An attempt to highlight the beauty of the deep philosophical themes of the story of FEUD :

The choice of the themes deplayed in the drama were outstanding.

I think it deserves a detailed analysis, so I decided to write on and I'll also  add in it all my comments I posted while watching this drama. It's going to be longg, let's get into it !

-The Principle of Polarity (Yin & Yang, Cause and Effects) :

The first and main reason of me liking this drama is the strong philosophical themes especially and mainly the Principle of Polarity theory. It was impressive, and this is why despite so many flaws, the drama did succeed in my eyes to differ from most recent xianxias ! I have watch many of them before, and I never saw a cdrama focussing this much on the Yin & Yang polarities. It made curious and pushed my reflextion on it futher more, especially making me reflect on how Yin & Yang can influent oneself and in the relationship with others.

I had a lot of fun trying guessing what influencing was both HRY & BJS's behaviors.

I'll from here add few of the reflections I posted on the comment section of the drama page, it's gonna make my post quite long, but I want to be the most detailed I can be on my analysis. So, please bear with me LOL.

Yin & Yang theory :

Thoughts about ep 19 & 20 :

I feel like the writers should have introduced the Ying and Yang theory to the audience, especially international fans, because most of them didn't get it. They were judging Hua Ru Yue & Bai Jiu Si  as if they were random humans beings when they arent't. They are precisely the personification of Yin and Yang energies.

"Heaven is an accumulation of Yang, Earth an accumulation of Yin." Yin and Yang are two opposing forces, but they are also complementary.

Ying and Yang, with each other and within themselves, have the ultimate goal of finding harmony while maintaining their respective polarities. If they don't achieve this, it leads PRECISELY to feud! And harmony isn't about being equal, but about accepting inequality and differences.

They both need to figure out how to honor the expressions of Ying and Yang in themselves and in each other. They've never truly created a real harmony, within themselves and in their relationship, where Ying and Yang are recognized and accepted. This is why they've never truly connected deeply to each other, because they weren't aware of their own Ying and Yang differences within themsleves.

BJS reaches this level of understanding in episode 20, but it was too late. HRY seems like she understood this early on (but it was only on a surface level), but was deceived by BJS and also by her expectations that he would accept her every action. They drift apart because they couldn't tolerate how unbalanced they love was appearing to be for each other. Sometimes it appeared he loved her more than she loved him, since she was breaking her promises and sometimes it was the opposite, she looked more in love than him because she was persevering in knowing he could understand and accept her way of seeing things.

BJS's point of perception is higher in the sky, while HRY's is closer to Earth. She focuses on details that BJS can't even grasp. BJS focuses on a broad understanding too far from reach for HRY.

Both see or perceive their differences as obstacles instead of seeing their beauty, how inner and mutual differences can lead to ultimate truth, how they transform beyond what one expects of oneself.

They grew apart when they decided to confront each other as enemies when in reality only their perception was different, their love was still bonding them together. But I think they also hated themselves for their very own differences, how they cannot deny their own nature for the other even though they love each other. When in reality, Ying & Yanfg have to precisely must hold on their indviduality and find a way to compromise at the same time to harmonize each other.

The energies of Yin and Yang express themselves more strongly than each other's at different times. They have failed to recognize, accept, and embrace who they truly are, for themselves and for each other, an undiying authentic movement between Yin and Yang, internally and externally. HRJ refuses to live in her Yin because she felt betrayed, which led her Yang to predominate. Thus, her love turned to unmoved hatred. She isn't heartless, she simply refuses to listen to her heart. BJS was never heartless. When he left her after sealing her power, he decided to silenced his heart, ignoring the Yin within himself, which led HRY to see only the Yang in himself.

HRY is yin, cold but gentle and chaotic. Her natural intuition has led her to show compassion for humans. BJS is yang, warm, dynamic but harsh. His logic has led him to act with reason to care about the consequences of one's action in the bigger picture, denying the present moment for the sake of the future.

But HRY has within her Yang's energy, and BJS is also holding within himself Yin's energy. HRY was too focussed on the triggered expression of her Yang, and BSJ was too obsessed with the expression of his Yang, deying his own Yin.

Hate is not the opposite of love. Hate is born from deceived love. And only love can appease hatred. And precisely BJS & HYR child was that love that was supposed to appease HYR's pain from the betrayal she experienced. But that child died, because she couldn't use her power to save him. Why? Because of BJS. Because of his actions.

Whether he had reasons for acting this way isn't what's important to understand. What's important to understand is that BJS himself betrayed his own nature through his actions toward HYR. How? He ignored the possible consequences of his actions toward her. He failed to see the bigger picture.

HRY is the same; she betrayed her own nature by desperately silencing her intuition: deep down, she knew he had never intentionally hurt her, that he hadn't truly abandoned her. She failed to grasp the details of his actions (his true intentions).

Conclusion : let the other be, accept them for who they are or just leave them. How can you live as your authentic self if you fail to let the other be who they truly are.

You don't always have to intervene, you can't control someone's nature anyway. The meaning of someone's actions is beyond the conscious of good and bad.

This drama precisely wants us to understand that taking one side or the other is useless. But most of the audience failed to understand the deeper meaning of what the writing was trying to convey.

Understanding the heart is doomed to a multitude of turmoil, but also the understanding of simplicity. A simplicity that most fail to comprehend, seeing only the complexity of the outward appearance of the consequences of the heart.

Both BJS and HRY are innocent and guilty, but ESPECIALLY, this two simply made MISTAKES.

Blaming someone who made mistakes because they didn't think enough or with more perspective doesn't take away the fact that they simply made mistakes. THEY DIDN'T KNOW BETTER !

When someone does mistakes, you have to forgive them, and both failed to forgive each other when HRY betrayed her promises to BJS while BJS betrayed her by not trying to understand her. Both failed betrayed, but they never meant to betray each other.

The cycle of life never ends :

Yin takes over and corrupts us when we allow emotions to detach us from all reason, all discernment. Yang betrays us when it pushes us to betray our human nature in favor of an ideal, when the idea of doing good distances us from actaully doing good in the present moment, preventing us from being human beings with emotions free from shame and guilt. We must learn to move when necessary (revolt leads to transformation), but to remain still when imperative (order leads to alignment).

The two cannot prevail over each other for long; balance and fairness, equity are the only answers to achieve a form of harmony beyond good and evil.

I feel that Yin represents God's love for humanity, while Yang represents his/its duty as master of the universe, creator and protector of life & creation.

Baijiu Si and Hua Ru Yue are drifting apart because they have failed to reconcile their differences in their understanding of the common good. HRY believes that everything must be done if possible, even at the cost of chaos, while BS believes that order must ultimately prevail, no matter what.

Hua Ru Yue will save a life in danger, sacrificing the safety of the world, while BS will give up a precious life to save the world. He believes his thinking is objective, when in reality, he is as subjective as Hua Ru Yue. Baijiu Si said, "Right and wrong can't be easily judge" but HRY asked him beforehand, "Do you think I did wrong?" He replied, "Yes." He was more willing to understand the rules of order than those of the heart. Not understanding, HRY simply could not betray her emotions. And HRY did not understand that BS could not betray his duty and responsibilities. She was more willing to show compassion to the mortal world than to the divine realm. Damn, this xianxia is so profound, I love it.

BJS betrayed HRY not because he disagreed with her or was disappointed, but because he decided (it was his choice) to become the judge of his beloved's actions. HRY betrayed him by not keeping her promise to him.

But by sealing HRY's energy just to remain faithful to his duties, to proclaim his innocence, he showed disloyalty to his beloved, making himself guilty to her. HRY risked his beloved's love for humanity, but to me, that wasn't betrayal. She chose to believe he would understand why she had to do what she did.

BS chose to inflict pain on his beloved, real physical pain (and then leaves her, like damn, it was cruel!) because of his inability to defy the Order, disregarding his very own heart and emotions, and of course hers. BS abandoned HRY in the mortal world because he has no attachment to the reality of that world, knowing he'll see her again in the divine world. But HRY's attachment lies more in the mortal world, not the divine world, and that's why she truly feels like he's abandoned her, even though he has no idea how intensely she perceived the situation.

I think BS truly loves HRY, but she no longer believes him because he never put his beliefs aside for her, but to be honest, she didn't do it for him either. HRY confuses love with attachment, and believes that detachment is abandonment. That's why she couldn't suppress her attachment to humanity, fearing it would mean she is abandoning human kind."

I want to add a reflection on masculine and femine energies.

BSJ who is yang detachs himself from human kind not because he's truly indifferent but rather out of self protection imo. Masculine energy's secret fear despite its behavior is the everlasting responsabilities put on its shoulder. Yang wish to be free from burdens. And of course, through logic the only "reasonable" way to free onself is with the help of detachment. Yang is also white, it craves for void, the idea of nothingness, of being free from attachment and its consequences.

On the other side, feminine energy (Yin) being like water, cannot be contained. It goes everywhere, in every realm and love behond limits. Yin is black for a reason. It can penetrates through the shadows. Its also in constant motion, it can not stay still. “Nature abhors vacuums” is a very famous expression that very much go with this idea. We also call nature “mother nature” for a reason.

Theory of causality: cause and effect

About ep 28 : "Some people still want to blame one more than the other when clearly the drama is about the theory of polarities.

We are now truly exploring the notion of cause and effect, after the Yin & Yang.

HRY & BJS' actions were also led and influenced by many exterior factors, behond determination and free will. For exemple BJS behavior was also influenced by what was expected from him as Yang, as a man but also of his position as Heavenly Lord Dacheng, just like HRY as a woman, as Heavenly Lord Siling and Yin. Cause and effect means that things happen because something prompted them to happen.

Expand but also center your perception, if you don't attention you would miss the whole point of the drama, just like HRY & BJS did lol. Both are victims and guilty.

And "life can only be understood backwards but it must be lived forwards". Some things were inevitable. Make peace with it. 

The energy of life goes around in circles forever, it is the natural law : actions leads to reactions, reactions leads to consequences. Every effect has a cause. The effect is already in the cause.

Nothing ever happens without a cause or, to be more precise, without a succession of causes.

« All things thrive, and that is creation. The world settles down, and that is stability. Gradual destruction is decay. Vanishing into nothing is void." (ep28)

The Lei Bird was slayed to avoid the « destructive calamity ».The action of everyone involving his death led to the destruction of the people Xiao Jing Shan loves the ones, innocents people, which caused him to dwell on hatred and chaos. Out of something terrible, something incredible can happened. And out of something beautiful happened the most tragic event can happened.

The effect and the cause coexist within a same « vibratory » continuum, in which the cause only has meaning in relation to the effect and vice versa: this is the principle of polarity.

As Spinoza wrote "From a determinate cause an effect necessarily results; and, conversely, if no determinate cause is given, it is impossible for an effect to occur".

And an event occurs, happens, results, or arises from a previous event precisely. There is continuity between all previous, consecutive, and subsequent events.

One good action can result to a flawed reaction of events, one mistake, one misunderstanding can lead to multiple events (good and bad). Even action made in the name of the greatest good or bad can participate in the rising of the greasted bad and good. Nothing and no one can prevent the casuality to happening, we can't even see it. « Its is inevitable. »

I like how the drama moved from the yin and yang theory to cause and effect. Them two being about the Principle of polarity. I'm gonna add some beautiful obsevations I found about the theory and taoism.

« The Principle of Polarity shows that free will and determinism are only half-truths, opposite poles of Truth. The theory teaches that onself can be both free and bound by any necessity; it all depends on the meaning of the words and the height of Truth from which the question is examined.

"The further creation is from the Center, the more determined it is; the closer it is to the Center, the closer it is to Freedom." »

"Everything is dual; everything has poles; everything has its pair of opposites; like and unlike are the same; opposites are identical in nature, but different in degree; extremes meet; all truths are but half-truths; all paradoxes may be reconciled."

Everything in existence has a pair of opposites. However, these opposites are not entirely distinct from each other; they are merely different degrees of the same thing.

We fuel both the causes and effects of the world and creation, even though we often tend to see ourselves only as an effect, or even a victim. Victims of our past, circumstances, other people, the passing of time, the environment, mass consciousness… »

« Determinism has as much place as non-determinism.

Learning to balance the perception of our own influence on the world is the condition for us to regain our power. For if we do not master the art of being a conscientious cause, we will live our lives as victims. Such is the law of polarity.

Seeing ourselves as an effect and not as a cause limits our freedom.”

-The theme of motherhood and fatherhood :

Episodes 13 and 14, in my opinion, highlighted how women, endowed with a strong maternal instinct, are willing to fight even against God for their children, while men generally do not, and I find this powerful.

Hua Ru Yue is definitely displaying her maternal instinct, and often it is said that mothers become kinda selfish for their love for their children. Bai Jiu Si also has paternal intinct but he chose to not have any children for Hua Ru Yue's safety, and it is as selfish, because he made the decision himself without her.

In a way, women, with their love, see beyond good and evil, they dwell on the higher potential of humanity, while men focus on the consequences of good and bad actions, which is equally important.

Ying & Yang indeed.

-Maternal instinct ( HRY being overprotective) vs detachment ( BJS chosing to take action for both of them without her consent, being also overprotective)

Episode 15 :

Hua Ru Yue is overprotective of Meng Qi and even more Meng Chi, like a mother to her child. This has led her to oppose God's plan for him, believing that death is the worst thing that can happen to him, when in reality, it isn't. The worst thing is not being able to become who you were born to be, and to become who you are meant to be by facing life itself. Suffering is what transforms us, what leads us to spiritual awakening.

Despite her good intentions, through her overprotectiveness, she encourages him to cultivate an unreasonable recklessness, a rebellion against the very concept of life since she revealed her divine identity to him, and the detachment from the divine world for mortal life, which only makes him even more determined to risk his life.

In a way, she truly tried to prevent him from becoming himself by depriving him of the opportunity to fulfill himself through the rebellion he wanted to display. Thinking she was helping him become a better person, reaching for his highest potential, she was actually distracting him from his life's purpose. But in reality, she could only buy time. Destiny will take its course, no matter what.

She had forgotten the power of letting go & trusting the unknown, confusing it with abandonment. And this is obviously in relation to the meaning of her love tribulation. Hua Ru Yue, Yin (which is what moves), will resent her lover Baijiu Si, and her inability to detach herself from her emotions will completely blind her, forgetting that she herself has not been faithful to the promises she made to him.

Conversely, Baijiu Si, Yang (which is tranquility), is completely detached from the mortal world, understanding that one can feel without being completely attached. This allows life to flourish without becoming an obstacle between life itself and others. However, by detaching himself so fundamentally, without flexibility and with absolute control, he fails to grasp the idea of devoting himself to a higher sense of love (one does not live only for oneself, life is also about your relationship with others), nor the idea of being willing to risk everything to save a precious life threatened with extinction. He misses the beauty of life on earth, and precisely the emotions it entails. And this is obviously in relation to the meaning of his tribulation of love. Later, he will sacrifice everything for his love, ignoring the rules and consequences, risking his own life for the safety of his lover, Hua Ru Yue.

HRY's weakness is her unconditional love for everyone she values, BSJ's weakness is his love for HRY only.

Ep 27 :

Xiao Jing Shan talking to HRY : « Divine Lord Siling .. Will you take my life at the cost of his ? You won't. That's your weakness. »

BJS while facing the Heavenly Emissary said « No one is allowed to hurt her, nor the way of heaven nor you »

-The challenges of perception :

"Episode 16 further reminds us how purely subjective perception is. No matter where you stand, pure truth is unattainable, perhaps because it's organic just like divine essence, and the essence of creation itself and not governed by dimensional boundaries.

I think the question this drama is trying to raise is about how to balance the flaw in perception itself. And I think it may be by accepting imperfection as it is, because we can never be sure we're right. The more we think we know, the less receptive we are to be teachable. We must do our best to balance this imperfect perception of truth with a sincere will & desire to bring greater justice to our world.

For example, some claim that during episode 15, that yes BJS did inflict physical pain by sealing HRY's powers, but it was to protect her, so it's okay, he can be forgiven. I'm going to try to challenge your thinking by simply saying this: some people in this world, people who don't think like you, would actually rather be hurt and die at the hands of people they don't care about than be hurt by the people they love, no matter how good their intentions. 

The purpose of eps 17 & 18 I think was to display an important parallel. During their first time in the mortal world, Bai Jiu Si was missing the importance of life because he was too focussed on his own goal (his love tribulation), and now Hua Ru Yue seems detach from the mortal world, precisely because she is focussed on her personnal goal (her revenge).

Life isn't an exam to pass, a check list to complete nor a reality to use for your own plans but a journey to live through meanings & memories.

BJS during this second time in what he thinks is the mortal world is the one sincerely getting attached to it (because he's the only one using his magical power to intervene). HRY is only there to win, which echoes their first time there but with an inverse dynamic : she was getting attached to humankind (using her magical power to intervene) while he was indifferent, focussing on his own plan.

I do think she trapped him in an illusion she created, the friend, the dog, the son etc everything there is to target BJS's symapathy. During the first time in the mortal world BJS for many decades ignored everyone, and now suddenly he cares enough, precisely because his heart is being targeted imo. During the first time, it wasn't, life wasn't manipulated for him to be forced into a certain direction, where here, he is. So indeed it was easier for him to remain detached the first time, and not now.

(It's just a hypothesis ofc, update : I was right)

And I think HRY precisely chose to not (pretend to) intervene the second time to let BJS suffer & experience the deep consequences of attachment on himeself, to advance in her revenge of course but also to make him understand her. He failed to grasp the meaning of her actions before. I mean, he understood but through the mind and not with his heart,which are two way of understanding but being able to synchronize understanding with mind and heart is what truly constitutes awakening. And that's what BJS is experiencing now, even if this time it might be an illlusion created by HRY. Just because you live in a lie, doesn't mean your behaviors & emotions aren't.

If you knew life was a lie, would you live that lie or not? Is what I was reflecting on when I finished episode 18.

Is HRY as unmerciful as BJS for not wanting to live life in a lie? Because BJS indeed did the same, he refused to get attached the 1st time because he was seeing his time in the mortal world as meaningless, only there for his love tribulation ...

They really mirror each other without realizing it, a true ying and yang, thinking they are so deeply opposite, but in the end still flowing the same way, just in different directions. There is her in him, and him in her.

Reality vs Imagination

« Every time you try to hurt him, you're only hurting yourself again and again.Without love, where would the hatred come from?»

We suffer more in imagination than in reality.

Desires and fears are caused by our own perceptions and resistance to what is happening to us. We were born to be free, yet we are the ones who want to become attached and to fear abandonment. This causes us to suffer while blaming God, even though we are the ones who decide our attachments and perceive non-attachment as tragic.

Our emotions light up our existences, they made us alive, they made life worth living but they can also destroy us.

Finding meaning and purpose to our suffering is the only way mankind is able to not destroy itself in insanity, an insanity led by our emotions.

-Hysteria or the condescending term and judgment of women's emotional expressions (Yin)

«There's no such thing as love without reason, nor hatred without reason.»

In a subtle but very present way, the writing of certain scenes sheds light on the perception of HRY's attitude. Many have characterized her behavior as extreme, denying her own way of acting in accordance to her very own nature. She is Yin.

Just because BJS acts logically and less impulsively doesn't mean she can't react in a completely different way. The vilain of the story Xiao Jing Shan , acts based on the extreme reaction to his emotions. But we never percieved him as being "hysterical" nor completely out of touch. He just seems like a man doing evil, not being evil. And for most people, if he was awoman, they wouldn't have the same perception on her, in my humble opinion.

Never a men is called hysterical for acting on his emotions ... which says a lot.Never underestimate a woman's pain. And never confuse her madness, born of deep dismay, with superficial distress. That's how you end up calling a woman hysterical when nothing in the expressions of her anger is absurd or disproportionate. HRY couldn't care less about "reason", because indeed in the face of everything she'd been through, it meant nothing. Only the truth could calm her terrible grief, and that's precisely what BJS is about to look for.

And to be able to voluntarily seek the truth, you must guide yourself with reason and logic, which HRY failed to do for most of the drama, dwelling only on her own suffering, blaming BJS was easier than observing, analyzing and seeking a greater truth.

I'd like to point out that, indeed, to understand her behavior (during the first and second part of the drama), we also must consider that maybe it wasn't purely BJS's actions that made her this way. It was also her out-of-control emotions that drove her to chaos. She has completely abandoned reason, precisely because the Yin she represents no longer finds balance within herself with her Yang, around her, with others.

I find it very refreshing that we were getting a female lead who wasn't written for the audience to like her. It's really about the analysis of her true essence, how her own singulariy can lead to greatness or calamity.

-The silent burdens in the expression of masculinity (Yang)

BJS chose to take the burden of HRY's actions. Not only he kept his protection as a secret, feeling responsible for her safety when in reality no one asked him to do it. But he had within himself the need and urge to do it. And it is the expression of Yang. He placed the responsibility for the actions of the woman he loved on his shoulders, trying to relieve her of the burden of the repercussions of her actions, thinking that this would free her from her own karmic destiny. And of course, it wasn't possible.

He never spoke about it to HRY, not because he just didn't want her to know what he had to go through to protect her in my opinion but precisely because he didn't how to express his feelings, his doubts, his unability to know and solve everything. Deep down, he was scared she would think that he simply failed her in not being able to protect her and him. He hided his fears and burried his emotions.

But of course, he also refused to let her think that he had to sacrifice himself for her safety; he didn't want her to think that she was a burden to him, and so he preferred that she see him as a selfish and ambitious man instead.

For most men, expressing their masculine energy leads them to act as if they already have the solution to every problem, when in reality, they don't.

Society expects men to always be strong, to protect, to set an example, to be leaders, regardless of the burden placed on their shoulders. Patriarchy demands that they ignore their emotions, to silence the very truth they convey in the name of the quest for power.

-The puirsuit of Truth & the construction of discernment

«There is something that matter more than life itself. What is it? The truth.» (ep22 )

I really enjoyed how the drama was trying to made us consider how emotions and logic participate but also block us in the search of the truth.

« I don't know what I should let go of or what I should hold on to » (ep27)

The turmoil of emotions distracts us from the ability of our mind to distinguish what is good, true, permitted, from what is bad, false, or forbidden , which is given to the mind or acquired through experience, to appreciate things according to their nature and at their just value, to judge them with right sense, with clarity.. But emotions also hold truth even in their turmoil.

The extremes of both logic & emotions lead to failure when it comes to meet the truth.

But what the theory of Yin & Yang, and polarities in a larger sense, help us to understand is that both logic and emotions aren't completely opposite forces, but complementary. There is logic in emotions and there is emotion in logic.

BJS's logic find its source in his very own emotions, his own nature hold within it emotions and HRY's emotions are driven by her very own nature, that build from her own logic too.

Nature and life are organic, it holds within itself logic and emotions. They are part of different "spectrums" that are inversely correlated with each other, and express themselves in not equal manners nor intensity when it comes to time and space.

Logic guides you to the truth which is expressed in a, let's say, static way (limitated), but emotions transcend it to its organic expression of truth (overflow the terrestrial dimensions of it).

Logic is, by default, a decision-making method that relies on rational and thoughtful decision-making to reach the best conclusion. Emotions, on the other hand, are genuine feelings.

Logic in a way is some sort of projection guided by emotions but also energy while emotions are real but they can lie through manipulation and become irraitional.