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human
How could the ancient Cynics claim to seek self-sufficiency ("autarkeia"), yet also beg for food and money to live?

I've never understood the Cynics. They have disdain for civilization and man's grasping for wealth and prestige, preferring to pare back their wants to those easily met, and to embrace shamelessness ("anaideia").

But I don't understand how they could both seek self-sufficiency "autarkeia" and hound people on the streets for for food and money. It seems like hypocrisy. They mock civilization, but are willing to seek shelter in public buildings. They don't want to work because they find it ridiculous, but will gladly take the money you earn while working so they don't starve.

Do we know how they reconciled these positions?

It seems to me that a Cynic who was true to his beliefs could only really live ideally as a hunter gatherer of some kind.
gpt
Most of the ancient philosophers who praise self-sufficiency (i.e. virtually all the ancient theorists of virtue) don't mean "able to do everything without assistance."  This would be totally crazy, since probably no one is this.  (For example, Aristotle says that the good-life includes self-sufficiency *and* that people *need* friends.)

What the Cynic (like Diogenes) *doesn't* need from other people is anything of significance - and most of the stories about Diogenes are meant to show this.  The stories where he tells Alexander to move out of the sun is the quintessential example.

So, one way to think about it is this - if Diogenes were to beg and no one were to feed him, then his life would be no worse, properly understood.  Perhaps he would just eat from the trash or dig roots out of the ground or whatever.  In the end, there's not much difference between foraging for berries in the wood and foraging for handouts in the marketplace.