How to See the Situation Clearly? The Hilarious Scene of Yuan Tiangang and Li Chunfeng Deducing the National Fate of the Tang Dynasty

During the Zhenguan era of the Tang Dynasty, a faint smell of burning always lingered outside the door of the secret chamber in the Taiji Palace—not from the imperial kitchen burning a dish, but from Li Chunfeng, who was inside again, deducing the fate of the nation.

Ever since Li Shimin ascended the dragon throne, a nagging worry had gnawed at him: How many generations would my Great Tang last? Could some disaster strike one day? After much thought, he summoned the two top technical experts of the time: Li Chunfeng, the Astronomer Royal who made a living observing the stars, and Yuan Tiangang, the Fire Well Magistrate who earned his keep reading faces.

Speaking of Li Chunfeng, his obsession with research would have made him the ultimate overachiever pulling all-nighters in a lab today. On the very day he received the assignment, he shut himself in the secret chamber, lit candles, spread out the I Ching and Eight Trigrams, and began calculating furiously.

From Wu Zetian's ascension to the throne to the An Lushan Rebellion, from the Huang Chao Uprising to the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, he pinched his fingers so hard they nearly sparked. The more he calculated, the more excited he grew, even forgetting to eat. Yuan Tiangang, who had been sipping tea and watching the show nearby, gradually sensed something was wrong—why couldn't his apprentice rein himself in?

Think about it: the boss only wanted to know if the company could go public next year, but you went ahead and drew up the K-line chart for the next two thousand years. Isn't that just asking for trouble?

The more Yuan Tiangang thought about it, the more restless he became. Having lived most of his life, he knew better than anyone how to read the situation—talking too big or leaving no room for maneuver never ended well. Just then, Li Chunfeng had calculated up to the Song Dynasty and was moving on to the Yuan, muttering under his breath, "Hey, why are all the Ming emperors so eccentric..."

Yuan Tiangang made a quick decision. He raised his hand and gave Li Chunfeng a firm push on the back.

Li Chunfeng, who was in the thick of his calculations, stumbled forward from the push. He was just about to turn around and snap when he saw his master give him a meaningful look. He froze for a moment, then glanced at the divination paper in his hand, covered in dense writing—and instantly broke out in a cold sweat.

He was right, after all. Deducing trends should be done in moderation. If you really laid bare the secrets of two thousand years, not only would Li Shimin lose sleep over it, but which of the countless emperors of later generations would tolerate such a book?

The two exchanged a glance, and both saw the same words in each other's eyes: "Survival comes first." Li Chunfeng quickly picked up his brush and wrote two lines on the final hexagram: "Countless thousands of things cannot be fully told; better to push each other's backs and retire to rest." It meant: let's stop here. If we keep going, disaster will strike. We old friends should just go home and sleep back to back.

And so, the *Tui Bei Tu* (Push Back Diagram) was born, quite by accident.

Later, someone asked Yuan Tiangang what to do when facing difficulties. Yuan Tiangang stroked his beard and smiled: "You see how absorbed Chunfeng was in his calculations? Even he needed someone to give him a push. In life, it's not just about knowing how to charge forward—it's even more important to know when to stop."

There's actually a lot of truth in that. Look at how many people today fret over their choices, always wanting to map out every step of the future with perfect clarity. But if you really knew everything, what would there be to look forward to in life?

Throughout his life, Yuan Tiangang read the fortunes of Du Yan, predicted the fate of Wu Zetian, and even knew exactly when his own end would come. But his greatest skill was never his accuracy in divination—it was his sense of propriety: knowing what to say and what not to say, when to step forward and when to step back.

Just like that *Tui Bei Tu*—sixty illustrations, vague and ambiguous, so that every generation after could see in it whatever they wanted to see. If it had been written with crystal clarity, would it have been passed down for so many centuries?