ON WU-WEI

(NON - DOING)



Wu means "not" or "non" and wei means "action" or "doing" "striving, "straining" or "busyness." It doesn't really mean doing nothing but to let ones mind alone, trusting it to work by itself. Wu wei, in gung fu, means spontaneous action or spirit-action, in the sense that the governing force is the mind and not that of the sense. During sparring, a Gung Fu man learns to forget about himself and follows the movement of his opponent, leaving his mind free to make its own counter-movement without any interfering deliberation. He frees himself from all mental suggestion of resistance, and adopts a supple attitude. His actions are all performed without self-assertion; he lets his mind remain spontaneous and ungrasped. As soon as he stops to think, his flow of movement will be disturbed and he is immediately struck by his opponent. Every action, therefore, has to be done "unintentionally" without trying.
Through wu wei, a reposeful ease is secured. This passive achievement, as Chaung-tzu pointed out, will free a gung fu man from striving and straining himself.



A yielding will has a resposeful ease, soft as downy feathers, a quietude, a shrinking fro action, an appearance of inability to do. Placidly free from anxiety, one acts with the opportune time; one moves and revolves in the line of creation one does not move ahead but responds to the fitting influence. Establish nothing in regard to oneself. Let things be what they are, move like water, rest like a mirror, respond like an echo, pass quickly like the nonexistent and be quiet as purity. Those who gain, lose. Do not precede others, always follow them.



The natural phenomenon which the Gung Fu man sees as being the closest resemblance to wu wei is water:



Nothing is weaker than water,

But when it attacks something hard,

Or resistant, then nothing withstands it,

And nothing will alter its way.



The above passage from the Tao Te Ching illustrate to us the nature of water: Water is so fine that it is impossible to grasp a handful of it; strike it, yet it does not suffer hurt; stab it, and it is not wounded; sever it, and yet it is not divided. It has no shape of its own, but moulds itself to the receptacle that contains it. When heated to a state a steam it is invisible, but has enough power to spilt the earth itself. When frozen it crystallized in to mighty rock. First it is turbulent like the Niagara Falls, and then calm like a still pond, fearful like a torrent, and refreshing like a spring on a hot summer's day. So is the principle of wu wei.



The river and the seas are the lord of a hundred valleys. This is because their strength is in lowliness; they are king of them all. So it is that the perfect master wishing to let them, he follows. Thus, though he is above them he follows. Thus, though he is above them, men do not feel them to be an injury. And since he will not strive, none strive with him.



The world is full of people who are determined to be somebody or give trouble. They want to get ahead to stand up. Such ambition has no use for a gung fu man, who rejects all forms of self-assertiveness and competition: 



One who tries to stand on tip toe cannot stand still. One who stretches his legs too far cannot walk. One who advertises himself too much is ignored. One who is too insistent on his own view finds few to agree with him. One who claims too much credit does not get even what he deserves. One who is too proud is humiliated. These are condemned as extremes of greediness and self-destructive activity. Therefore, one who acts naturally avoids such extremes. 



Those who know do not speak;
Those who speak do not know;
Stop your sense: let sharp things be blunted,
Tangles resolved, The light tempered
And turmoil subdued; 
For this is mystic unity in which the wise man is known 
Neither by affection, 
Nor yet by estrangement
Or profit or loss
Or honor or shame.
Accordingly, by all the world,
He is held highest.




A Gung Fu man, if he is really good, is not proud at all. Pride is a sense of worth which derives from something that is not organically of oneself. Pride emphasis the importance of superiority of ones status in the eye of others. There is a fear and insecurity in pride because when one aims at being highly esteemed, and having achieved such a status, he is automatically involved in the fear of losing his status. Then protection of one's status appears to be his most important need, and these create anxiety. 



The less promise and potency in the self, the more imperative is the need for pride. One is proud when he identifies himself with an imaginary self; the core of pride is self -rejection. 
As we know that Gung Fu is aiming at self-cultivation; and, therefore, the inner self is ones true self; so in order to realize his true self, a Gung fu man lives without being dependent upon the opinion of others. Since he is completely self-sufficient he can have no fear of not being esteemed. A Gung Fu man devotes himself to being self sufficient, and never depends upon the external rating by others for his happiness. A Gung Fu master, unlike the beginner, holds himself in reserve, is quiet and unassuming, without the least desire to show off. Under the influence of Gung Fu training his proficiency becomes spiritual and he himself, grown ever freer through spiritual struggle, is transformed. To him, fame and status mean nothing 



Thus wu wie is the art of artlessness, the principle of no principle. To state it in terms of Gung Fu, the genuine beginner knows nothing about the way of blocking and striking, and much less of his concern for himself. When an opponent tries to strike, he instinctively parries it. This is all he can do. But as soon as training starts, he is taught how to defend and attack, where to keep the mind, and many other technical tricks , which makes his mind stop at various junctures. For this reason whenever he tries to strike the opponent he feels unusually hampered (he has lost altogether the original sense of innocence and freedom). But as month and years go by, as his training acquire fuller maturity, his bodily attitude and his way of managing the technique move toward no mindedness which resemble the state of mind he had at the very beginning of training when he knew nothing, when he was altogether ignorant of the art. The beginning and the end thus turn into next-door neighbors. On the musical scale, one may start with the lowest pitch and gradually ascend to the highest. When the highest is reached, one finds it is located next to the lowest. 



In a similar way, when the highest stage is reached in the study of Taoist teaching, a Gung Fu man turns in to a kind of simpleton who knows nothing of Tao, nothing of its teachings, and it devoids all learning. Intellectual calculation are lost sight of and a state of no-mindness prevails. When the ultimate perfection is attained, the body and limbs perform by themselves what is assigned to them to do with no interference from the mind. The technical skill is so automatized it is completely divorced from conscious efforts.