I. You Know All the Principles — But Can't Follow Them

Our generation probably knows more principles than any before us.

Speak less, listen more; don't overreach; be more caring toward others; don't get swept away by success; stay composed — you have read these in a hundred books, heard them at countless talks, and can recite them to others yourself.

But ask yourself honestly: of all these things you "know," how many have you actually lived?

Why are the simplest principles the hardest to follow?

In Chapter 70 of the Daodejing, Laozi lets out a long breath and speaks of exactly this. This chapter is unusual — Laozi suddenly steps back from his teaching voice and speaks almost to himself, with a faint loneliness.

II. "My Words Are Simple — Yet No One Can Follow Them"

Laozi says:

"My words are very easy to understand, very easy to practice; yet no one can truly understand them, and no one can truly practice them."

Wait — "very easy to understand" and yet "no one can understand" — isn't that a contradiction?

No. Because "understanding" and "practicing" each have two levels:

— "Very easy to understand, very easy to practice" means: you can hear it and imitate it. When I say "don't assert dominance," you understand those three words; you can even perform a posture of not asserting dominance.

— "No one can truly understand, no one can truly practice" means: no one can think it through all the way on their own and live it as their own. Hearing and grasping a statement, and letting it grow into your bones, are two different things.

This is the deepest gulf between "knowing" and "doing."

A recent example: everyone knows "focus — don't multitask." This cannot be a simpler statement. And yet how many times do you and I pick up that phone in a single day? "Knowing" about focus is easy; "doing" focus has stumped nearly everyone. Sometimes the simpler the principle, the wider this gulf.

Being able to recite a principle is not the same as truly understanding it. Being able to follow it occasionally is not the same as having lived it. What Laozi is sighing about is exactly this: the words are so simple, and yet not one person truly understands and does them.

III. Why the Simplest Is Hardest

Why is it that the simpler a principle, the fewer people can actually follow it?

First: because it is too ordinary.

We tend to assume that what is powerful should be complex, deep, novel. "Listen more, speak less" is too plain — plain enough that you skim it and think "I already know that," then turn back to chasing something flashier and more intricate. The most important thing often gets skipped over exactly like this.

Second: because it runs against your instincts.

All the teachings running through this series — don't put up signs, don't compete, don't assert, stand in the lower place — every single one runs contrary to human instinct. Instinct says: be seen, win, press above others, stand at the front. Hearing these teachings is easy; pressing your own hand down in the moment you want to assert — that is as hard as anything.

It is like rowing against the current: where the principle points is usually exactly opposite from where your instinct wants to go. Going with instinct costs no effort. But the principle asks you to go against instinct — each time you actually do it, you are arm-wrestling with the more primitive version of yourself. Hearing is downstream; doing is upstream. That is why a principle can be understood in one hearing and take half a lifetime to live.

So "simple" is never the same as "easy." "Simple" means it has few moving parts; actually doing it is among the hardest things in the world. You know you should sleep early, listen more, stay composed — and you still don't. That is not stupidity — between "knowing" and "doing," there is always a river.

Here is where this chapter's weight lies: Laozi is not giving you another new principle — he is reminding you that what you lack was never "one more thing to know." It is doing, even once, what you have already heard a hundred times.

IV. Words Have a Source, Actions Have a Root: Grasp That One Root

Laozi continues:

"My words have a source (jun). My actions have a root (zong)."

Jun here is not "sovereign," and zong is not "ancestor." They mean: all the things I have said, all the things I have done, run down to the same single root.

Look back across this whole series — don't put up signs, don't compete, stay below, hold "I" back — it looks like many separate principles, but it is really one thing. They all grow from one root.

This matters enormously. Most people learn by collecting individual techniques: accumulate a heap of methods, a heap of principles, a heap of rules — and by the end, there are too many to remember, and they contradict each other. But someone who has truly learned grasps the one root underneath: once you have the root, all the scattered techniques become clear on their own — you don't have to memorize them.

This is how a true master operates: not consulting an internal rulebook and checking each item one by one — those rules long ago became an intuition inside them. What they grasped was the "why" beneath the rules; so all the rules, for them, are different expressions of the same one thing. Better to digest one thing fully than to memorize one hundred.

This is also one reason Laozi is sighing: people all focus on his individual statements (the techniques) but rarely try to grasp the root beneath those statements. Without the root, all these teachings remain scattered in your hands.

V. True Understanding Cannot Be Poured In — It Must Grow from Within

The next line has long been misread, but it holds the most tender layer of Laozi's meaning:

"It is only because of the absence of knowing that I am not known."

This is not Laozi calling people stupid for not understanding him.

What he means is: there is simply no such thing as "I pour my understanding into you" — true understanding can only be your own understanding.

He has put his words out, clearly and plainly; but that genuine "understanding" cannot travel from his mouth directly into your mind. He can point; you have to see it yourself. He can speak; you have to grow it yourself.

This is the same teaching we encountered earlier: even in the act of teaching, Laozi does not force — he does not colonize your mind; he sets things out and waits for you to grow into them.

You have surely had this experience: someone told you something clearly, many times, and you nodded — but it did not truly land. Then one day you ran into it yourself, felt it yourself, and that old saying suddenly came alive — and only then did you understand what it was saying. That moment of understanding was not given to you by anyone; it was grown out of your own experience.

The best teachers are like this: they do not pour the answer into you; they lead you to the door — and the door, you have to push open yourself. The pushing open is when the understanding truly becomes yours.

This means: reading this essay, reading this whole Daodejing, you are only ever reading doors. The landscape behind each door — you have to walk in yourself, live it yourself, for it to truly grow into you.

So "no one can truly understand" is not because Laozi speaks in mysteries — it is because understanding is something only you can complete. No one else can hand it in. That is also why "hearing and grasping" can never be the same as "truly understanding": words can be handed to you; understanding has to grow on its own.

VI. Few Truly Understand — But Those Who Do Carry Jade Inside Them

Laozi sighs once more, then gives one quiet but solemn reminder:

"Those who truly know are few — and therefore what I say is precious."

Note: Laozi is not saying "few understand me, therefore I am of great worth." He is not elevating himself. After the sigh, he offers a gentle reminder: this is worth your understanding, worth your practicing. The fewer who understand, the less reason to be self-satisfied and the more reason not to let it go — one more reminder.

Then comes the close of this chapter, and of this whole thread:

"Therefore the sage is clothed in coarse cloth, yet carries jade within."

The true sage looks ordinary from the outside, and carries what is most precious on the inside.

This "jade" is not just jade — it is virtue (de), the genuine weight of the person.

The one who looks most ordinary carries the most precious thing inside. He does not write "I have jade" on his face (that is "clothed in coarse cloth" — not putting up the sign); the preciousness is inside, not outside (that is "carrying jade within").

This breathes with ch. 67's "great yet not carved into a fixed shape": the truly great don't carve "I am great" onto their face; the truly weighty don't hang "I am precious" on their person.

Seen from today, there are two layers here:

One is for looking at others: don't be fooled by the packaging. The truly substantial person often looks the most unremarkable; the one blazing with signals, terrified you might not notice how capable they are, often has very little inside. The loudest sound is the empty one; the truly full one makes no sound — a bottle filled to the brim doesn't slosh, but the one half-full makes the most noise.

The other is for yourself: you do not need to urgently prove to anyone that you carry jade. "Having" matters far more than "being seen to have." The more urgently you try to prove your weight, the more it shows you are not grounded (which brings us back to: assertion is what those without confidence need). Real jade is quiet. It is inside you. Knowing it yourself is enough.

VII. To the Reader

This chapter offers several things you can put to use right now:

First: know the difference between "hearing and grasping" and "truly understanding."

The principles you can recite one by one are not necessarily ones you have lived (easy to understand, yet no one truly understands). Don't mistake "I know this" for "I have done this."

Second: don't dismiss something because it seems too simple.

The most plain-looking statement is often the most important one — it is just so ordinary that you skim past it (very easy to understand).

Third: grasp the one root — don't memorize a hundred rules.

All the scattered techniques usually come from the same one principle; grasp the root and you don't need to remember so much (words have a source, actions have a root).

Fourth: true understanding has to grow on its own.

No one can pour understanding into your mind; someone can point the way, but you have to see it yourself (not known by me). So don't stop at "I've heard it" or "I've saved it" — that isn't yours yet.

Fifth: don't rush to prove you carry jade.

"Having" matters more than "being seen to have." Real weight is inside, not outside (clothed in coarse cloth, carrying jade within). The more urgently you prove it, the more it shows an unsteady foundation.

This chapter's core can be summed in one line —

The simplest principles are hardest to live because they are too ordinary, because they run against instinct, and because true understanding can only grow within you. But the person who has truly understood — they look the most ordinary, carrying jade inside a coarse cloth coat.