A Conversation with a Reader: If We "Don't Practice," How Should We "Apply Ourselves"?

Preface: Recently, I wrote “Spiritual Practice Is a False Concept: Striving Is Already a Mistake; Let Nature Take Its Course” and “The Birth of a New Ego: The Spiritual Practitioner’s Ego.” These were a summing-up of my thinking at this stage and a new turning point—another awakening and reconciliation after my “awakening” to Zhuangzi in April 2024. The claim that “spiritual practice is a false concept” is rather abstract and involves the whole framework. I hadn’t expected readers’ acceptance and feedback to be quite so positive, which has been heartening and encouraging. The conversation below develops the idea in concrete terms.

Reader A:

Hello, I’d like to ask: if striving is already a mistake, how should we apply ourselves in everyday life?

Can we only subtract, diminishing and diminishing again, until we reach non-action? Thank you.

Su Huoyi:

I. In Pursuing the Way, Diminish Daily

Thank you for your appreciation. This is a very good question; it shows that you, too, are seriously studying and practicing Zhuangzi’s teachings. My current understanding is exactly as you say: in pursuing the Way, diminish daily. As you know, Daoism does not speak of striving, and Zhuangzi does not speak of spiritual practice.

As I currently understand it, “sitting in forgetfulness” and “fasting of the mind” are results, not causes.

II. A Good State Comes Naturally

To be specific: 1. Are those common forms of so-called practice—meditation, breathing exercises, sitting meditation, observing thoughts—really so magical? I think they are simply results. 2. Every day, I naturally go to the park and exercise—playing tennis, playing basketball, taking walks—and even naturally slow my breathing and let my mind wander, enjoying the tranquility, happiness, and mindfulness within it all. To an outsider, this looks like self-discipline and effort. To me, there is no feeling of effort at all. Eating until I’m about seventy percent full and not looking at my phone may seem almost harshly disciplined to some people, but they are actually instincts of the body and mind, unfolding naturally. With studies, careers, and getting things done, everyone actually knows that mindfulness is more often what drives us.

That is my understanding: every good way of living is instinctive to human beings. The problem is that people go against their own instincts. In Zhuangzi’s terms: remove human contrivance and return to nature.

III. Is This the Result of Striving?

Returning to the theory: are these “results” the outcome of my “striving”? Can other people “strive” to achieve the same results? Can I work hard to teach others to be this way?

It has more to do with “fate.” I don’t mean that I am blessed with good fortune or superior to others; rather, ordinary people are so often unfortunate. I grew up in the countryside. Those classmates from my rural primary school cannot reach the state I’m in; they don’t even know what tennis is. Is that because they “don’t try hard enough”? Su Shi said, “The rivers, mountains, wind, and moon have no permanent master; whoever has leisure is their master.” Are people unable to reach this state because they don’t work hard enough amid all their rushing around? It is precisely striving that keeps people from having any leisure.

IV. Allowing, Not Resisting: Exercise and Learning Come Naturally and Require No Striving

Returning to the concrete: ever since I let go of all thoughts of spiritual practice, I have felt much more relaxed, especially now that I no longer fight or judge distracting thoughts, negative states, and emotions. This, too, is like playing a sport: outsiders see you applying yourself, while you are actually just being more natural.

Exercise is a very good analogy. Once someone has taken up exercise, they no longer need to “strive” to do it. So-called “striving” to motivate yourself to exercise often amounts to little more than anxiety and self-attack. These things actually only take people further away from the instinctive vitality that exercise requires.

Anyone who did well in secondary school knows that learning well does not actually “take effort”; everything comes naturally. In my own secondary-school experience, some aspects of studying came naturally—it generally went fairly smoothly—and others involved painful effort. I would often stay up talking or climb over the school wall to spend the night at an internet café, which affected my state. I also had weaknesses in certain subjects that required “effort” to study on my own. This so-called effort was merely the effect of karmic obstructions. Secondary-school students suffer so much, and there is no “good solution”; things simply unfold naturally. This is human innate wholeness.

That is my understanding at present. I have only just begun this transition and have not yet put it into practice over the long term. But inwardly, I feel this direction is right, and that it accords with Zhuangzi and even Marx and Engels. Marx and Engels did not engage in “spiritual practice.” They, too, often suffered and often felt helpless, but do their lives and the level of understanding they reached still need to be questioned?

V. So Many People Who Do Not Engage in “Spiritual Practice” Are Just as Happy, Joyful, and Accomplished

So many people who do not engage in “spiritual practice” are just as happy, joyful, and accomplished. Doesn’t that show precisely that so-called spiritual practice is not so important? Did Einstein also do breathing exercises and sitting meditation? Or did he “strive” to adjust his state by playing the violin? What about Buffett? He not only skips sitting meditation, copying scriptures, and exercise—he even drinks Coke.

For people whose karmic obstructions are not deep, the five elements—studies, career, social life, body, and mind—naturally form a virtuous cycle. We call that good fortune.

VI. If You Don’t Strive to Be Aware, Will You Have Less Awareness?

This is an interesting and crucial point.

“Spiritual practitioners” make awareness the core of their practice. Yet without striving or practicing, awareness has not decreased; it has actually increased. Isn’t that interesting, and also rather ironic?

The simple, accessible way to put this whole line of reasoning is that doing things, making progress, and being aware all come naturally. They are instincts of our instinctive being and require no striving.

Reader A:

Yes, yes. Once there is a goal to achieve, it turns into the ego’s striving. That has been my experience too. Your articles have actually given me a great deal of insight. I have been practicing awareness of my thoughts, but it often used to turn into “striving” and deliberate practice. It felt as though it had become yet another thing I was attached to, reinforcing the “self.” I also used to keep thinking about how to achieve non-action. Now I’m beginning to feel that perhaps forgetting—letting go of—that very thought is the way.

Also, you just mentioned distracting thoughts and negative emotions in daily life. How do you let go of them? I seem to have always had unresolved emotional knots and a sense of insecurity, and I find it very hard to feel truly happy inside.

Su Huoyi:

I. Karmic Obstructions: Don’t Resist; Let Them Do as They Please

Emotional knots, insecurity, unhappiness; distracting thoughts, negative emotions. We can collectively call these “karmic obstructions”—of course, this is just a name and a way of grouping them together.

My current view and approach is not to resist. Put simply, let them do as they please; whatever happens, happens. Don’t become unhappy over the fact that you are “unhappy.”

However intense a negative state may be, even if it lasts a few days, it will eventually pass, won’t it? (If a severely negative state persists for months, that is at a pathological level and requires seeing a doctor. I recently wrote an article called “I Suggest Keeping a Diary to Record High-Energy States,” which also discusses this. A person’s lows and highs are continually changing, and with time, our instinctive being is also continually healing itself. Understanding this can also give us a little more confidence and optimism about innate wholeness.)

So-called “spiritual practice” often involves fighting this negative state, making an already dejected me feel even more dejected. Now that I am no longer thinking about eliminating it, it seems to disappear a little faster. This kind of “letting things fall apart” actually happens to accord with those popular ideas of “acceptance, surrender, and allowing”—Hellinger has a poem called “I Allow”—as well as the philosophy of Japan’s Morita therapy: coexist with suffering, and let suffering take its natural course.

II. Is There a Method?

Exercise helps me “reduce distracting thoughts and increase happiness.” Does that make exercise a “method that requires striving”? No. If I stop exercising and the suffering returns, does that mean exercise is merely a way to “temporarily relieve” it? No, that isn’t it either. Happiness and suffering often “coexist” in people. Does that mean happiness is merely a “temporary state” of escaping suffering? Or should we understand it the other way around: suffering is merely a temporary state of being apart from happiness—a temporary state of being removed from the tranquility and happiness of our instinctive being. Those who are suffering too much have no energy or courage to exercise at all. Is this merely “a sign of not trying hard enough”? Certainly not. Taken together, all these things are the natural unfolding of the whole system.

This brings us back to the question of “spiritual practice is a false concept.” Can I intervene in the pace at which karmic obstructions dissolve? They are destined to accompany us throughout life, so let them follow their own rhythm.

III. From the Perspective of the Five Elements of Life

Put this way, it is a little abstract. From a “practical” perspective, the five elements of life are studies, career, social life, body, and mind. If there are serious problems in these areas, there will be unease and suffering. If there is progress or a breakthrough, unease will diminish. For example, after I became more confident about my career—even though I had not made any money, I had gained an awakening about value investing—and more confident about my studies—even though I am still relatively weak in subjects such as mathematics and physics—and after changes such as becoming more selective in my social life, letting go of unnecessary relationships, and distinguishing my responsibilities from other people’s, as well as losing 15 kilograms and getting the hang of tennis, my unease diminished considerably and my overall state improved a great deal.

(Of course, I am not suggesting here that we should seek things outside ourselves. Often, it is only after we stop seeking outside ourselves and the ego dissolves that we “advance” into a new state. The five elements are simply a tool ordinary people can use to break down and take stock of the state of their lives.)

But is this pace the result of my “striving”? Can others use my experience as a reference to accelerate their own progress? When I explain the principles of value investing and recommend books on it, is that really “useful” to others? If I invest prudently, keep public records, and sustain high returns for thirty years, will that be “useful” to others? Will it “convince” them? Hasn’t Buffett already done precisely that? How many people has he convinced?

This is simply how luck has arranged things, and this luck isn’t even all that good. People whose studies and careers have always gone smoothly, whose bodies and minds have always been healthy, and whose social lives have never fallen into toxic patterns have had better luck.