DICTIONARY · CC-CEDICT

放下身段

Mandarin · pinyin fàng xià shēn duàn

to get off one's high horse; to dispense with posturing (and adopt a more humble or empathetic attitude)

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Characters in this entry

放: fàng · put, release, free, liberate
下: xià · under, underneath, below; down; inferior; bring down
身: shēn · body; trunk, hull; Kangxi radical 158
段: duàn · section, piece, division

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

4–4–1–4 · fang4 xia4 shen1 duan4

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Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

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