What Does Full Departure Feel Like? Top Line of Retreat Hexagram: "Fei Dun, Wu Bu Li (Fat Retreat, Nothing That Does Not Further)" — True Freedom Only Comes When You’ve Gone Far Enough

Have you ever had this kind of experience?

You make up your mind to leave a place,

a person, a relationship.

At the very beginning,

you feel a little out of sorts.

Every now and then, you want to go back and check,

wonder how they're doing now,

wonder if they're doing okay

without you.

Sometimes you even doubt yourself —

was I wrong to leave back then?

If I'd hung on a little longer,

would things be different now?

You say you've left,

but your heart is still there.

Your body has walked away, but your soul hasn't.

You say you've let go,

but your mind keeps turning it over and over.

You stop thinking about it during the day, but it shows up in your dreams.

This state

is not true Retreat.

You've physically left, but your heart hasn't.

You think you've let go,

but you're still being affected by it.

The top line of the Retreat Hexagram, the Nine at the Top,

speaks of true Retreat.

It has a very interesting name,

called 「肥遁」 (Fei Dun / Fat Retreat).

Fei Dun: The Most Thorough Withdrawal

The Nine at the Top of the Retreat Hexagram is a Yang Line in a Yin position,

at the very peak of the Retreat Hexagram.

The Line Text says: 「肥遁，无不利。」 (Fei Dun, wu bu li / Fat Retreat, nothing that does not further.)

Fei Dun means a plump, well-fed retreat,

a comfortable, easy retreat,

a retreat with plenty of room to spare.

Wu bu li — nothing that does not further.

All benefits, no downsides.

Why is it called "Fei Dun" (Fat Retreat)?

This character "fei" (fat) is especially interesting.

"Fat" doesn't mean literally being overweight;

it means ample, unhurried, with more than enough space.

It means withdrawing very thoroughly,

very calmly, very freely.

No ties holding you back,

no loose ends trailing behind,

light and unburdened through and through.

The Nine at the Top is at the very top of the Retreat Hexagram,

completely separated from the two trigrams below.

All the petty people, all the troubles,

all the gossip and drama down below

can no longer affect it.

It stands high up, far away,

watching everything below,

all of it having nothing to do with it.

What does this remind you of?

It's like quitting a toxic company,

wrapping up the handover completely clean when you leave,

taking what's yours, saying what needs to be said,

no lingering issues left behind.

You start a new life,

the new job is pretty good,

the new colleagues are nice too.

After a while,

you can barely even remember the name of your old company.

All the messy stuff from before

feels like it happened in a past life when you think about it.

This is what Fei Dun is.

When you go, you just go —

you leave cleanly,

you leave with full clarity,

you leave completely and thoroughly.

No looking back, no overthinking, no clinging.

Let the past stay in the past,

let the people from before stay where they belong.

Wu bu li — there's no downside at all.

Why no downside?

Because you've completely left the environment that was draining you —

what could possibly be unfavorable for you?

You're free.

Your time is yours,

your energy is yours,

your mood is yours too.

No one can drain you, hold you back, or affect you anymore.

This is the best state to be in.

Why Can't Most People Achieve "Fei Dun"?

It sounds simple enough,

isn't it just leaving completely?

But people who can actually do it

are actually very few.

Why?

Because people have a few flaws

they just can't seem to fix.

The first flaw: nostalgia.

Humans are emotional creatures.

No matter how bad a place was,

you develop feelings for it after staying long enough.

No matter how terrible a person was,

you get used to them after being together long enough.

Once you actually leave,

you end up missing them instead.

What do you miss?

You miss the good times,

you miss the happy moments.

You forget all the bad parts,

and only remember the good ones.

Then you start doubting yourself —

was I too impulsive?

Should I not have left?

That's not actually the case.

You just forgot why you decided to leave in the first place.

Wait till you go back and stay for a couple days,

and you'll want to leave again.

That's just how people are —

once the scar heals, you forget the pain.

The second flaw: unwillingness to accept loss.

I put in so much effort,

and ended up with nothing to show for it —

why should that be?

If I leave,

won't I just be letting those people get off easy?

No way, I can't just let it go like that.

I need to see how things turn out for them,

I need to see if they get what they deserve.

And what happens in the end?

They just go on living their lives like normal,

while you're over there obsessing over them every day,

ruining your own life in the process.

Wen Laoshi once said something:

how much you hate someone

shows how much power that person still has over you.

If you're constantly fixated on whether they'll get what's coming to them,

that means they're still controlling you.

If you really want to "win" against them,

it's not about watching them fall —

it's about living a better life than they do.

The third flaw: lack of self-confidence.

After you leave,

the moment you hit a little rough patch,

you start thinking —

did I make the wrong choice back then?

Should I not have left?

If I'd stayed there,

would things be better now?

It's not that you made the wrong choice —

it's that you're idealizing what staying would have been like.

Remember this:

when you decided to leave back then,

you must have already reached your breaking point.

Without that breaking point,

you wouldn't have left.

So don't doubt the choice you made back then.

The decision you made

was definitely the right one

given the circumstances at the time.

The fourth flaw: not finding a new source of fulfillment.

Why do people keep dwelling on the past?

Because the present isn't good enough.

If your life right now is really full,

really happy, really full of purpose,

you wouldn't have time to think about the past at all.

You'd wake up every day thinking —

today is another great day.

Where would you find the time to think about all that messy old stuff?

So being unable to move on

usually isn't because the past was so great —

it's because the present isn't good enough.

These four flaws

trap a lot of people in a "half-retreat" state.

You say you've left, but you haven't really let go.

Stuck in limbo, and that's the worst feeling of all.

How to Tell If You've Achieved "Fei Dun"

What counts as true Fei Dun?

It's simple — ask yourself four questions.

First question: Do you still often think about things from the past?

It's not that you can never think about it at all —

it's that when you do, it doesn't stir up any feelings anymore.

It's like watching someone else's story,

no sadness, no regret,

no anger, no clinging.

You just think of it briefly,

then let it go again.

If thinking about it still makes you emotional,

or still makes you sad or regretful,

that means you haven't moved on yet.

Second question: Do you still go out of your way to ask for news from the past?

Do you sneak a look at someone's Moments feed?

Do you ask old friends —

how are they doing lately?

Is the company still doing okay?

What's so-and-so up to now?

If you're still asking around,

that means you haven't let go yet.

True letting go

is not caring at all.

Whether you're doing well or not

has absolutely nothing to do with me.

Third question: If you ran into someone from the past again, could you face them calmly?

Would you feel awkward?

Would you feel nervous?

Would you want to hide?

Or would you

greet them openly and casually,

chat for a minute, then go your separate ways,

with not a single ripple in your heart?

Being able to stay calm

is what true letting go looks like.

Fourth question: Is your life now better than it was before?

It's not necessarily about having more money or a higher status —

it's about your overall state:

are you happy? Are you free?

Are you fulfilled? Do you have something to look forward to?

If you're doing better now than before,

then you definitely made the right choice to leave.

And you won't cling to the past anymore.

If you're worse off now than before,

then you'll definitely feel regret,

and want to go back.

For these four questions,

if all the answers are yes —

no nostalgia, no prying, calm composure, better present —

then congratulations,

you've reached the state of "Fei Dun".

If more than two answers are no,

then you still have some practicing to do.

How to Achieve "Fei Dun"

So how do you truly and completely move on?

Remember four words —

keep moving forward.

Don't look back,

don't overthink it over and over,

don't add extra drama in your head.

Just keep your head down and keep walking forward.

As you walk and walk,

you'll find the past getting further and further away.

As you walk and walk,

you'll meet better people and better things.

As you walk and walk,

you'll forget why you were ever sad about it in the first place.

How to do this in practice?

Here are a few practical tips for you.

First, cut ties cleanly.

Delete what needs to be deleted, unfollow what needs to be unfollowed,

block what needs to be blocked.

Don't be reluctant,

and don't feel bad about it.

What are you keeping it for anyway?

Keeping it just to make yourself miserable?

Out of sight, out of mind.

Start by creating physical distance,

and the emotional distance will follow naturally.

Second, keep busy.

Why do people overthink things?

Because they have too much free time.

If you're so busy every day that you're running ragged,

and pass out the second your head hits the pillow,

would you even have time to think about the past?

Find things to do —

work, study, fitness, socializing,

fill up your time completely.

Busy is the best cure for all melodrama.

Third, move forward.

Don't keep living in the past —

think more about the future.

Find yourself new goals, new directions.

If you want to learn something, go learn it.

If you want to go somewhere fun, go there.

If you want to meet new people, go meet them.

Once the door to a new world opens up,

who would still be hung up on the trivial stuff from the old one?

Fourth, don't negate the past.

A lot of people, once they move on,

start negating everything about the past.

Saying that place was total garbage,

that person was all flaws,

that whole period of time was a total waste.

There's no need for that.

The good parts of the past were good,

the bad parts were bad.

Remember the good, let go of the bad.

Negating the past

is negating a whole chapter of your own life.

Why bother?

Fifth, allow yourself to think about it occasionally.

Don't be too hard on yourself,

saying things like "I have to completely forget it,

and never think about it again."

That's impossible.

People and experiences you shared together —

how can you just forget them like that?

Thinking about it once in a while is totally normal.

Don't fight yourself over it.

If you think about it, you think about it —

just keep going with whatever you were doing,

and you'll forget about it again soon enough.

Wen Laoshi once said,

letting go isn't throwing the past in the trash —

it's putting it up on a shelf.

You know it's there,

but you don't take it down to look at it every day anymore.

It's just there, gathering dust,

but it doesn't affect how you live your life now.

I think that's a really great metaphor.

True letting go

isn't deletion —

it's archiving.

You know that file is saved in some folder somewhere,

but you don't open it anymore.

Fei Dun Is Not the End — It's a New Starting Point

A lot of people think once you reach the Nine at the Top of Retreat, it's over,

that Fei Dun is the final step,

the furthest you can retreat.

That's actually not true.

Fei Dun is not an ending —

it's a new beginning.

Only when you've completely let go of the past

can you travel light into the future.

Only when you've shaken off all the things holding you back

can you run faster and fly higher.

Wu bu li —

nothing that does not further,

nothing but opportunities, possibilities, and hope.

Why?

Because you've emptied out.

Only when you're empty can you fill yourself with new things.

When you've cleared out all the toxic people and messy stuff from the past,

new people and new things can come in.

When you've freed up space in your heart,

better things can be placed there.

So Fei Dun is not the end point —

it's a new starting point.

It's the start of your next chapter in life.

Retreating to the Nine at the Top

doesn't mean you have nowhere left to retreat to —

it means you've retreated enough, retreated cleanly,

and it's time to move forward.

This is also the wisdom of the I Ching (Book of Changes) —

when Yin reaches its extreme, it becomes Yang;

when retreat reaches its extreme, it becomes advance.

When you've retreated as far as you can go,

what comes next is advance.

When you've lost as much as you can lose,

what comes next is gain.

Sounds like a motivational quote, right?

But it's actually not.

It's a law of how things work.

When things get bad enough,

they can't get any worse —

what comes next can only be getting better.

When a person hits rock bottom,

they can't go any lower —

what comes next can only be going up.

As long as you don't give up on yourself.

Final Thoughts

The Nine at the Top line of the Retreat Hexagram

is the conclusion of the Retreat Hexagram.

「肥遁，无不利」 (Fei Dun, wu bu li / Fat Retreat, nothing that does not further),

six characters,

spoken so lightly and effortlessly.

But I know

actually reaching this point is not easy.

From the Six at the Beginning's "Retreat of the Tail",

to the Six in the Second Place's "Held Retreat",

to the Nine in the Third Place's "Tied Retreat",

to the Nine in the Fourth Place's "Favorable Retreat",

to the Nine in the Fifth Place's "Admirable Retreat",

and finally to the Nine at the Top's "Fei Dun (Fat Retreat)".

Every step is a hurdle,

every step brings you to a whole new level.

You have to pass through every line,

and every hurdle will cost you something.

But as long as you make it through,

you'll realize —

all those hurdles you thought you'd never get past

are actually behind you now;

all those people you thought you'd never forget

are actually forgotten now;

all those things you thought were the end of the world

actually don't seem like such a big deal when you look back.

That's just how life is —

you walk along, you leave things behind along the way,

you leave things behind, you pick up new things along the way.

What you leave behind are burdens; what you pick up is freedom;

what you leave behind is the past; what you pick up is the future.

Fei Dun, wu bu li — Fat Retreat, nothing that does not further.

May every path you walk

never be walked in vain.

May every place you leave

make you a better version of yourself.

May you one day,

when you look back,

be able to say with a smile —

it's all in the past now.

And what's more —

the present is better.