A couple years back, I shared with some of the you the story of when Jodi shared with Brendan a book she’d purchased for me. It was called, The Tao of Pooh, and used the classic A. A. Milne characters to illustrate principles of Taoist philosophy in an easy-to-read and -understand way.

I loved the book. Brendan’s comment, however, was, “Is that about Winnie-the-Pooh, or just poo?”

Our tai chi instructor recently gave me his extra copy of the companion follow-up to The Tao of Pooh, a somewhat thicker volume called The Te of Piglet. I couldn’t wait to dig in.

A lot of people love both of these books. For me, Te tries way too hard to make Big Points, forgetting the point of the book is the Virtue of Smallness, manifested in Piglet. Much of the content centers on the author’s politics, which is fine, but none of his points require the pages he takes to make them, and what the book gains in weight it loses in charm.

Read The Tao …, and enjoy how Benjamin Hoff captures the spirit and voice of Milne and his beloved animals. If you like it, by all means pick up The Te … and read just one chapter: “The Upright Heart.” The tao of Piglet is contained there. The rest is kind of just poo.