The following is adapted from 7 Principles of Nature by Aldrich Chan.
Paradox is woven into the fabric of life. Opposing forces, rather than simply canceling one another out, often create balance and reveal deeper truths. Without our tendency to categorize, we might see paradox not as contradiction but as the wholeness of experience holding everything in tension.
The world itself is paradoxical. On one hand, life feels meaningful—our pursuit of truth, morality, and beauty gives weight to our existence. Yet, when measured against the vastness of time and space, life can also appear meaningless. Humans bridge this gap by making meaning, and because we are a part of nature, nature itself becomes a meaning-making process.
Death and life illustrate this perfectly. Cell death, or apoptosis, is necessary for healthy development, just as psychological “deaths” allow us to grow into new behaviors. But unchecked proliferation brings destruction—cancer biologically, or mania psychologically. Too much life, without death, becomes unsustainable.
Paradox extends to thought itself. Our linear minds struggle with contradictions, but non-linear experience—dreams, art, or flow states—can hold paradox without breaking it down. Daoist philosophy has long embraced this view. The Daodejing presents opposites as complements: being and nonbeing, effort and ease, yielding and strength. Each defines the other.
Zhuangzi expanded on this perspective through parables. In one, a carpenter dismisses a crooked tree as useless for building. Later, the tree reveals in a dream that its very “uselessness” spared it from exploitation, allowing it to live for centuries and shelter countless creatures. What seems worthless in one frame of reference becomes invaluable in another.
Daoism teaches that opposites—male and female, full and empty, soft and hard—are not enemies but partners. The Yin-Yang symbol captures this truth: light contains shadow, and shadow contains light. Each exists only because of the other. Nature, impartial and spontaneous, makes no distinction. The sun rises on the virtuous and the corrupt alike.
Even human development follows paradoxical patterns. Growth often means returning to a kind of purity—not naïve innocence, but a deeper simplicity that emerges from experience. In this sense, progress is less a straight line than a spiral, circling back while reaching forward.
Perhaps the most famous paradox is wuwei—action through nonaction. It describes the effortless flow athletes call “the zone,” when performance peaks precisely because one stops trying so hard. The paradox is that the best action often happens when effort drops away.
Paradoxes defy logic, but they also enrich life. They invite us to see beyond rigid categories, to hold contradictions without forcing resolution. In doing so, they reveal the world not as fractured, but as a dynamic harmony of opposites.
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For more reflections on paradox and the principles of nature, you can find 7 Principles of Nature on Amazon.
Aldrich Chan, Psy.D., is a neuropsychologist, psychotherapist, and founder of the Center for Neuropsychology and Consciousness. He is an adjunct professor for the doctoral and master’s program at Pepperdine University and author of the award-winning book Reassembling Models of Reality. Dr. Chan has publications on mindfulness, trauma, creativity, and novel psychotherapeutic approaches. He hosts weekly meditation groups and has been practicing meditation with special interests in Daoism and Zen for over a decade.