Wu Wei

Wu wei, non-action, is the Taoist art of accomplishing without forcing: acting so entirely in accord with the time that the result arrives of itself. Its charter is Tao Te Ching 37, "The Tao does nothing, yet nothing is left undone," deepened in chapter 48, where the student of the Tao decreases day by day until he reaches non-action. The Book of Changes states the same law at its own root, in 02 K'un - The Receptive:

Straight, square, great.
Without purpose,
Yet nothing remains unfurthered.

Wilhelm's gloss could stand in the Tao Te Ching unchanged: the Receptive "attains what is right for all without artifice or special intentions. Man achieves the height of wisdom when all that he does is as self-evident as what nature does."

The oracle's practical counsels of wu wei recur everywhere as variations on one instruction: do not pursue. In 38 K'uei - Opposition, "If you lose your horse, do not run after it; It will come back of its own accord." In 51 Chên - The Arousing (Shock, Thunder), "Do not go in pursuit of them. After seven days you will get them back again." In 25 Wu Wang - Innocence (The Unexpected), "Use no medicine in an illness Incurred through no fault of your own. It will pass of itself," for one should "quietly let nature take its course." And in 63 Chi Chi - After Completion the principle becomes a whole ethic of worth: "That which is a man's own cannot be permanently lost. It comes to him of its own accord. He need only be able to wait."

Entire hexagrams are wu wei as situation. 05 Hsü - Waiting (Nourishment) teaches that "Waiting is not mere empty hoping. It has the inner certainty of reaching the goal." 24 Fu - Return (The Turning Point) observes that "it is not necessary to hasten anything artificially. Everything comes of itself at the appointed time," and the hidden dragon of 01 Ch'ien - The Creative, who does not act until the time ripens, is the image's most famous face. Non-action is never inertia; it is the precision of the one who knows what the time itself is doing.