Image source: Phoenix Buddhism Photo: Xu Shangjie
"Plotting is in people, and success is in heaven", this is the most incisive and philosophical sentence of the ancient Chinese. Unfortunately, usually people only focus on the "people" who plot things, and ignore the "heavens" that accomplish things. The "people" who plot are ourselves.
Because everything requires our meticulous planning and management, as well as continuous efforts.
What about the "heavens" that are accomplished in heaven? Is it the sky we look up to see? Or is it invisible, untouchable, unpredictable luck? The sages tell us that "heaven" is actually ourselves!
It's just not the present self, but the past self.
It is a kind of potential energy accumulated by our own past actions, words, and thoughts according to the principle of immortal energy.
The colloquial language is called "virtue", that is: merit, yin virtue, merit, morality.
They are like electrical energy, which is invisible, but it is transformed into all kinds of powerful forces.
Therefore, it is more accurate to say that it is in people to plot things, and it is moral to accomplish things.