How to Make the Right Decision? Tao Zhu Earned His First Pot of Gold by Relying on the Second Yang Line of the Qian Hexagram

In the early years of the Western Zhou Dynasty, Tao Zhu, a merchant outside the city of Luoyi, was crouching in front of a pile of millet, sighing. He was a small trader from the Tao region, who had brought half a cart of linen cloth to exchange for millet and make a profit from the price difference. But this year, a severe drought had struck the royal domain, causing millet prices to rise by 30 percent. The money he had on hand was not even enough to buy half a cart of goods.

The shop assistant who had come with him wrung his hands anxiously. "Boss, why don't we sell the linen at a low price to raise money for millet? If we wait too long, I'm afraid the price will go even higher." Tao Zhu held his counting rods and said nothing—selling the linen cheaply meant losing 30 percent upfront. If he bought millet and brought it back, only for prices to drop due to a bumper harvest in Tao, he would lose money on both ends, risking his entire savings.

He recalled the line from the Qian hexagram he had copied at the Grand Astrologer's Office before leaving: the nine in the second place says, "Seeing a dragon in the field, it is favorable to see a great man." Back then, he had thought it was just an auspicious saying, but now it felt like a date pit stuck in his throat—he could neither spit it out nor swallow it down. Where was this dragon? Where was the great man? He couldn't just wait for some nobleman to fall from the sky and pay his bills for him.

Just as he was fretting, an old man in a blue cloth robe approached from the distance, leading two donkeys loaded with salt. He stopped in front of Tao Zhu's stall, picked up a strand of linen to examine it, and asked the price. Tao Zhu quoted him the actual price. The old man nodded, then asked why he was guarding his linen instead of exchanging it for millet, when everyone else was scrambling to buy it.

Tao Zhu did not hide the truth. Counting on his fingers, he said, "The royal domain has been in drought for three months. Most of the nearby millet has already been bought up, and transporting it from farther away would cost even more. If I buy at high prices now, I won't make it back in time for the urgent demand before autumn planting, and I'll be stuck with the goods." He sighed again. "I'm stuck trying to figure out what to do—selling is bad, waiting is bad too."

The old man smiled and said, "You small trader—you're not the type to rush after every profit. Do you know how to read the situation? The millet price in the royal domain won't hold for more than ten days." Tao Zhu's eyes lit up, and he hurriedly asked why. The old man pointed south. "The grain granaries in Chengzhou opened last week. The official price is being used to stabilize the market; the news just hasn't reached this market outside the city yet. If you trust me, sell me your linen at the original price. I'm heading to the State of Wei and need cloth for the journey. Take the money, wait for the official grain to arrive, buy millet at the stable price, and get back to Tao before the autumn harvest. You'll make a steady profit."

Tao Zhu stared at the old man for a long while, then suddenly stood up and bowed deeply. "Sir, could you be the chief diviner from the Grand Astrologer's Office? I went to copy the hexagram texts last month and saw your back." The old man stroked his beard and laughed loudly, neither confirming nor denying it. He only said, "The nine in the second place of the Qian hexagram—'a dragon appears in the wild'—doesn't mean some nobleman descends from heaven. It means you were willing to use your head instead of following the crowd blindly, which is why you could listen to reason."

What happened next was exactly as the old man had said. Three days later, official grain entered the market, and millet prices dropped by 20 percent. Tao Zhu bought two full carts of millet and returned to Tao, just in time for the local lean season when food was scarce, making a huge profit. Later, he often told people: What does "favorable to see a great man" mean? There's no such thing as a nobleman who falls from the sky. You have to first be like a dragon in the field—steadily crouching in the mud, thinking things through instead of flying around blindly. Once you've truly figured things out, the "great man" will naturally come to you.

When people asked him what was most important in doing business for the first time, he always smiled and said: "Figuring out how to make the right decisions first works better than saving up any amount of capital."