Why Striving Goes Wrong and Forcing Falls Short: A Perspective Based on Connection

From the Perspective of Connection: Why Striving Goes Wrong and Forcing Things Falls Short

This series of articles on connection explores the importance of connection—with ourselves, other people, the people, society, history, nature, and the universe. It is the essence of Zhuangzi’s philosophy of the unity of heaven and humanity, and the answer to existential crisis.

Connection cannot be achieved through striving. There is as much as there is. All we “can” do is “be aware.”

Connection cannot be forced. Applying force actually breaks the connection. The urge to force things is precisely an unconscious response to a broken connection.

The essence of “striving” and “applying force” is dissatisfaction with and escape from “the present.”

I. Interpersonal Relationships Work Exactly This Way

How much connection two people have depends on affinity.

Feeling that it is not enough, giving in to greed, anger, and delusion, and forcing things only reveal your own lack and karmic obstructions to the other person. Their response, in turn, often comes from lack and karmic obstructions too. Relentlessly pursuing a girl -> an ill-fated relationship. An ill-fated relationship is an entanglement of karmic obstructions and karmic forces, rather than connection.

So, as in “Screening in Social Relationships,” be rigorous in filtering whom you associate with, and lenient with yourself.

Over these years of writing for my own online channels, I have actually had a somewhat clear understanding of this too: I can only quietly await my own growth and changes, and patiently await those with whom affinity brings a shared wavelength and resonance. I cannot force the relationships I have now to go further, or conjure idealized relationships out of thin air.

II. Connection with Yourself Cannot Be Forced

Trying too hard is attachment. Forcing yourself to strive, forcing yourself to exercise, forcing yourself to fall asleep—futile, and bound up with karmic obstructions.

The essence of every good habit is connection. People who have that connection naturally enjoy it. People who do not yet have that connection see it as drudgery, effort, willpower, something “against human nature.”

Exercise, going to bed early and getting up early, chewing slowly and thoroughly, limiting phone use, limiting sugar, studying, and so on—including the unassuming things I often say are the only advice I can give people: keeping a diary and going for walks.

How habits form: inner strength recovers -> small things in the present -> greater inner strength, the processing of karmic obstructions, and the radiance of one’s true nature—a virtuous cycle. All we can do is remain clear and quiet, wait for our inner strength to recover, and let healing happen naturally. Every year, tens of millions of students in China are quietly working through their own predicaments in life. Quietude and non-action.

Many people’s predicament is a lack of connection with themselves—their bodies and minds. They do not understand or accept themselves, and do not know how to love themselves.

Connection with one’s true nature, and the experience of innate wholeness, are even less amenable to force. Many “spiritual practitioners” remain unable to awaken precisely because they are too attached and try too hard: “The Spiritual Practitioner’s Ego,” “The Malaise of Spiritual Practice: Elitism.”

III. Connection with Nature

For me, it means feeling it deeply. I can try gently to “describe” what I feel—what, exactly, is the beauty I am experiencing? Heaven and earth possess great beauty, yet say nothing. Wanting too much to describe it only interrupts the connection.

For a while, I was too deliberate about trying to connect with nature: come on, hurry up and experience the unity of heaven and humanity. Assigning myself homework like this actually made me a little afraid to go to the park. (See the earlier article “A Very New Kind of Ego: The Homework-Doer’s Ego.”)

IV. Learning Depends Most on Connection and Is Most Undermined by Striving

Good students all have a sense of connection with learning, so it comes without strain. Good students understand this, but find it difficult to explain to others. Some good students believe their success comes from hard work, genius, or study methods; this is a delusion. Average students all have some connection with learning, and often “work hard” at the subjects in which they are falling behind.

Students who struggle academically lack connection and experience fear, loneliness, and anxiety. At such times, parents “urge them to study” or force them to study, talking about society’s brutal competition and rat race. Other people’s children, the family being too poor to provide a safety net and instead waiting for urgent help, and so on—all of this merely increases the pressure and makes it even harder for children to connect.

Being good at mathematics comes from having a connection with mathematics. But believing yourself to be a genius, highly intelligent, and superior to others—the mathematics ego—can instead gradually sever your relationship with mathematics. Many students at Tsinghua University, Peking University, and the University of Science and Technology of China develop elite-university syndrome after enrolling. Unable to accept having no sense of superiority over those around them, they suffer a backlash from their elitism of genius, and from then on lose their connection with mathematics.

V. A Career Also Depends on Connection

Doing the same thing, some people find it deeply rewarding, while others find it as tasteless as chewing wax and feel as though they are sitting on pins and needles. Buffett: do the kind of work that makes you tap-dance to work.

“The Most Important Thing in Value Investing Is Connection”

Marx, in “Reflections of a Young Man on the Choice of a Profession,” written at age 17, on the eve of his secondary-school graduation: If we have chosen the profession in which we can work most for the welfare of humanity, then burdens cannot overwhelm us, because they are sacrifices for the benefit of all; then what we experience will be no petty, limited, selfish joy, for our happiness will belong to millions, our deeds will live on quietly but perpetually at work, and over our ashes noble people will shed hot tears.

VI. Connection with the People and History

Many enthusiasts of Marxism try too hard and are too eager to become saviors. They think this comes from their sense of responsibility and connection. In fact, it comes from lack, a sense of superiority, and a broken connection. They do not realize that they too are ordinary people, and have no real connection with the people and history, so they do not understand historical materialism or the people-centered view of history.

“Breaking Out of Your Comfort Zone Is a False Concept; Wherever This Heart Is at Peace Is My Home”:

An unsettled heart gives rise to ten thousand demons; a peaceful heart dispels ten thousand evils.

Build a comfort zone; expand your comfort zone.

Safety gives rise to flow; flow gives rise to breakthroughs.

Be at peace with the times and accept your lot; let things follow their natural course.