William James argued that attention is the very substance of will — that where you place your focus is, in effect, who you are becoming. The Taoist concept of wu wei complicates this beautifully: not all valuable work happens through directed effort, and over-attending to an outcome can stiffen the very process that would produce it. The synthesis is a practical discipline: choose your focus deliberately, then release your grip on the result. Attend to the system; let the outcome breathe.

Where in your work are you attending so hard to the destination that you're disrupting the process that would actually get you there?

Drawing from Pragmatism × Taoism — Synthesized: William James / Laozi