Taoism, a Chinese philosophical and religious tradition, influences The Lathe of Heaven in several ways. One Taoist idea that figures prominently in the novel is the idea that the universe exists in a state of cosmic balance, wherein every force has a corresponding, balancing counterforce. Many of the novel’s characters struggle with the misconception that their actions have the power to disrupt this balance and force irrevocable changes onto the world. George Orr, the novel’s protagonist, wants to stop his power to change the world through his dreams because he thinks it’s morally wrong to disrupt the natural state of people’s lives this way. Dr. William Haber, Orr’s psychiatrist, disagrees and exploits Orr, manipulating the content of Orr’s dreams to create a new reality that coheres to his vision of a perfect world. Though Haber and Orr represent opposite stances on the ethics of altering the natural state of the universe, what they both fail to recognize is that Orr’s effective dreams can’t actually disrupt the universe’s cosmic balance, since, according to the book’s Taoist philosophy, the universe will respond to each change they enact with a counteracting force of its own. Through the Taoist idea of cosmic balance, then, the novel suggests an alternate path of making peace with the world by reimagining one’s place within the larger universe. Rather than trying to alter (or trying not to alter) the universe to conform to some hypothetical ideal, a person needs to accept their position within that larger universe, avoid engaging in deliberate action or inaction, and instead find reassurance in the restorative power of the universe’s natural balance.
The novel demonstrates the Taoist concept of yin and yang through the opposing personalities and ethical positions of Orr and Haber. The concept of yin and yang dictates that the universe’s opposite forces complement each other to maintain universal balance. Yin symbolizes the earth, the female sex, dark, and passivity. Yang symbolizes heaven, the male sex, light, and activity. In the novel, Orr represents yin, evidenced by Haber’s description of him as “passive” and “feminine.” Haber, boasting typically masculine, strong qualities, represents yang: he’s “broad, hairy,” and repeatedly described as bear-like, which underscores the wild, aggressive, active elements central to his character. The novel establishes Orr and Haber as opposing forces, and for much of the novel they, too, regard each other as foes: Orr criticizes Haber’s action, believing (correctly) that Haber is abusing his medical privileges to exploit Orr’s effective dreams and meddle with the way the universe ought to be. In turn, Haber attacks Orr’s inaction, citing Orr’s refusal to use his effective dreams to improve society as evidence of his moral inferiority.
Though Haber and Orr repeatedly challenge each other’s opposing ethical stances, neither character conquers the other. This reflects the Taoist concept that opposing forces complement rather than overpower each other. Every time Haber manipulates the content of Orr’s dreams to change the world, Orr’s unconscious includes caveats that undermine whatever progress Haber’s changes sought to achieve. For example, in one of their sessions, Haber gives Orr a hypnosuggestion to eliminate racism. Orr’s unconscious responds by eliminating race entirely, giving all of humanity identical, gray skin. Though Orr’s response technically fulfills Haber’s suggestion, it doesn’t actually do anything to change the nature of prejudicial behavior: if everyone’s skin is the same, identical shade of gray, people no longer have a reason to be racist, but that’s not the same thing as eliminating racism altogether. Further, eliminating race eliminates the cultural diversity that accompanies racial difference, and this loss undercuts social progress in Haber’s post-racial world. Orr’s unconscious repeatedly thwarts Haber’s attempts to change the world: Haber’s extreme action gives way to Orr’s extreme passivity, and the world remains basically as good (or as bad) as it was at the start.
In place of adopting extreme moral positions about one’s relationship to the universe, the novel suggests one ought to find a balanced, middle path where one sees oneself as part of, rather than outside, the universe. Orr discovers this path in a dream, when an Alien teaches him about Er’ perrehnne, an Alien concept of cosmic balance. The Alien explains to Orr that “a conscious mind must be part of the whole, intentionally and carefully—as the rock is part of the whole unconsciously.” Whereas unconscious beings like the rock settle into a natural state of harmony within the larger universe, humanity’s consciousness compels it to (incorrectly) conceive of itself as separate from—and therefore able to influence—the universe. This belief only creates dissatisfaction and suffering in confused humans like Orr and Haber, who mistakenly believe that the secret to a fulfilled existence is extreme passivity or extreme action. Orr finds peace after heeding the Aliens’ advice. In his final dream, he sees “great, green sea turtles […] swimming with heavy, inexhaustible grace through the depths, their element.” This image parallels the novel’s opening scene, where a jellyfish swims effortlessly through the ocean, protected by its existence within the larger ocean despite an otherwise fragile physique. In the end, Orr glides through his dreams and waking life as effortlessly as the turtles and jellyfish. The animals, Orr, and his Alien teachers live a satisfying existence because they don’t regard the universe as separate from themselves and as needing to be either challenged or left alone. In the words of Orr’s Alien teacher: “Self is universe.” Orr learns to see his dreams as part of himself, and himself as part of the world: he no longer conceives of his dreams as a harmful, unethical force he needs to control or defeat, nor the universe as a helpless victim from which he must defend those dreams: they are all one, effortlessly ebbing and flowing through time.
Related Themes from Other Texts
Cosmic Balance ThemeTracker
Cosmic Balance Quotes in The Lathe of Heaven
Current-borne, wave-flung, tugged hugely by the whole might of ocean, the jellyfish drifts in the tidal abyss. The light shines through it, and the dark enters it. Borne, flung, tugged from anywhere to anywhere, for in the deep sea there is no compass but nearer and farther, higher and lower, the jellyfish hangs and sways; pulses move slight and quick within it, as the vast diurnal pulses beat in the moon-driven sea. Hanging, swaying, pulsing, the most vulnerable and insubstantial creature, it has for its defense the violence and power of the whole ocean, to which it has entrusted its being, its going, and its will. But here rise the stubborn continents. The shelves of gravel and the cliffs of rock break from water baldly into air, that dry, terrible outer space of radiance and instability, where there is no support for life. And now, now the currents mislead and the waves betray, breaking their endless circle, to leap up in loud foam against rock and air, breaking… What will the creature made all of sea-drift do on the dry sand of daylight; what will the mind do, each morning, waking?
“And the events of the mind, believe me, to me are facts. When you see another man’s dream as he dreams it recorded in black and white on the electroencephalograph, as I’ve done ten thousand times, you don’t speak of dreams as ‘unreal.’ They exist; they are events; they leave a mark behind them.”
“Who am I to meddle with the way things go? And it’s my unconscious mind that changes things, without any intelligent control. I tried autohypnosis but it didn’t do any good. Dreams are incoherent, selfish, irrational—immoral, you said a minute ago. They come from the unsocialized part of us, don’t they, at least partly?”
That geniality was not faked, but it was exaggerated. There was a warmth to the man, an outgoingness, which was real; but it had got plasticoated with professional mannerisms, distorted by the doctor’s unspontaneous use of himself. Orr felt in him a wish to be liked and a desire to be helpful; the doctor was not, he thought, really sure that anyone else existed, and wanted to prove they did by helping them.
He must act, he had to act. He must refuse to let Haber use him any longer as a tool. He must take his destiny into his own hands.
“You speak as if that were some kind of general moral imperative.” He looked at Orr with his genial, reflective smile, stroking his beard. “But in fact, isn’t that man’s very purpose on earth—to do things, change things, run things, make a better world?”
“I don’t know. Things don’t have purposes, as if the universe were a machine, where every part has a useful function. What’s the function of a galaxy? I don’t know if our life has a purpose and I don’t see that it matters. What does matter is that we’re a part. Like a thread in a cloth or a grass-blade in a field. It is and we are. What we do is like wind blowing on the grass.”
The end justifies the means. But what if there never is an end? All we have is means.
The infinite possibility, the unlimited and unqualified wholeness of being of the uncommitted, the nonacting, the uncarved: the being who, being nothing but himself, is everything. Briefly she saw him thus, and what struck her most, of that insight, was his strength. He was the strongest person she had ever known, because he could not be moved away from the center. And that was why she liked him.
She believed him, and denied her belief with fury. “So what? Maybe that’s all it’s ever been! Whatever it is, it’s all right. You don’t suppose you’d be allowed to do anything you weren’t supposed to do, do you? Who the hell do you think you are! There is nothing that doesn’t fit, nothing happens that isn’t supposed to happen. Ever! What does it matter whether you call it real or dreams? It’s all one—isn’t it?”
“I don’t choose,” Orr said. “Don’t you see that yet? I follow.”
“You are afraid of losing your balance. But change need not unbalance you; life’s not a static object, after all. It’s a process. There’s no holding still. Intellectually you know that, but emotionally you refuse it. Nothing remains the same from one moment to the next, you can’t step into the same river twice. Life—evolution—the whole universe of space/time, matter/energy—existence itself—is essentially change.”
“That is one aspect of it,” Orr said. “The other is stillness.”
“Volcanoes emit fire.”
“They are of the dream time. I don’t understand it, I can’t say it in words. Everything dreams. The play of form, of being, is the dreaming of substance. Rocks have their dreams, and the earth changes … But when the mind becomes conscious, when the rate of evolution speeds up, then you have to be careful. Careful of the world. You must learn the way. You must learn the skills, the art, the limits. A conscious mind must be part of the whole, intentionally and carefully—as the rock is part of the whole unconsciously. Do you see? Does it mean anything to you?”
Destruction was not his line; and a machine is more blameless, more sinless even than any animal. It has no intentions whatsoever but our own.
After a while the big body moved, and presently sat up. It was all slack and loose. The massive, handsome head hung between the shoulders. The mouth was loose. The eyes looked straight forward into the dark, into the void, into the unbeing at the center of William Haber; they were no longer opaque, they were empty.
Orr slept. He dreamed. There was no rub. His dreams, like waves of the deep sea far from any shore, came and went, rose and fell, profound and harmless, breaking nowhere, changing nothing. They danced the dance among all the other waves in the sea of being. Through his sleep the great, green sea turtles dived, swimming with heavy, inexhaustible grace through the depths, in their element.
“Take evening,” the Alien said. “There is time. There are returns. To go is to return.”
“Thank you very much,” Orr said, and shook hand with his boss. The big green flipper was cool on his human hand. He went out with Heather into the warm, rainy afternoon of summer. The Alien watched them from within the glass-fronted shop, as a sea creature might watch from an aquarium, seeing them pass and disappear into the mist.
