Ruling oneself 1 (zhishen 治身) and ruling the state (zhiguo 治国) are two important and constituent parts of Daoist thinking. When Laozi 老子 talks about the dao 道 of government, he speaks simultaneously about the way to
rule oneself. The thinking of Laozi uses the heavenly dao to understand the human affairs and, with respect to the human dao, the question of how to regulate the state is the core subject. For Liezi 列子 and Zhuangzi 庄子, however, the basic question is how to regulate oneself.