📖 Meaning
To become a regular practice or habit, so that an action is done so often it is taken for granted as routine. It describes something that has turned into a customary, unremarkable occurrence rather than an exception.
📜 Origin Story
The phrase appears in the Book of Northern Qi (《北齐书》), in the biography of the official Sima Ziru. It records that whenever he was about to return, Emperor Shenwu (Gao Zu, Gao Huan) and Empress Wuming both gave him gifts and rewards, and this became a regular practice (率以为常). The idiom was later also used by the Song dynasty loyalist Wen Tianxiang, who wrote in a letter to Zhu Taibo of riding out with packed food at dawn and returning at dusk, doing so as a matter of routine. Over time it came to mean any act that has become habitual and customary.
💡 Example Usage
自那以后，两人每周相聚论学，率以为常。
From then on, the two met every week to discuss their studies, and it became a regular practice.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 率以为常
- Pinyin: shuài yǐ wéi cháng
- Literal Translation: as a rule, take as, regular
- Category: Lifestyle
- Characters: 4