Self-Reflection and Vulnerability in Action Research: Bringing Forth New Worlds in Our Learning

Abstract

This paper looks at experiences in using action research in a self-reflective fashion. It addresses some of the problems which the action researcher has in coping with ourselves in our research. Mendes (1996) quotes Maturana: Everything is fundamental in our being alive and therefore, if we want to explain human experience we need to understand how being alive together generates our existence.2 Although I would add that the social view of existence can be complemented by the view that our personal existence comes forth from a deeper domain, this statement is my starting point. Working from a anecdote which demonstrates the critical importance of individual perception in labeling any issue as a mess, I discuss the importance of self-reflection in the research process and the importance to us as researchers in recognizing our own vulnerability in the research context. Finally, I describe some positive outcomes or prizes of recognizing our vulnerability in research processes and using this vulnerability as a spur to improving our research.

Full text

Systemic
Practice
and
Action Research, Vol.
11, No. 2,
1998
Self-Reflection
and
Vulnerability
in
Action
Research: Bringing Forth
New
Worlds
in Our
Learning
Simon Bell1
Received October
8,
1997; revised November
6,
1997
This paper looks
at
experiences
in
using action research
in a
self-reflective
fashion.
It
addresses some
of the
problems
which
the
action researcher
has in
coping
with
ourselves
in our
research. Mendes (1996) quotes Maturana: "Everything
is
funda-
mental
in our
being alive
and
therefore,
if we
want
to
explain human experience
we
need
to
understand
how
being alive together generates
our
existence.
"2
Although
I
would
add
that
the
social view
of
existence
can be
complemented
by the
view
that
our
personal existence comes
forth
from
a
deeper domain, this statement
is my
starting
point.
Working
from
a
anecdote which demonstrates
the
critical importance
of
indi-
vidual
perception
in
labeling
any
issue
as a
"mess,"
I
discuss
the
importance
of
self-
reflection
in the
research
process
and the
importance
to us as
researchers
in
recog-
nizing
our own
vulnerability
in the
research context. Finally,
I
describe some positive
outcomes
or
"prizes"
of
recognizing
our
vulnerability
in
research processes
and
using
this
vulnerability
as a
spur
to
improving
our
research.
KEY
WORDS: vulnerability; action research; participation.
Priests, politicians, bureaucrats, doctors, lecturers
and
other
powerful
professionals
all too
commonly
go
through
life
sure they
are right,
denying
ignorance
and
hiding error.
Robert Chambers (1997
p.
201)
1.
AN
ANECDOTE. WHEN
IS A
MESS
NOT A
MESS?
(OR
"WHOSE
MESS
IS
THIS?")
This paper
is a
reflection
on the "I" in my
research
and on the
issues which
arise when this
"I" is not
adequately taken into account
as we
strive
for
objec-
1
Centre
for
Complexity
&
Change, Open University, Milton Keynes,
UK.
2 Not of
direct relevance
to
this paper
but of
interest
to a
wider debate concerning
our
subjectivity
is
the
following insight
from
Maturana (1997), given
at a
workshop held
at the
Open University
in
March 1997:
"We
exist only
in the
present.
The
past
and the
future
exist only
in the
present."
179
1094-429X/98/0400-0179$l5.00/0
©
1998 Plenum
Publishing
Corporation

180
Bell
tivity
in
research practice.
"Research"
is not one
thing,
but
broadly
we
might
argue
that
it is
concerned with problem identification, description, analysis,
and
solving.
In all
these
processes
there
is the "I"
behind
the
perception
and
practice
of
research.
In my
practice
I
have
found
self-reflection vital
in
understanding
how
I am
relating
to my
research
and how
this subsequently informs
my
practice.
In
what follows
I
describe some problems with
not
dealing with
the
perceptional
issues which relate
to
being
who we are in our
practice
and I set out
some
lessons
from
identifying
the
vulnerability
of the
researcher.
As an
undergraduate
I
studied
at the
School
of
Development Studies
at the
University
of
East Anglia. Soon
after
completing
my
degree
in
1981
I
attended
a
lecture
at the
school
given
at a
workshop
by a
visiting lecturer.
I do not
remember
who the
lecturer
was but the
anecdote
has
been
of
lasting importance
to me. It
sums
up a lot
about
our
experience
of the
world
as
those seeking
to
intervene
for the
"good."
It has a lot to say
about intervention, accuracy,
objectivity,
and
critical reflection. Here
it is, and if my
memory
is
poor
and the
detail
is
incorrect,
I
apologize
but . . . the
story
was
still
an
instructive narrative
for
me.
This
is an
anecdote about
a
plague
of
variegated grasshoppers which
occurred
in
North Africa. Over
a
period
of
time
all was
laid waste
by the
menace. Cash crops were devastated
as,
locust-like,
the
plague spread across
the
countryside eating everything.
Here
is the
problem,
but how
should
the
international community deal
with
it?
The
answer
was to
send
in
experts.
The
Food
and
Agriculture Organisation
of
the
United Nations
(FAO)
was
called upon
to
send
in a
team
of
experts
to
analyze
and
solve
the
problem. What sort
of
experts does
a
situation
of
this type
call
for?
The
answer which
was
assumed
by the
international community
was
grasshopper
eradication
experts.
A
team
was
picked
and
sent.
The
team included
people
who
understood grasshoppers, people
who
understood pesticides, people
who
understood
the
effect
of
pesticides
upon grasshoppers,
and
people
who
understood
the
effect
of
pesticides
and
grasshopper upon crops. There were lots
of
experts.
One
nonessential person
was
included,
but
this could
not be
helped.
On
the
team
of
experts
was an
anthropologist. Why?
Did
this person understand
grasshoppers
or
pesticides
or
crops?
No, but
anthropologists
do
understand
how
to
talk
to
people,
and
this
was an
issue
which
was
seen
as
having
some
incidental
relevance
and
importance
to the
core business
of the
team.
The
team arrived
and got on
with
its
job.
The job
consisted
of
assessing
the
ways
in
which
the
maximum number
of
grasshoppers could
be
killed
in the
shortest time
and at the
lowest
cost.
While
the
true experts
got on
with
the job
the
anthropologist went
and
talked
to the
local
people,
benighted
by the
plague.
The
scientists came
up
with
a
variety
of
scientific means
to
eradicate
the
problem
for a
certain
cost
and in a
certain time;
the
anthropologist
found
that
the
"mess"
was not the
mess
first
thought. Variegated grasshoppers
are a
del-

Self-Reflection
and
Vulnerability
in AR
181
icacy
of
some considerable value
and a rich
source
of
protein. While
it is
true
that
they take feeding
to
gain maturity,
the
devastation
to the
crops
was a
small
cost
for the
value
of the
abundant food supply which they subsequently repre-
sented.
2.
LEARNING FROM
THE
ANECDOTE
(PUTTING
THE
ANECDOTE
TO
WORK)
The
anecdote above
is set out in the
format
in
which
I
received
it as a
student, providing
a
stark constrast between institutional problem solving
and
questioning
the
nature
of the
problem,
but
What
did I
learn
from
this?
• The first
point relates
to
accuracy
and
critical reflection. This anecdote
helped
me in
developing
my
understanding
of
what
is a
"mess."
A
"mess"
is a
function
of the
onlooker's
preperceptions.
• The
second point
is
related
to
intervention
and
objectivity.
"Problems"
are
defined
by
people
who
experience
what they think
is a
"problem."
The
actor
in the
context brings
forth
an
interpretation
of the
reality which,
if
the
actor
is
powerful,
can
become
the
reality
accepted
by
others.
• The
third point, arising
from
the first
two,
is
that
a
narrow, single-actor,
definition
of
"objectivity"
is not a
consistent
or
trustworthy device
for
understanding problems
in
variable contexts.
• The
fourth
point
is
that there
can be
argued
to be
three variable realities
which
are
important
in the
understanding
of the
"reality"
of the
research
process—personal
context, social context,
and
environmental context
(see
Fig.
1).
• The fifth
point
is
that
the
researcher
is in a
very
difficult
and
challenging
position.
This also takes
me to the
core
of my
input
to the
Forum
One
Conference
3
(Wilby,
1996):
that
we, as
researchers,
are
intensely vulnerable
in the
research
context.
We
often
do not
take ourselves seriously;
often
we do not
reflect
ade-
quately
upon
our
social context
(the
baggage
we
bring
in and the
contrast which
we
perceive)
and we
have problems
in
recognizing
the
complexity
of the
envi-
ronmental
context.
In the
anecdote,
the
biologists
and
pesticide specialists were
not
wrong
but
their view
was
partial
and
limited
and
should
not
have dominated
all
other views.
Reality
is
complex
and no
single view will
be
adequate
to
explain
the
nature
of
the
complexity within
and
around
us. In
quoting Donald Schon, Chambers
(1997
p.
190)
says,
3
Forum
One:
Action Research
and
Critical Systems Thinking
was a
conference held under
the
auspices
of the
Centre
for
Systems
Studies,
University
of
Hull, April
29-May
1,
1996.

182
Bell
Fig.
1.
Overlapping realities.
"In the
varied topography
of
professional practice, there
is a
high,
hard ground
overlooking
a
swamp.
On the
high
ground, manageable problems lend themselves
to
solution
through
the
application
of
research-based theory
and
technique.
In the
swampy
lowland,
messy, confusing problems
defy
technical solution.
The
irony
of
this situ-
ation
is
that
the
problems
of the
high ground tend
to be
relatively unimportant
to
individuals
or
society
at
large, however great technical interest
may be,
while
in the
swamp
lie the
problems
of
greatest
human
concern.
The
practitioner
must
choose.
Shall
he
[sic] remain
on the
high ground where
he can
solve relatively unimportant
problems according
to
prevailing standards
of rigour, or
shall
he
descend
to the
swamp
of
important problems
and
non-rigorous enquiry?"
The
evolving paradigm turns this
on its
head,
as
Schon perhaps would wish.
His
high ground
describes
the
conditions
of
normal professionalism,
but a new
pro-
fessionalism
is
taking
over.
The
imagery
is
upended:
the
swamp
becomes
the new
high
ground.
In
the new
paradigm
of
understanding,
the
"swamp"
or
mess becomes
the
primary
ground
for
understanding
and
learning.
The
challenges
for the
researcher
grow;
the
sense
of
vulnerability
and
anxiety
(as
well
as
excitement) grows. Non-
self-reflective
practitioners have
for
many years focused
on the
manageable
and
the
limited type
of
problem
on
which their discipline focuses.
In
Fig.
2 I
show
this
as a
shaft
of
light
in a
dark room.
The
important point arising from
the
consideration
of
Fig.
2 is
that
the
potential world
is not the
potential world
of the
single discipline. This discipline,
be it
agriculture
or
physics
or
biology (the dominant science, with
the
dominant

Self-Reflection
and
Vulnerability
in AR
183
Fig.
2. The
potential
and
"known"
world.
worldview
for the end of the
20th century)
or
whatever,
can
never
"know"
the
total potential world
by its own
definitions because
the
potential world
is
more
than
any or
even
all of
these definitions.4
The
result
of
this observation
in my
research
has
been
a
recognition
of the
need
to
reflect
consciously
and
critically
on
my own
practice. Reflection might
be an aid in
response
to the
anxiety which
arises
from
a
recognition
of
vulnerability.
4
The
way in
which
a
science
rises to
domination
is
interesting
and is
discussed elsewhere
(e.g.,
see
Kuhn,
1962).
From atomic physics, followed
by
chemists
and the
Green Revolution,
now
genes
and
biologists.
A
pattern
emerges:
•
Someone makes
a
breakthrough with
big
implications/ramifications
for
commerce
or
what-
ever.
• The
breakthrough generates
the
usual
cluster
of
academics
fighting it out for the
high ground.
• As the
area becomes better known, resources
and
funding
pour
in,
often
depleting
funding
from
other
fields in the
process
(e.g.,
at an
AIDS conference
I
attended medics talked
of the
movement
of
funds
from
heart disease
to
cancer
to
AIDS
as
money
following
"fashion").
• If
advance continues, more resources
follow,
more academics cluster,
and the first
products
start
to
make
it
from
science
to
technology.
• The
technology
is
adopted quickly
and
widely. Great claims begin
to be
made, doubters
are
discouraged
and
often
seen
as
doom mongers
or
pessimists against
the
bright
new
dawn.
•
Ultimately
the
problems
of the new
science make themselves known
by a
catastrophe
of
some kind which
the
original scientists claim
"could
not
have been
foreseen."

184
Bell
3.
COMING
TO THE
POINT:
REFLECTIVE PRACTICE
Any
insights
I
have concerning
my
practice arise
from
reflection
on my
practice.
Emphasizing this point, elsewhere (Bell, 1996,
pp.
61-62)
I
have said,
concerning reflections
on my own
work,
I do not see the
points made here
as
being
final or
conclusive
and I
reserve
the right
to
change
ray
mind
and
start again.
I am now a
confirmed
addict
to
reflection
on
practice.
I am
aware that this
can be ...
seen
as
being
a
decadent
luxury.
I am
also
aware that
in my
experience
it has
been
a
source
of
insight
and an
opportunity
to
reflect
upon
the
real
process
of
personal
and
group development which
all
research
involves.
To
ignore
it is to
abstain
from
a
profound learning gain which
is
available
free-of-charge
within
all
research
processes.
The
researcher
is
fallible
and
vulnerable
within
the
research context.
Of
course
we can try to
cover
up
this vulnerability with
the
garb
of our
profession
but
this
instantly
diminishes
us as
experiential creatures sharing
the
understanding
of
our
existence with others. This
is a
gateway
to a
deep topic which
I
cannot hope
to
cover here.
Briefly,
it
includes
the
nature
of
ownership
of
understanding
and
recognition
of
authority. Long (1992,
p.
27),
in
discussing actor-oriented
research, describes some elements
of
this topic
as
follows:
Knowledge
encounters
involve
the
struggle between actors
who aim to
enroll
others
in
their 'projects,' getting them
to
accept
particular
frames
of
meaning,
winning
them
over
to
their
point
of
view.
If
they succeed
then
other parties
'delegate'
power
to
them.
These struggles
focus
around
the fixing of key
points
that
have
a
controlling
influence
over
the
exchanges
and
attributes
of
meaning.
The
research method which
I
have
found
most
satisfying
in
terms
of
developing
my
reflective practice
and
developing
my
counderstanding
of the
meaning
in
the
world
is
action research.
4.
ACTION RESEARCH (AR)
Early
on in my
research
practice
I
struck upon
AR as the
basis
for
mean-
ingful
exploration
of
complex
social
situations.
At the
time
I was
unaware
of
the
work
of
Reason
and
Heron
in the AR
domain (Heron, 1990; Reason, 1994;
Heron, 1996; Reason
and
Heron, 1996)
or of
Ulrich (1996)
in the
systems
domain,
and
working
in
developing countries,
I
took
my
format
for
action
research
from
the
work
of
Bottrall (1982). Bottrall (1982) provided
a five-step
approach
to
action research
as set out
below.
1.
Diagnosis. Research team
to
conduct independent, objective appraisal
of
client
organisation's existing structure
and
management performance; subsequent joint dis-
cussion
of findings
between client
and
research team
and
agreement
on
definition
of
principal problems.

Self-Reflection
and
Vulnerability
in AR
185
2.
Action planning. Joint consideration
of
alternative sources
of
remedial action.
Joint
agreement
on
course
of
action
to be
followed.
3.
Action taking. Client organisation
to
take agreed action; research team
to
stand
back
from
action, monitoring
client's
decision making
processes
and
their
effects.
4.
Evaluation. Research team
to
present evaluation
of
action programme
to
client
for
joint discussion.
5.
Specifying
learning. Client
to
extract lessons
from
evaluation
of
particular concern
to
itself (which
may be fed
back into
further
cycles
of
action planning, action taking
and
evaluation). Research team
to
extract lessons
for
general theory
and for its
application
in
action research programmes elsewhere.
My
reflective application
of
this approach
is to be
found
elsewhere (Bell,
1996),
however,
my
experience
was
that,
in
adopting
the
action
research
perspective
in
my
work
I
moved
from
a
scientific
view
of
problem solving
to a
systems
view
of
problem solving.
The
differences
between these
two
positions
as I see
them
is
shown diagrammatically
in
Figs.
3 and 4.
The
challenge
of the AR
perspective
is one of
recognition
of the
true
richness
which
the
world contains
and
which
we can and
must attempt
to
contain
too if we are to
achieve sympathetic understanding
of it.
Inviting
in the
world
and
taking responsibility
for the
world
which
we
bring
forth
in our
understanding
is
an
action which places
us in a
position
of
vulnerability,
but I
argue that this
position
is to be
preferred
to any
adopted
by
those Chambers refers
to as
"pro-
fessionals."
Drawing
from
Plato's
Republic, Chambers
(1997,
p. 55)
says,
Unwitting
prisoners, professionals
sit
chained
to
their central places
and
mistake
the
flat
shows
of
figures,
tables,
reports, professional papers
and
printouts
for the
rounded,
dynamic,
multidimensional substance
of the
world
of
those others
at the
peripheries.
But
there
is a
twist
in the
analogy. Platonism
is
stood
on its
head.
Plato's
reality,
of
which
the
prisoners received only
the
shadows,
was of
essences,
each sample,
unitary,
abstract
and
unchanging.
The
reality,
of
which
core
professionals perceive
only
the
simplified
shadows,
is in
contrast
a
diversity:
of
people,
of
farming
systems
and
livelihoods,
each
a
complex whole,
concrete
and
changing.
But
professionals
recon-
struct that reality
to
make
it
manageable
in
their
own
alien analytic terms, seeking
and
selecting
the
universal
in the
diverse,
the
part
in the
whole,
the
simple
in the
complex,
the
controllable
in the
uncontrollable,
the
measurable
in the
immeasurable,
... For the
convenience
and
control
of
normal professionals,
it is not the
local,
complex, diverse,
dynamic
and
unpredictable reality
of
those
who are
poor,
weak
and
peripheral that counts,
but the flat
shadows
of
that reality that they, prisoners
of
their professionalism,
fashion
for
themselves.
So
my
position
has to be one of
recognition
of my
vulnerability
as an
agent
who
can
make mistakes
5
and as an
actor,
alive
in the
world which
I
share with
others.
I
want
to go on now to
look
in
more depth
at the
issue
of
vulnerability.
5Another quote
from
Maturana (1997) provides insight here:
"When
you
say,
'I
made
a
mistake,
I
apologize,'
this does
not
undo
what
was
done,
it
simply begs respect
for
one's
honesty."

186
Bell

Self-Reflection
and
Vulnerability
in AR
187

188
Bell
5.
VULNERABILITY-A
VALUABLE ASSET
TO
KNOW ABOUT?
Vulnerability
is a
state:
"wounding,
injurious,
to
wound" (Webster's 1924).
The
vulnerable condition
or
state
is one of
being open
to
danger
and
personal
injury.
Historically,
we
have tended
to see the
scientist
and
researcher
as
being
far
from
such conditions. Rather,
the
scientist,
as
innovator
and
change
agent,
has
at
times taken
on a
rather heroic form.
However,
there
can be a
down
side:
This then
is the
myth
of the
hero-innovator:
the
idea that
you can
produce,
by
training,
a
knight
in
shining armour who, loins girded
with
new
technology
and
beliefs, will
assault
his
organisational fortress
and
institute changes both
in
himself
and
others
at
a
stroke. Such
a
view
is
ingenuous.
The
fact
of the
matter
is
that organisations such
as
schools
and
hospitals
will,
like dragons,
eat
hero innovators
for
breakfast. (Geor-
giades
and
Phillimore, 1980,
p.
113)
The
experience
of the
hero-innovator researcher
can be a
tough one. There
are
a
number
of
areas
of
vulnerability which
I can
identify
arising
from
my
expe-
rience—here I
categorize them
as
relating
to
personal context, social context,
and
environmental context
as first
defined
in
Section
2.
While each area
is
distinct, there
is
considerable overlap between categories, which
are not
intended
to
be
definitive
but, rather, exploratory.
For
each
of the
three categories
of
context
I
draw
out
three problems
or
areas
of
vulnerability
for the
researcher.
5.1. Vulnerability
in a
Personal
Context
• The
unrealistic research quality
"threat."
Researchers
are
required
to do
research
and to
produce
it at a
given quality
and of a
given quantity.
Research which does
not
appear
to
meet
the
target
set by
peer
groups
is
not
acceptable.
Often
the research
model being applied
is
unrealistic
and
often
the results of
research
are
manicured into shape
and
publication.
Nevertheless, there
is a
constant pressure
on researchers to
produce imag-
inative,
unique,
and
quality research such
as one
sees
on the
bookshelves,
research which itself
has
often
been manicured into acceptable shape.
• You may not be
paranoid
but
they
are out to get
you! Researching
is
often
a
process which
is
aggressively
reviewed by
others. Discussion
of
a
Ph.D. with examiners
is
called
a
"defense."
There
can be a
feeling
that
enemies
surround
you on all
sides.
•
Self-doubt. Researchers, building upon
a
life-long experience
of
winning
academic prizes,
are
expected
to be
(and
often
are)
confident
and
self-
assertive. Heaven help
researchers who
doubt their work
or are riddled
with
self-doubt about their
own
capacities.

Self-Reflection
and
Vulnerability
in AR
189
5.2.
Vulnerability
in a
Social
Context
•
Self-preservation. Active research practice
can be
very tough
and
there
is
often
a
perception that
"bastards
do
well."
Self-preservation
can
lead
to
callous
and
unkind behavior
to
others.
• The
authorities
who
control research funding—"I must
justify
my
posi-
tion!"
Linked closely
to the
instinct
for
self-preservation
can be a
need
constantly
to be
expressing
one's
"self"
as the
dominant feature
in the
research context. Requirements
to
"publish
or
perish"
can
feed this
instinct.
Incessant self-expression
can be
very tiring
and
eventually lead
to
exhaustion.
•
Domineering mindsets.
The
outcome
of
research process
is to
recognize
that
there
are
dominant thinkers
and
thoughts with which
one has to be
careful.
The
researcher, when
"established,"
can
become such
a
dom-
inant
one
too. This domination
is
self-assertion
out of
control:
"My
ideas
count"
is
often
followed
by
"Your
ideas
don't!"
Anyone
who has
witnessed
two
professors attacking each other
at a
conference knows
all
about
this!
5.3. Vulnerability
in an
Environmental
Context
• Out of my
depth. Situations
can be
worrying, especially
if, on
reflection,
you
think
you do not
have
the
necessary skills
and
talents
to
deal
with
the
research
in
progress. Cryptically this
can
lead
to the
researcher
feign-
ing
expert status
as a
means
to
cover
up.
• Out of my
context.
You
probably
feel
that
you
know your
own
reality
of
work
and
home pretty well. Strange contexts, other
people's
homes
and
work,
can be
worrying
and
outside
one's
range
of
world experiences.
This
can
result
in
panic, which
can in
turn lead
to
self-preservation, self-
assertion,
and
self-expression.
•
Keep
it
out!
If the
reality
we are
trying
to
study
is
personally, socially,
or
environmentally worrying,
we may
wish
to
"keep
it
out," creating
distance
between
ourselves
and the
objects
of
concern.
This
sometimes
leads
to
self-blinkering, aggression,
and
various levels
of
ignorance
in
one's
understanding
of the
shared context.
6.
MAKING VULNERABILITY WORK
FOR
YOU—PRIZES
Arising
from
the
negative elements brought
out in the
previous section,
I
would
like
to
conclude this article
by
underlining
the
positive outcomes which
can
arise
for the
researcher
who
grasps
the
opportunities
of
self-reflection upon

190
Bell
Table
I.
Problems
and
Prizes
of
Vulnerability
Problem
of
non-self-reflective
vulnerability
Unrealistic quality standards
Paranoia
Doubt
Self-preservation
Incessant self-expression
Undue
self-assertion
Out
of my
depth
Out
of my
context
Keep
it
out!
Prize
of
self-reflection
with
vulnerability
Realistic expectation
Tolerance
Humility
Self-giving
Listening
Self-containment
But
I can
learn
But
I can
experience
But
I am
already part
of
"it"
and
"it"
is
part
of me
one's
own
vulnerability.
I put up the
following
"prizes
of
vulnerability"
in
Table
I as
positive
responses
to
threat.
I do not
wish
to be
seen
as
indicating
that
I
have
achieved
these prizes
but I do
think
I am
working toward them.
I
welcome comment upon them following reflection. Reflecting critically upon
one's
research
and
one's
intervention
in the
world leads
me to the
paradox
of
action
in
inaction
and
knowing
in not
claiming
to
know. Possibly this reflection
takes
the
discussion
out of the
realm
of
orthodox research,
and a
quote
from
Lao Tze
might
be
enlightening:
The
Showing Forth
of the
Mystery.
Looking
at it, it
eludes
the
eyes;
therefore
it is
called Invisible. Listening
to it, it
eludes
the
ears; therefore
it is
called Inaudible. Touching
it, it
eludes
the
grasp;
therefore
it is
called Intangible. These three cannot
be
described,
but
they blend
in
unity—The
Tao. Above
it is not
bright: below,
it is not
dim. (The Shrine
of
Wisdom,
1974,
p. 11)
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