Laozi concepts
Read wu wei, ziran, softness and limits in context.
4 articles
Knowing Enough and Knowing When to Stop: "How Much" Versus "Where", Then Desire and Limits
Chapters 44, 46, 33, 9 and 12 of the Laozi show that knowing enough asks "how much is enough" and knowing when to stop asks "where to halt". Side by side, the lines separate moderation, stopping and passive restraint.
Read first: Dao and De in the Laozi: Reading Chapters 1, 21, 25, 38 and 51
DA-005Softness and Non-Contention: Read the Images First, Then Talk About Strength and Yielding
Water, life and death, plants and the sea show what softness (柔弱) and non-contention (不争) mean in the Laozi. Chapter 78 itself adds "none can practice it", which sets the text apart from later "yield and win" readings.
Read first: Dao and De in the Laozi: Reading Chapters 1, 21, 25, 38 and 51
DA-003Wu Wei: Why It Is Not Doing Nothing, Read Through Chapters 2, 48, 57 and 64
A three-column comparison, the "loss on loss" chain of chapter 48 and the three moves of chapter 64 read wu wei: the text writes "nothing left undone", and "lying flat" is a modern borrowing.
Read first: Dao and De in the Laozi: Reading Chapters 1, 21, 25, 38 and 51
DA-004Ziran: Read It as "So of Itself" First, Then Talk About Landscape
Five passages in the Laozi use ziran. Substituting "so of itself" and "the natural world" into each line, then comparing the Zhuangzi, separates what the text says, how tradition reads it and what modern speech borrows.
Read first: Dao and De in the Laozi: Reading Chapters 1, 21, 25, 38 and 51