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Overview
Many people lead stressful lives. They hate their jobs, don’t spend enough time with loved ones and rarely feel a true sense of purpose in life.
What can we do? Ancient Chinese teachers and philosophers knew how to live effortlessly. Although they lived thousands of years ago, their teachings are still valuable today.
You can be happier if you listen to your gut and do the following things: (1) get enough sleep, (2) exercise, and (3) spend time with friends.
Big Idea #1: Traditional Chinese philosophy teaches the concept of effortless work through total immersion in process.
Can you remember the last time you were completely absorbed in an activity like playing with a child or solving a challenging puzzle? The Chinese have a word for this: wu-wei. It means to be so wrapped up in an experience that it seems effortless.
This idea poses interesting questions about the relationship between the mind and body. People tend to separate them, but for wu-wei, they work together as one entity. The result is a fluidity that adds intelligence and spontaneity to our actions.
The author’s writing process is one of wu-wei, a state of being that he experiences when he writes. It’s defined by relaxation and pleasure with his work. The Chinese philosophy Taoism also talks about living in harmony with the natural flow of the universe. In Zhuangzi, there’s a story about how a woodcarver finds himself in this state before making an ornate bell stand from a single tree. He fasts for seven days and then enters the forest to find that tree from which he can see his creation.
Wu-wei is an essential aspect of martial arts. It makes you whole, and it’s when your mind stops seeing your body as separate from the world around you. You don’t think about what to do; instead, you act instinctively, guided purely by instinct. Work done while in this state reflects the beauty of the process and how sincere it feels at that moment.
Big Idea #2: The Chinese concept of effortless work leads to great power and a path to becoming a perfect human.
Wu-wei unites your whole being, and de is a concept that refers to power, virtue and charisma. De transports one into a perfectly spontaneous mind-set.
Power and influence are important to leaders. If they reach a certain point, people will naturally follow them without being forced to do so. Average citizens can also benefit from this by making other people like them, feel attracted to them or even stop wild animals from threatening or attacking them.
So, why are people attracted to those who have de? Because they’re in touch with their unconscious mind. We trust this mind because it allows people to act from their natural instincts and not from any sneaky forethought. De is also connected to The Way, which is an ancient Chinese concept of heaven that leads one on a path towards perfection.
People who are on The Way have a certain quality that makes them spontaneous. They act with virtue and use their subconscious as a guide instead of their rational mind. This is similar to the concept of flow, which was defined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.
He believes that the flow is a state of mind in which you can concentrate so much on what you’re doing that time seems to disappear. The Chinese believe that life should be easy, even when it’s challenging.
Big Idea #3: Confucianism relies on a more strict practice to attain wu-wei.
Taoism offers one concept of attaining wu-wei, but not all Chinese thinkers agreed with it. Confucius developed another strategy for becoming a perfect human being. His school of thought, known as Confucianism, sought to diminish the natural aspect of our being by transforming it through education and effort in the service of attaining wu-wei. In other words, we need to improve our willpower, behavior and knowledge about cultures that came before ours.
