15 Heartfelt Chinese Idioms With Heart (心)

Treat others as yourself

Literal: Exchange heart for heart

To exchange (换) one heart (心) for another, using (以) your own as the thing you give. The image is of trust as a swap rather than a demand: you put your own candour in first and take the other person's in return. This is a common set phrase rather than a classical idiom — it has no locus classicus an...

Lower one's guard

Literal: Handle it with a careless heart

Liu Zongyuan of the Tang, writing to a younger man, says of his own composition: 故吾每为文章，未尝敢以轻心掉之，惧其剽而不留也 — I have never dared toss a piece off (掉) with a light (轻) heart (心), fearing it would come out glib and leave nothing behind. The letter's larger subject is whether he will accept the role of te...

Words differ from thoughts

Literal: Mouth yes heart no

The mouth (口) says yes (是), the heart (心) says no (非). 是 and 非 are the standard classical pair for right and wrong as well as for assent and denial, so the phrase carries a moral charge that the English 'two-faced' does not quite have — the split is between what is affirmed and what is believed true...

Invest utmost effort and emotion

Literal: Vomit heart drip blood

Li He wrote by riding out with a bag, dropping lines into it as they came, and working them up at night; his mother, looking at the bag, said this boy would not stop until he had vomited out (呕) his heart (心). Han Yu, in a related image, wrote of cutting out his liver for paper and dripping (沥) his ...

Deeply and permanently affected

Literal: Carve bone inscribe heart

Cut (刻) into the bone (骨) and inscribed (铭) on the heart (心). 铭 is specifically the verb for casting an inscription into bronze, so both halves name permanent media, and what the phrase claims is that the impression cannot be worn away. Tang usage attaches it to gratitude — a debt too deep ever to b...

Restless, unfocused mind

Literal: Heart monkey mind horse

The heart (心) as a monkey (猿), the mind (意) as a horse (马). The pairing comes out of Buddhist writing on meditation, where the two animals name two different failures: the monkey will not stay on one branch, and the horse will not stay where it is put. Chinese kept both. It describes attention that ...

Courage balanced with careful attention

Literal: Bold gallbladder, careful heart

The physician Sun Simiao set out the pairing in his writing on medical practice: the gall (胆) should be large (大) and the heart (心) small (细), the intelligence rounded and the conduct square. He was describing the qualities of a good doctor — the nerve to act and the care to attend to detail, each u...

Fundamentally kind and virtuous character

Literal: Heart ground kind good

A heart-ground (心地) that is kind and good (善良). 心地 is the interesting half: it is Buddhist vocabulary, the mind figured as ground in which actions are planted and from which consequences grow, and it entered ordinary Chinese from that usage and stayed. The full phrase, though, is a plain modern desc...

Constant dread; unable to stop worrying

Literal: Lift heart hang gall

The heart (心) hoisted up (提) and the gall bladder (胆) left swinging (吊). Chinese physiology puts courage in the gall, so the phrase names both organs of nerve as displaced at once — it is a description of the body, not of the thoughts. That is what separates it from ordinary worry. It describes sust...

Act with extreme caution and care

Literal: Careful, and solemnly attentive

The Book of Songs uses it of King Wen: reverent and careful (小心翼翼) in his service. 翼翼 there means solemn and attentive rather than anything to do with wings, though the character is the one for a wing and the association is hard to shake off. In the classic it describes a religious attitude. Ordinar...

Perfectly satisfying every expectation

Literal: Match heart according wish

Matching (称) the heart (心) and according with (如) the intention (意). The two halves are not redundant: 心 is what a person feels and 意 is what they meant, so the phrase claims that the outcome satisfies both the wish and the plan. Note the reading — 称 is chèn here, to match or suit, not chēng. Purcha...

Acting on a sudden impulse or whim

Literal: Heart's blood comes in a tide

The heart's blood (心血) coming in like a tide (来潮). The physiology is that of Chinese medicine, where the heart governs the blood and also the mind, so a surge in one is a surge in the other. What the phrase describes is therefore an impulse with a bodily cause and no reason behind it. The tone is ne...

Wholeheartedly; with undivided attention

Literal: One heart one mind

One (一) heart (心), one (一) intention (意). The repetition is doing the work: 心 and 意 are separate faculties in Chinese, feeling and purpose, and the phrase insists that both are pointed the same way, which is a stronger claim than concentration alone. Its opposites are instructive — 三心二意, three heart...

Careless; negligent

Literal: Coarse heart, broad intention

A coarse (粗) heart (心) and a broad (大) intention (意). Both halves say the same thing about grain: the attention is set too wide a mesh, so small things pass through it. That is why the phrase describes a standing disposition rather than a single lapse, and Chinese distinguishes it from stupidity — t...

Calm and composed; even-tempered

Literal: Heart calm and breath harmonious

A level (平) heart (心) and settled (和) breath (气). The pairing is not decorative: 气 is the moving part of a person in Chinese medicine, and its state and the emotions are treated as one system, so steadying the breathing and steadying the temper are a single operation described twice. Su Shi uses the...