Dwell Among Flowers, Sleep with Books, Ask Nothing of Others—Why the Rush?

Li Yu (courtesy name Liweng), who lived between the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, wrote a book called Xianqing Ouji (Casual Expressions of Idle Feeling), a famous ancient Chinese work on wellness and leisure. It contains a dedicated "Planting Section," which discourses at length on the joys and tricks of growing flowers and plants.

Li Liweng was, among men of letters, the one best at enjoying himself; his life was rich and varied. He was also a noted dramatist in Chinese history, hailed by later generations as the Shakespeare of the East.

If Xianqing Ouji were not mixed with so much preachy text, it would be simply beyond reproach.

I too love planting. My study, my balcony, and the open space outside my home are all filled, wherever a gap could be found, with every kind of green plant and flower.

The joy planting brings me cannot be put into words. But I do not grow rare or costly plants; any joy that requires too high a price to obtain holds no attraction for me.

Many of my flowerpots were given away by friends who could not take them when moving house, or were old pots thrown out when neighbors renovated. Each time I find a pleasing pot beside the residential-compound trash bins, I am happy for a long while. What others discard I take; what others abandon I gain; getting something for nothing is truly easy and pleasant.

The year before last, when the flower-and-bird market near my home was demolished and the owner was selling off stock cheaply, I picked up a batch of inexpensive pots and green plants. Under my patient care, most of the plants survived.

A few years ago I also bought cheap, pre-trained bonsai. Nowadays I gradually prefer buying inexpensive seedlings—ten to twenty yuan apiece—and training them myself.

An osmanthus sapling I newly planted is growing most promisingly. In another two or three years it should grow into a fine potted specimen. A bonsai one has patiently grown oneself is far more interesting than a ready-made one bought in a shop.

Compared with the joy these "darlings" bring, the care lavished on them is simply not worth mentioning. Li Yu expressed this joy beautifully in Xianqing Ouji. But in my view, though Li Yu's literary talent was fine, he still could not describe this joy to the full.

As someone long engaged in mental work, planting has healed my occupational fatigue. Watching all things thrive, I have almost forgotten that the world holds the sorrow of parting and death.

Now many people study horticultural therapy, using gardening to treat conditions including autism and depression. Gardening indeed brings people much joy, enough to dispel many troubles from within.

Besides these green plants, my darlings also include the books on my several large bookshelves.

Every day, after work ends, to bask in the sun, read a book, write an article, and trim my flowers and plants has become almost the whole of my life.

Reading is part of my life. It is not a tool I use to pursue some position. Ever since I escaped the bonds of the system and became a freelancer, both reading and writing have ceased to be tasks for me and have become pleasures.

So I read almost without any plan, and write likewise. One day I am suddenly interested in a certain book, and I pick it up and read.

I also have a 32-gigabyte Kindle, onto which I have downloaded a thousand or two e-books. When I go out, I carry my Kindle with me, reading wherever I go.

Usually I spend the whole afternoon, and the few hours after waking in the morning, reading. After lunch, I go out for a walk or do some exercise indoors, and then I can sit by the balcony and read.

Often, as I read, I doze off for a while, then wake and go on reading. Such a life truly has few worries. So even now I still keep my looks un-aged; most people who meet me find it hard to believe my real age.

I have lived this way since 1999, when I dropped out of university. Back then I was penniless, able only to borrow a little money from my cousin and rent a bungalow in a remote area for fifty to eighty yuan a month, earning a living by writing articles for people while finding joy in reading and growing flowers.

The large number of articles I published online in my youth had already made me well known. Twenty years ago I was active for a time on online forums such as Tianya, very much in the limelight. But by nature I weary of fame and gain; whenever I had amassed many followers on a platform, I chose to vanish without a trace.

To this day I am willing to keep only my personal website and this WeChat official account. I never like to craft sensational headlines to grab readers' eyes. My readership now is far smaller than before, but my own free time is far greater.

Before thirty, I had secured a comfortable living and grown tired of the life of constant striving. I may modestly call myself a disciple of Zhuangzi and Russell, valuing freedom and a richly varied life. I think my greatest achievement is that I have conquered my own desires. This desire is broad in scope: not only the desire for fame and gain, for wealth and sex, for fine food, but also the desire for a spotless reputation.

Many men of letters easily conquer the former desires but cannot conquer the desire for a lofty reputation; they like to pursue being thought high-minded, and in the end inevitably become a pedantic, sour scholar.

There is a saying in Caigentan (Vegetable Roots Discourse): "He who flaunts righteousness will surely be reviled for righteousness; he who parades moral learning will often be blamed for moral learning." So once a person has some pursuit—even the pursuit of righteousness and fair fame—he inevitably fetters himself. A clean reputation is fine, but "not more so" is even better.

The Kun hexagram of the Zhouyi advocates the way of "embracing disgrace"; later generations even took bearing shame and insult as one of the basic qualities a man should possess. If one lets go of the desire for a clean reputation, bearing disgrace and insult comes naturally. If one does not cling to a fair name, what disgrace or shame is there to speak of?

The way of no-desire is hard! The ultimate no-desire is to have let go of all clinging and pursuit. Viewing all things as illusory, and viewing even illusion as illusory, yet without being infatuated with nihilism. Natural and at ease: if there is, there is; if not, there is not; neither having and not-having, nor gain and loss, stir the heart, let alone make waves.

Reaching such a state of no-desire, life is naturally without fear or worry. Plain tea and coarse food then become no different from delicacies. Whether one is covered in honors or cursed by the whole world, it is all much the same.

Of all the sufferings of life, the mind suffers most; of all the joys of life, the mind enjoys most. The mind suffers because it easily becomes a prisoner in an invisible prison. The mind enjoys because it has escaped those invisible prisons, ceased to be a prisoner, and can roam freely.

In planting flowers and in reading and writing, I have released the self from this prison of life. I have become a person of the same kind as Li Yu, Zhuangzi and Russell. For this arrangement of life that Heaven has made for me, I am well satisfied and full of gratitude.