"Keeping It Simple"--Huang Ming-chien

Huang Ming-chien lives in a commercial building on Taipei's bustling Hsinyi Road, where she's been for over ten years. Her 80-square-meter apartment is simply decorated, with a pink sofa facing a television and a few prints hanging on the walls.

Huang's lifestyle is the same as her decorating-minimalistic. Before she formally left the business world at the age of 38, every day for a whole month she took boxes of suits and high heels from home, some of which she'd never even worn before, to the office to give to co-workers.

"Why does everybody have to go to work? I just don't get it," she says, even as she approaches her 48th birthday.

Sometimes those around her don't get it, but she made her decision at the age of 13: She didn't want to get married, have children, or work. She wanted to spend her time doing her three favorite things-reading, watching films, and traveling.

From the time she was in sixth grade, she has been attracted to the pithy sentences of the Taoist sage Laozi. Later, she discovered Zhuangzi, and became even more deeply entranced with the Taoist philosophy of non-action. She's kept these two volumes at her bedside for years, and takes comfort in them when she has trouble in her work or her social life.

Perhaps Taoist philosophy influenced her, or perhaps it merely brought out her own voice, but she began her rebellion over 30 years ago. She was a smart girl, and easily made her way from business school at National Taiwan University to the University of Illinois' MBA program. She entered the world of business and was successful.

Different fields, different lifestyles

After finishing graduate school, she decided that five years of work would be enough. She'd try different fields, experience different lifestyles, and then retire. Then, having worked as a contributing editor for the Economic Times and chief editor of Excellence Monthly and Leader Magazine, she prepared to live her own way.

After a while a friend asked her to take charge of two groups at the China Production Center, each of which was losing NT$5 million a year. On her first day on the job, she found that each of the 14 desks in the office faced a different direction. There was no organization. She spent the first week putting the place in order. She formed teams, and began weekly meetings with team leaders.

With this consulting position, she only needed to go to the office two hours per week for the meetings, and she received an annual salary of NT$1 million. But after a few years, she came to the realization that she had already applied all of her managerial knowledge in the position, and that the office was now running itself. She had nothing more to offer, and the position would offer nothing more to her, so she decided it was time to leave.

"In life, you should do what you like, and work should be a way to see more of the world," she says. She knew she'd never be a nine-to-fiver, so she considered ways to make a living as her own boss. Her original plan was to open an independent workshop with a friend, but nothing came of it after half a year as they were both "too lazy," she says. So she began writing prolifically and selling books, hoping to put away a nest egg for her retirement. She put out more than ten books in succession.

Just for herself

After a while, she became tired of writing. For three years, she would write only intermittently, trying to take it easy and let the pressure of being a best-selling author "fade out." She found herself happier, and only lacking in her social life. Her publisher stopped asking her out for coffee after hearing she wasn't writing anymore.

She says that it's rare for her to actively seek people out. She rarely makes phone calls, so her phone bill never even reaches three digits. The only number she dials is that of her mother, who lives nearby. They chat every day.

"My mom likes to take care of other people, but can't stand for others to take care of her," Huang says. Once while walking in a park, they saw an elderly person being pushed in a wheelchair by a family member. Huang's widowed mother said she'd rather be dead than wind up like that. Huang thinks that her mother is a little extreme in her independence, but she can understand it as her grandmother, who lived to her eighties, was the same way. Her grandmother, who had four sons and four daughters, had never been hospitalized, and cared for herself through her old age.

"It's impossible to have no problems in life. The biggest problem is fear. People worry that in old age they will suffer from illnesses, so actually the problem isn't aging but illness." She says people should realize what their fears are, and live healthily.

Contentment

Isn't she worried about money? Huang Ming-chien says that once she really retired, she realized that you don't need that much money, and that you need not work yourself up over it.

"Retirement is a mindset, placing emphasis on what you find interesting in your life. Everybody says that they'll wait until retirement to do what they want to do. They wait until they're done with school, they wait until they're married, until the kids are grown, until they have enough money, until retirement-always waiting, and then they die." She says she doesn't recommend a life of detachment for others, as not everyone has the character for it. "You have to get involved and put something in to get something back."

"I've got so much to do these days!" She says sometimes people laugh at her, saying "What are you so busy with? You don't have anything to do!" But there are always books she hasn't read yet, and movies and performances she hasn't seen yet, so she'd rather live her own life. "I don't ask much of others," she says. She bought the collected works of Borges and spent last year working her way through all four volumes. This year she re-read the works of Eileen Chang. Sometimes she can't be bothered to go traveling anywhere, and just pretends her daily walk is a trip, taking in the simple pleasure of a soft breeze.