A researcher has developed a theory called paradox of wu wei, the Chinese term for effortless action, a look at spontaneity based on millenniums of Asian philosophy and decades of research by psychologists and neuroscientists. | credits: New York Times Service

Just be yourself. The advice is as maddening as it is inescapable. Its the default prescription for any tense situation: a blind date, a speech, a job interview, the first dinner with the potential in-laws. Relax. Act natural. Just be yourself.

But when youre nervous, how can you be yourself? How you can force yourself to relax? How can you try not to try?It makes no sense, but the paradox is essential to civilization, according to Edward Slingerland.

He has developed, quite deliberately, a theory of spontaneity based on millenniums of Asian philosophy and decades of research by psychologists and neuroscientists.

He calls it the paradox of wu wei, the Chinese term for effortless action.

Pronounced ooo-way, it has similarities to the concept of flow, that state of effortless performance sought by athletes, but it applies to a lot more than sports. Wu wei is integral to romance, religion, politics and commerce. Its why some leaders have charisma and why business executives insist on a drunken dinner before sealing a deal.

Slingerland, a professor of Asian studies at the University of British Columbia, argues that the quest for wu wei has been going on ever since humans began living in groups larger than hunter-gathering clans.

Unable to rely on the bonds of kinship, the first urban settlements survived by developing shared values, typically through religion, that enabled people to trust one anothers virtue and to cooperate for the common good.

But there was always the danger that someone was faking it and would make a perfectly rational decision to put his own interest first if he had a chance to shirk his duty.

To be trusted, it wasnt enough just to be a sensible, law-abiding citizen, and it wasnt even enough to dutifully strive to be virtuous. You had to demonstrate that your virtue was so intrinsic that it came to you effortlessly.

Continued here:
A meditation on the art of not trying