soft on the inside despite one's hard shell; appearing tough on the outside as to mask one's inner vulnerability; also written 內柔外剛|内柔外刚[nei4 rou2 wai4 gang1]
trad. 外剛內柔
Also written 外剛內柔【wài gāng nèi róu】
Characters in this word
4外
Strokes: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0
outside, in addition, foreign, external
- Pinyin
- wài
- Strokes
- 5
- Frequency
- 2016 of 2500
刚
Strokes: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0
(literary) hard; firm; strong, exactly; precisely, barely; only just, just; only a short while ago
- Pinyin
- gāng
- Traditional
- 剛
- Strokes
- 6
- Frequency
- 750 of 2500
内
Strokes: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0
inside, inner, internal, within, interior
- Pinyin
- nèi
- Traditional
- 內
- Strokes
- 4
- Frequency
- 744 of 2500
柔
Strokes: KanjiVG, CC BY-SA 3.0
soft, flexible, supple, yielding, rho (Greek letter Ρρ)
- Pinyin
- róu
- Strokes
- 9
- Frequency
- 35342 of 2500