守株待兔

shǒuzhūdàitù 

Imagine for a moment that a person buys a scratch off lotto ticket and wins 500 dollars. It's free money, right? So, they splurge on a big meal at a fancy restaurant and go off an buy a bunch of junk they don't need. Within a day, all of the money is gone. No harm, no foul, right? It was found money, after all. Most everybody would go back to work and day to day life. However, what if the person did something irrationally, like quit their job and devote all of their money to buying lotto tickets? In most cases, they would end up destitute and broke. You make money by working hard and picking the right investments. Money doesn't magically fall from the sky, and a career lotto scratcher is not a viable way to earn a living wage. I think this is something we could say most people would agree on. 

There is an old Chinese idiom that speaks to this. It's ....

守株待兔

shǒuzhūdàitù 

Let's breakdown the characters. They go like this ...

守 -- keep watch

株 -- tree trunk

待 -- wait

兔 -- rabbit

Clean up the literal translation, and you get something like "Waiting at a tree trunk for rabbits." So, that doesn't make sense, right? Of course not, this is an idiom, and those do not literally translate. That's like complaining that "your tank is empty" and being upset that Chinese people do not understand that your are trying to say that you a very tired. There is a cultural context that is missing if you are not Chinese. So, here is the back story.

A lazy farmer goes out to plow his field. Nearby, some hunters are chasing rabbits. Frightened, a bunch of bunnies flees. One of them is either blind and has bad eyesight. It runs head first into a tree stump. It breaks it's neck. It's dead. The lazy farmer can either mourn the death of something fuzzy and cute, or he can realize something more existential. Dinner just killed itself for him and presented itself to him. What a stroke of luck! He takes the hare home, cleans it, and eats well. Life is good

The next day, does he go back to tilling and seeding his field? No, he goes back to the tree stump and waits another rabbit to accidentally kill itself. After all, the tree stump must be magical. It must have a magnetic field that warps bunny minds into senseless suicide. Right? So, the guy waits and waits for another rabbit to sacrifice itself for the honor of filling the farmer's stomach. It never happens. In the meantime, the field has not been plowed, crops have not been planted, and the farm has failed. The farmer has no food for the coming winter. He's absolutely screwed.

Basically, it's the same situation as the lotto junkie in present day. This is an expression that warns against shunning hardwork and trusting solely in chance. Lotto tickets are not keys to the future, and waiting for rabbits to die on your behalf will not lead you to a full stomach.