The Difficulty of Being Wisely Unconcerned

This afternoon, I was walking by the lake as usual. On a fallen dead tree in the middle of the water stands a very large bird. From a distance it looks remarkably real, but it is not a real bird. It is a sculpture.

The bird has been there for quite some time, and I have known about it all along. Most people who come to the lake regularly probably know it too. Today, though, I noticed several visitors who seemed new to the area running over to take photos with genuine curiosity. They may have taken it for an unusual encounter with wildlife.

The lake itself is not short of real birds. Its ecology is already rich and remarkably self-contained. Australian black swans are common here, along with Eurasian coots, dusky moorhens, cormorants and purple swamphens. Some drift quietly on the water, some dive for fish, and some race across the surface before lifting into the air. For me, this is not an occasional sightseeing destination. It is close to where I live, a place where I often walk, rest and exercise. Returning so often, one gradually notices the order this small ecosystem has already formed for itself.

I later learned that this kind of sculpture is not merely decorative. It gives people a reason to pause and look, adds a little life to the lakeside, and may also serve an ecological purpose by encouraging real birds to perch or gather nearby.

It reminded me of something else I have seen while travelling in Australia. Along some country roads there are no actual herds of cattle or sheep, yet models of cattle and sheep have been placed beside the road. They look convincing at first. On closer inspection, their positions are too orderly and their poses never change. It soon becomes obvious that they are only models.

What is interesting is that neither the false bird nor the false livestock is really trying to deceive anyone. Most visitors know they are artificial. Their designers know that visitors know, and visitors know that the designers know. Everyone understands the situation; there is simply no need to make a point of exposing it.

What matters is no longer only whether something is real or false. It is why it is there and what it actually does. The bird sculpture provides a subject for photographs and may attract real birds. The roadside animals give an otherwise featureless stretch of road a little character and lightness. They do not replace nature, but their artificiality does not make them worthless.

This naturally brings to mind the Chinese expression nandé hútú, often translated as “it is hard to be wisely unconcerned.” It is often taken to mean that one should not take everything too seriously, or even that one should drift through life in a state of vague confusion. But I increasingly feel that its real precondition is understanding. Only after one has seen a situation clearly can one remain composed, refuse to force every issue into black and white, and avoid pursuing every question until there is no room left for life itself. That is a capacity, and perhaps a form of cultivation.

The opposite is quite different. Many people have not understood a matter and have no wish to examine it further, yet mistake that condition for broad-mindedness. That is not the difficulty of being wisely unconcerned; it is the difficulty of becoming clear-minded in the first place. The former is restraint after clarity. The latter may simply be unexamined confusion. They can look similar from the outside, but they are fundamentally different.

Maturity does not mean constantly appearing to be the smartest person in the room, nor does it mean proving oneself right in every matter. It is more a sense of proportion: knowing what requires a firm principle and what can be accepted as reality; knowing when truth must be pursued and when some ambiguity can be allowed. This is not an abandonment of thought. It is a more deliberate ordering of thought, one that reserves limited attention for what truly matters.

Looking again at the artificial bird by the lake, it remains only an artificial bird. Yet visitors take photographs there, real birds may perch nearby, and regular walkers have already absorbed it into the ordinary scenery of the lake. Everyone knows it is not real, but is willing to let it remain quietly in its place. Perhaps that is one form of nandé hútú: not ignorance, but the decision not to expose or contest everything precisely because one already understands.