumblr version as well, or is it only on Instagram? (I have a Tumblr account only).

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Lovely - I'm into Taoism and teaism too.

 

Is there a Tumblr version as well, or is it only on Instagram? (I have a Tumblr account only).

Old River,

 

No, sorry, this specific thing lives only on Instagram - it sort of spontaneously began the other day between me and another user.  I'm trying to invite others to take part - not sure how it could export to another platform...and I'm not too familiar with Tumbler...

 

She's started with ch.1 on one of her tea photos, and the next day I saw ch. 2 and asked her if she planned on posting all 81, 1 each day...and she said yes.  I thought of some of the threads here at Dao Bums in the Textual Studies section where folks shared their ideas on the sections.  The timing was perfect - I had just gotten hold of several new versions myself, including Red Pine's with all the commentary.  So, it seemed like a cool thing to attempt, despite the nature of the platform which is not very conducive to discussion.

 

I'm actually pretty new to Instagram.  I had grown bored with Facebook and its constant noise, and about the same time began drinking tea in earnest again (from a long hiatus).  I was enjoying taking photos of my tea, at first to just help document all the new stuff I was trying (most of my tea drinking life I'd been a green tea guy), and then it kinda worked its way into part of my daily (or 2x daily) ritual.  I stumbled on Instagram one day when reading a post on Steepster (what this place is to dao, that place is to tea), and really fell in love with the simple, clean, less busy, image focused nature of it.  I opened an account began posting my tea photos....tea only.  It's been great, there's quite the lovely tea community that has "found" each other through photos.

 

You can check out my photos here ( I don't think you have to be registered to view pages)

 

Anyhow, that's a long ramble to answer a short question!

 

There's an older Tea Thread or 2 hanging around that I keep meaning to bump, but they're in the Healthy Bums section.  I'd love to have one that's more general than that.  While I'm not opposed to the healthy aspects of tea, it's not why I drink it - and with its rich history among daoist (and buddhist, and...) traditions I think it deserves a place beyond a "Health" section :)  .... guess I'll have to go start one!

 

Thanks for your comment!  Oh and BTW, I've been checking out your beautiful version of the DDJ - it's wonderful...may I share sections of it online (in this Instagram idea for example) with others?

Edited by 9thousandthings
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I'm not too familiar with Tumblr, but yes, just about anything is a better alternative than Facebook's high noise to signal ratio.  I think there are ways some of these networking sites overlap or intersect or link up or whatever the technical terms might be.  But its a beautiful idea.  I have run across a few other tea-o-pheliac (?) sites on Tumblr in the past.  Thank you for sharing your own pics.  I think a tea tradition thread would be lovely (I love hot tea a great deal, but my knowledge of it is not very deep).

 

And by all means, yes, I don't mind you sharing chapters from my version of the DDJ -- I'd be honored, in fact! 

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