When I first started snowboarding, Oscar had a bootlegged version of the video: Subjekt Haakonsen. Terje was and still is one of the dopest boarders out there. Whenever I was up on the hill I would always try to imitate his effortless style. This video blew my mind and the clip will make you have nights dreaming of the pow.

I picked the book, Toa Te Ching translated in English means, "The Book of the Way". The authors name is Lao-Tzu (551-479 B.C.E.) who was thought to be an older contemporary of Confucius.

In the book, Lao-tzu's words can be read as almost a poem where this man or woman has mastered Nature:

"not in the sence of conquering it, but of becoming it. In surrendering to the Toa, in giving up all concepts, judgements, and desires, her mind has grown naturally compassionate. She finds deep in her own experience the central truths of the art of living, which are paradoxical only on the surface: that the more we let go of what we love, the more present our love becomes; the clearer our insight into what is beyond good and evil, the more we can embody the good. Until finally she is able to say, in all humility, "I am the Tao, the Truth, the Life."

In the 33rd poem, it goes like this:

Knowing others is intelligence;
knowing yourself is true wisdom.
Mastering others is strength;
mastering yourself is true power.

If you realize that you have enough,
you are truly rich.
If you stay in the center
and embrace death with your whole heart,
you will endure forever.