What to Do When Gossiped About? Xu Hexagram Nine in Second Place: Steady Pace Wins No Loss

Have you ever had this kind of experience?

You’re seriously working on something, but there’s always someone nearby making snide remarks. “Will this even work?” “Stop wasting your time, it’s useless.” “Look at so-and-so, they quit ages ago.”

At first you can brush it off, but as more people say these things, you start to second-guess yourself. Am I really wrong? Should I give up? Then the more you overthink, the more tangled you get—your perfectly good rhythm gets derailed by just a few words from other people.

The second line of the Waiting Hexagram (水天需) talks about exactly this stage. It says: **"需于沙，小有言，终吉。" (Waiting on sand; there is some gossip, but in the end, good fortune.)**

Waiting on Sand: Drawing Closer to Danger

First, let’s explain what “waiting on sand” means.

The core theme of the Waiting Hexagram is holding back and waiting. From the First Line (初九) to the Top Line (上六), it describes a process of gradually approaching danger. The First Line is in the suburbs, far from the water, so it’s perfectly safe. The Nine in the Second Place (九二) has moved onto the sand, closer to the water.

What does water represent in the I Ching (Book of Changes)? It stands for danger, the Abysmal (坎), and trouble.

So “waiting on sand” means: you’ve taken a step forward, closer to your goal, but also closer to risk. At this point, people start to notice you, and idle gossip follows.

This stage is really interesting. You haven’t succeeded yet, but you’re far from failing either. Stuck in this in-between space, you’re the easiest target for criticism.

Think about people who are building something: when you’re just starting out, no one pays you any mind—they figure you’ll never amount to anything. Once you’ve actually made it, everyone comes around to flatter you—after all, you’re already successful, and they don’t want to get on your bad side.

It’s the middle part that’s the hardest—you’re on the way up, but you haven’t arrived yet. Some people believe in you, some don’t, some are waiting to see you fail, and some are secretly tripping you up.

This is what “there is some gossip” refers to.

There Is Some Gossip: Where Do Idle Remarks Come From?

“There is some gossip” means people are talking behind your back, judging you, or pouring cold water on your plans.

Why does this happen? From what I’ve observed, there are roughly three scenarios.

**First, jealousy.** You’ve moved forward, but they’re still stuck in the same place. You’re working harder than them, and that makes them uncomfortable. They don’t want to put in the effort themselves, and they don’t want to watch you progress either. So they make snide comments to pull you down to their level, which makes them feel better about themselves.

These people are the easiest to spot. They never point out specific problems with what you’re doing—they just make vague remarks like “it won’t work,” “it’s not reliable,” or “don’t bother.” If you ask them why it won’t work, they can’t give you a real reason; they just have a feeling it won’t.

For people like this, just tune them out. When they say you can’t do it, it’s not that you’re incapable—it’s that they’re incapable, and they assume everyone else is too.

**Second, good intentions.** Some people really do have your best interests at heart. Like your parents or your friends—they’re worried you’ll get hurt or take a wrong turn, so they advise you to play it safe and not take risks.

This one is trickier. They mean well, so you can’t just ignore them, but you can’t take everything they say to heart either. Ignoring them hurts their feelings; taking all their advice means you’ll never get anything done.

The key is to tell the difference. Are they giving you specific suggestions, or just vague negativity? Have they achieved anything in their own field? Do they actually understand what you’re working on?

Once you think through these questions, you’ll know how much of their advice to take.

**Third, information gap.** They don’t understand what you’re doing, so they judge it based on their own experience and think you’re being unrealistic.

For example, if you work in the internet industry, a relative back in your hometown might say “everything online is a scam.” It’s not that they’re mean—they just genuinely have no idea how much the world has changed.

There’s no point arguing with people like this either. The more you explain, the more they’ll think you’ve been brainwashed. Just keep doing what you’re doing—once you show results, they’ll come around on their own.

No matter which type it is, the answer from the Nine in the Second Place of the Waiting Hexagram is the same: **ignore it, keep going, and good fortune will come in the end.**

The Key to Final Good Fortune: Staying Steady

Why does it turn out well in the end? Because the Nine in the Second Place is in the central and proper position, so it’s stable.

What does that mean? It means your own rhythm doesn’t get disrupted. What other people say is their business—you just keep doing what you need to do. Keep learning, keep building, keep moving forward.

What’s the worst thing that can happen? You lose your cool first.

One person makes a comment, and you spend three days overthinking it. The more you think about it, the more you think they’re right, the more you doubt yourself. Then you start changing your direction, changing your strategy, and in all the switching around, you lose sight of what was working in the first place.

I have a friend who runs a social media account. At the beginning, his numbers were bad. His relatives and friends all said, “Quit, there’s no future in this, get a real job.” He stuck it out at first, but after hearing it enough times, he started to wonder if he really was cut out for it.

Then he started changing everything haphazardly. One day he’d copy another creator’s style, the next he’d steal someone else’s topic ideas, the day after that he’d switch to a different platform. The more he changed, the worse his numbers got; the worse his numbers got, the more he changed. He almost gave up entirely.

Then he realized: all those people talking were just armchair critics. He was the one actually doing the work, and only he knew whether it could work or not. He went back to his original direction, posted consistently for half a year, and slowly built up his audience.

Now he has hundreds of thousands of followers, and all those people who used to make snide remarks are coming to him asking how to grow their own accounts.

See? That’s just human nature. **When you’re weak, there’s the most gossip; when you’re strong, it naturally dies down.**

So what do you do when you face “some gossip”? Don’t explain, don’t argue, don’t take it to heart. The more you care about it, the more power it has. If you ignore it, it’ll fade away on its own.

Spending your time and energy on the things that matter is better than anything else.

Three Methods to Help You Brush Off Gossip

It’s easier said than done, of course. No one feels good when people are talking about them behind their back. Here are three methods that I’ve tested and found really helpful.

**First, tell the difference between criticism and advice.**

Criticism is emotional: “You’re no good,” “You’re doing this wrong,” “I knew this would happen.” Forget these comments as soon as you hear them—don’t take them personally.

Advice is constructive: “You could tweak this part a little,” “There might be a risk there,” “Here’s an experience of mine you might find useful.” Listen carefully to these, take notes, and apply what’s useful.

How to tell them apart? It’s simple. **Criticism targets you as a person; advice targets the thing you’re doing.** Comments about how you’re “no good” are just criticism; comments about how a specific part of your work could be improved are actual advice.

**Second, lower your expectations.**

Don’t expect everyone to understand you or support you. In this world, there are very few people who genuinely want the best for you. Most people are just making offhand remarks—they forget what they said five minutes later.

If you take every single thing everyone says to heart, you’ll never get anything done in your life—you’ll be too busy processing all the emotions.

**Third, keep your rhythm in your own hands.**

What other people say doesn’t matter—your own rhythm can’t fall apart. Eat when you need to eat, sleep when you need to sleep, work when you need to work.

Look at people who practice Taiji: no matter how hard someone pushes them, they stay slow and steady, never falling into the other person’s pace. You can rush all you want, but I’m staying calm. In the end, the person who gets flustered first is always the one who was in a hurry.

Final Thoughts

At the end of the day, the Nine in the Second Place of the Waiting Hexagram boils down to one sentence: **Walk your own path, and let others talk.**

But this isn’t said out of stubbornness—it’s said with confidence.

You know what you’re doing, you know your direction is right, you know this is just the middle stage and there’s still a way to go before the finish line—but you will get there.

With that kind of certainty, gossip can’t hurt you.

“There is some gossip, but in the end, good fortune.” The important part isn’t the “gossip”—it’s the “good fortune in the end.”

All those idle remarks are just sand on the road. Just step over them and keep going—don’t squat down to pick up every single grain.