Pu (say "poo") is the old Taoist image of the uncarved block: wood before anyone has cut it into a bowl, a chair, or a chess piece. The old texts contrast this directly with the more familiar ideal of polishing and shaping a person into a finished, useful thing, a title, a role, a resume line. Pu isn't a claim that raw and unskilled is somehow better than trained. It describes an original wholeness that existed before all the carving started, and that carving, once done, cannot easily be undone. The chapter that uses this image pairs it with a sage who governs effectively without forcing anything, so it isn't an argument for passivity either. Before you check your phone or your task list this morning, spend one unhurried minute as the block itself, before today's roles get carved onto you, and notice what's still there underneath all of them.