生之畜之 生而不有 為而不恃 長而不宰 是謂玄德

Giving life and nurturing
Giving life and not possessing
Giving and not expecting reward
Raising and not ruling‒
This is known as the Subtle Virtue.

- From #Daodejing Chapter 10 #parenting

Tagged it as parenting... for no particular reason 
Laozi 🤝 Kahlil Gibran
Like, just, love ur kids and let them be their fabulous selves maaaan ✌️
Also if you're a Romance of the Three Kingdoms nerd you might know that 玄德 xuándé, which I have rendered as the Subtle Virtue (more literally Dark Virtue but in English dark = evil, so), is the courtesy name of Liu Bei. This Daoist influence is a peek into the syncretic nature of premodern Chinese societies. Liu Bei is built up to be this ideal of Confucian virtue but that's not at all mutually exclusive with following Daoist ideals. There's this Western conception that Confucianism is this authoritarian, close-minded philosophy like modern right-wing Christianity and that is simply not true, especially in pre-medieval China before the advent of neo-Confucianism.