What have wisdom traditions taught about change, and how do people live well when nothing stays the same?
These passages speak directly about change as the condition of a human life: the passing of circumstances, the flow of time, and the freedom found in meeting what comes as it comes.
Common Ground
These traditions agree that change is the nature of things and treat that fact as a doorway rather than a threat. The Tao Te Ching observes that even a violent wind fails to last a morning, so human extremes pass sooner still. Zhuangzi lists gain and loss, success and failure, praise and blame as changes of circumstance that follow one another like day and night. Confucius, standing at a stream, sees time passing without ceasing. Marcus Aurelius writes that all things are in continual flux, himself included. Epictetus counsels wishing for events as they happen. The Dhammapada names the perishing of all created things as the way to purity. Across these sources, peace comes from seeing change clearly and moving with it.
A violent wind does not last for a whole morning; a sudden rain does not last for the whole day. To whom is it that these (two) things are owing? To Heaven and Earth. If Heaven and Earth cannot make such (spasmodic) actings last long, how much less can man!
Taoism - Tao Te Ching, Chapter 23, James Legge, 1891
Read in the libraryDeath and life, preservation and ruin, failure and success, poverty and wealth, superiority and inferiority, blame and praise, hunger and thirst, cold and heat;--these are the changes of circumstances, the operation of our appointed lot. Day and night they succeed to one another before us
Taoism - The Writings of Zhuangzi, Book V, James Legge, 1891
Read in the libraryThe Master standing by a stream, said, "It passes on just like this, not ceasing day or night!"
Confucianism - The Analects, Book IX, James Legge, 1893
Read in the libraryAll things that are in the world, are always in the estate of alteration. Thou also art in a perpetual change, yea and under corruption too, in some part: and so is the whole world.
Stoicism - Meditations, Book IX, Marcus Aurelius, Meric Casaubon, 1634
Read in the libraryDemand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well.
Stoicism - The Enchiridion, VIII, Epictetus, Thomas W. Higginson, 1865
Read in the library`All created things perish,' he who knows and sees this becomes passive in pain; this is the way to purity.
Buddhism - The Dhammapada, v. 277, F. Max Müller, 1881
Read in the libraryDifferent Paths
Taoism
Taoism reads change in the weather and the seasons: extremes exhaust themselves quickly, and the circumstances of a life follow one another as naturally as day and night.
Browse Taoism sourcesConfucianism
Confucianism watches change with reverence: time passes like a stream, and the wise person notices it without trying to hold it.
Browse Confucianism sourcesStoicism
Stoicism accepts flux as the whole condition of the world and finds freedom in wishing for events as they actually arrive.
Browse Stoicism sourcesBuddhism
Buddhism makes impermanence the first thing to see clearly: everything created perishes, and seeing this is itself the path to purity.
Browse Buddhism sourcesSources
All passages are drawn from public domain sources. Read them in full in the library.