What is better than teaching them to fish rather than giving them a fish?

We are familiar with the saying,

• "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime."

Can you improve it?

The answer is Yes according to Chinese Sayings.

“授人以鱼，不如授人以渔；授人以渔，不如授人以欲。”

Give a person a fish is not as good as teaching him how to fish.
Teaching him how to fish is not as good as motivating him to want to fish.

鱼 Eating a fish belongs to the body.
渔 How to fish belongs to the mind.
欲 Wanting to fish belongs to the heart.

All three Chinese words have the same pinyin spelling of  "yu".

Do you like Mandarin?

Touching the heart, self-motivation is most important.

That is why God wants to in Ezekiel 36:26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you, your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.

That is why believers need to be born again

That is why Zhuang Zi of the Dao School, says 内圣外王 Saint within and King without.

And Mencius of the Confucius School, says, 内修外治 rule out from inside-development.

There is the saying, "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink".

In Chinese, you have the more advanced version of:

《论语·雍也第六》知之者不如好之者 好之者不如乐之者.

[Analects Chapter 6] Knowing is not as good as the one with desire (to know).

Wanting it is not as good as enjoying it.

We can see why a typical advice for the entrepreneur is about doing it with passion.

Lim Liat (c) 19-7-17