Chapter 6 society 4

A few days ago, I cleaned up the room, put away the seasonal clothes, took out the T-shirts and shorts I wore in summer, and cleaned up a dead corner of hygiene. It was a cabinet door that I hadn’t touched for several years, and there were some miscellaneous things in it. Stuff, obsolete Nintendo consoles, game cards, some computer game programs, stuff left by the old girl, etc., I packed those old things like some kind of relic into two large plastic Suddenly, a chess set and some chess books attracted me. The chess pieces are of that old style, painted crimson jujube pieces, crushed to the ground Unfolded plastic chessboard, glued paper chess box, this is probably the longest thing I have kept, I remember

It was something I used in junior high, I hesitated, and ended up putting them in a trash bag, and I knew, I'd never use it again. I played chess purely by accident. One day, I was alone downstairs waiting for my friends to come out to play football. For some reason, I was alone that day. I stood under the shade of a tree. There was an old man there, and we all took care of him. His name is Uncle Wang. Uncle Wang is a chess fan. He plays chess under the tree every day, rain or shine. He sits on the pony that he brings with him. The chessboard is laid on the ground, surrounded by a group of people.

Uncle Wang’s luck was as bad as mine that day. He was also alone. There was a neatly stacked chess game on the ground. Every piece was placed in its original position. None of his opponents came. On the ground opposite to Uncle Wang, separated from Uncle Wang by the chessboard, Uncle Wang was smoking a long-lost tobacco pipe "slightly" and kept looking at me for a while. Finally, he couldn't help asking: "Would you like to play?" ?" I shook my head. In fact, I can't even walk around the field. Uncle Wang is really boring, so he taught me these basic rules, and he gave up the horses and guns for three bucks, and won me in a row. Three games, this time I was in a hurry, my friend came and asked me to play football, but I didn’t go, Uncle Wang’s chess friend came and gave me some advice, Uncle Wang almost turned against them, so, A group of people watched with great interest as I lost game after game. Every time I was checkmate, Uncle Wang would pretend to be steady, but his face could not conceal his complacency. This time, I played until dark. I didn't win a game, and my self-esteem was greatly hurt. As soon as school was over the next day, I smashed my piggy bank, bought this chess set and two chess books, and used all my time to study desperately. Among a group of old men, I played a game with Uncle Wang. Of course, at school, I quickly found a chess friend, and I played all day long. At the beginning, I was ridiculed by Uncle Wang: "Oh, you are a good horse. Ah!" Or: "You can even use the mandarin duck gun, it's not easy!" But after a month, the situation changed drastically. I read five or six chess books in a row, and my chess skills improved dramatically. I can no longer fight with me, I can easily beat him, and I don’t like to play with him anymore, but I have to pass by that chess stand after school every day, but Uncle Wang insists on me playing non-stop, even if I am playing with others , but also to pull me over, and call me apprentice, when the two of us are playing, I am not allowed to give up. What is even more annoying is that after he loses the wind, he starts to play tricks, and he keeps regretting the chess, but he does not let me regret it. One step, but still can't beat me in one set, which makes him very angry, and he can't let him let me go, he always holds me back, and uses various methods to make me play him in the next set before giving up. After losing, he sighs With a sound, his eyes were depressed.A year later, I became obsessed with chess. At first I was ambitious and kept buying a lot of chess books, but one day I played against someone who really knew how to play chess, and I realized that I was a stinky chess player who hadn’t started at all, so I lost my game. interest.

When I threw the broken chess set into the trash can, unexpectedly, I thought of Uncle Wang, and I was very puzzled. Why would he be obsessed with that kind of game that loses every game? What supports him is only one A kind of old urchin-like competitive heart? I don’t know, I just think of him, I think of him sitting under a tree in the open air every day guarding that chess set, waiting to grow old, waiting to fail, waiting to fight with me, he So dissatisfied, I really feel sad for him, I don't want to associate him with Sisyphus, but I understand that it is a kind of human spirit, it is like a kind of stubbornness, and it is like a kind of fate, of course Well, we generally just treat it as a character.

Before 2001, I have experienced 30 Spring Festivals, some I remember, some I don’t remember, anyway, in my impression, the Spring Festival should be a happy day, but why are they happy? Why do people Are you happy about the Spring Festival? I just came back from a trip in other provinces. First, I drove alone from Beijing to Xiamen to visit old friends. Along the way, I crossed provinces and cities. Sometimes, on a whim, I turned into a small town and went around to see the road. People and things on the side, I see the north The poor peasants, the tombs of their ancestors in the fields, and the peasants in the south, those industrious peasants who have just changed their houses from one floor to two floors, and the countless toll gates on the road, those are similar , towns and cities with no characteristics, anyway, the Chinese have passed the year 2001 AD, with all the hardships, stupidity and yearning for a new life, there are people everywhere, farmers, cities are like stars in the night sky However, those places that are not illuminated by the stars are still rural areas, fields, and farmland everywhere. As long as there is such a small piece of land, it must be reclaimed as farmland and planted with edible things. I know , which means that China is still poor, and it is still a rural China. The prosperity and luxury of consumer cities like Beijing and Shanghai are built on the poverty of these rural areas. I know that it is from the farmland Every penny is used for the prosperity of the city, the shoulders of the peasants are still bent, and their faces are still dirty.Even in cities other than Beijing, it is difficult for me to see the unique confident expressions of Beijingers. The southern cities are full of cheap fashion stores, supermarkets, restaurants, and department stores. Young people wear weird fashions, chasing With the false civilization taught to them on TV, there are no bookstores, too few bookstores, few bookstores, no more bookstores, and even if there are bookstores, there are very few valuable books in them, which shows that spiritual life I haven’t started in China yet. In other places, I searched for bookstores everywhere. The more I found, the more I searched. The result made me very disappointed. There are billions of people, what are they pretending to be in their minds?

I feel sad for the false civilization bred in 5000 years. Agricultural civilization, light industry and heavy industry civilization are also civilizations, but it happened in 2000 AD. . When I return to Beijing, it’s like returning from a foreign country, like returning from decades ago. I feel that as a Beijinger, I am living on the shoulders of peasants. I don’t know if it’s luck or misfortune. For some reason, these things weigh on me, very heavy. Yes, China is not only a geographical concept, but also a psychological concept. The same yellow skin, black hair, and black eyes speak different dialects, experience different lifestyles, and have different thoughts in their minds. The same thing, the difference is so big, so big--from my observation, the suffering in China is far from over, far from fruitful, I think that extreme poverty has just disappeared, people have just been able to live, but the suffering will still be in other ways The form continues, and it continues unabated. In fact, I think that rich and poor are not the main problem in China. Hong Kong and Taiwan are not poor, but it is useless. Taiwan and Hong Kong are neither in China nor in the world. Important, why? This is not an economic issue, this is another issue. People living on the earth do not exist only to create means of production and means of living. They should have higher goals and have beliefs. It is my point of view that a nation cannot enter into true civilization without honest and noble beliefs.

On the road, I talked to a lot of people, the general feeling is that there is a lack of ambition, a lack of ambition, a lack of fighting spirit, people generally muddle along, people are like being tied by some invisible rope, people are building, but they have no long-term plans , the old city is a mess, the new city is the same, impatient and long-term planning, management chaos, everything is changing slowly, but mud and sand, this is like a place where snobs gather, life has no passion, people are not strong Enduring pain and working silently, but living on an ignoble existence.In my opinion, this is caused by a spiritual desert. Spiritual poverty leads to a single value orientation and no originality. It amazes me to sleep in such a mental state for so long—it reminds me of the strange and long Middle Ages in Europe. For thousands of years, Europeans also seemed to be sleeping, but it was different, although in the Middle Ages, religion took absurd forms. It brought a lot of suffering to Europeans, but at the same time, it also gave them the belief in survival. That kind of belief is different from the Chinese "harmony between man and nature". Comparing these two cultures, one can feel sad for China's negativity.In fact, the result is that Europe woke up, started the Renaissance, started the Industrial Revolution, started the difficult and bold attempt, but what about China? I can't tell, but there is a strong feeling that China is imitating the East, and the Yin is the same. A set of Yang, its shape is very bad.

There are too many words to go on. In fact, I am not happy this Spring Festival, especially when I meet some of my friends. Most of them are not in good condition due to various reasons. At home, looking through books, I feel a little depressed, I can’t lift my spirits when doing anything, I feel incompetent and useless again, I don’t know why, I always think of bookstores, bookstores, bookstores, I hope people don’t buy those fancy fashions , save every little money to buy books, people use books to broaden their horizons and draw spiritual power, and people keep thinking about the future, about the present, and about what is in our short life. What is important is what should be done by hand, what should be brave enough to try without fear of risk, what is not worth it--I have a dream, I hope there will be more bookstores in China, more, more, let bookstores spread all over More importantly, the land of China needs more valuable books, so that people can have more spiritual strength and confidence, so that Chinese people can stop self-deception and learn to think independently instead of following others.After the Spring Festival, I am thirty-three years old. Due to various reasons, I feel that my generation is unable to accomplish some real work, but it should be given to the people behind, those who have just been born, and those who are about to be born. , the Chinese, pave the way for them to move on, they not only need material food, they also need brains, courage, strength, and patience, but they must change, if they are still unhappy like me, lacking life, then their lives will be as worthless as mine.To be honest, I don't believe that the path people are taking is healthy, and I don't believe that everything is changing rapidly and getting better. I don't want to lie to myself, and I hope others will stop lying. In the new century, where What kind of new century is there? There may only be, only new Chinese, new human beings, new attempts, new adventures, about ideals, about lifestyles, about more reasonable life arrangements, especially, With regard to the perfection of the human mind, the enrichment and construction of the meaning of life, with the new human beings, even if the calendar is turned back thousands of years, there is still hope for everything, but old bottles and new wine, old people and new clothes, are of no avail. If anything, it's no use, no use at all.

There are too many things in our life that are beyond our control, and those things that are not good for us can happen at any time. It is scary to think about it. For a certain sense of psychological security, we will choose to take the initiative to do something, So there is a certain kind of superstitious activities, of course, religion is the most important thing here. For a while, I suffered from depression and my mental state was very bad, so I tried to get rid of it. In addition to taking medicine indiscriminately, I also tried to gain comfort through certain beliefs. At that time, it was popular in Beijing to study Buddhism, so I followed suit. one go, i'll go

I went around the small shop near the west gate of Lama Temple, bought a batch of Buddhist equipment such as Buddhist books, Buddha statues, and incense burners, and secretly studied them at home. Of course, with my intelligence level, the basic theories of Buddhism cannot make me Very satisfied, so hard to believe, that is to say, I stopped at the threshold, I couldn't believe in this religion, which made me anxious, my emotions wanted to believe it so much, and my intellect wanted to believe it. But I couldn’t do it, which made me feel embarrassed. After reading more than a dozen Buddhist scriptures and some biographies of famous Buddhist figures, I found that the main points of Buddhism must be verified through meditation. The state of trance, according to the book, only in that state can people feel the state of "selflessness", but once they recover from that state, people will return to normal. I couldn't get around to meditating, so I started to practice. At the best time, I could only feel a light feathery state on my upper body within three to five minutes. Otherwise, I would relax.

Because of studying Buddhism, I met some buddhist friends. I thought that since I couldn’t enter meditation, others could. What’s more, after entering meditation, there would be some mysterious experiences that made me curious, that is, the so-called “supernatural powers”, what are they like? I asked them about telepathy, clairvoyance, etc., to see if I could show it, and the answer was always no. What is annoying is that even if true believers have never seen any supernatural powers, they all blindly believe in it. I have a deeper understanding of the word superstition, that is, people who believe believe in whatever they do. I have doubts, their firmness makes me feel the power of religion, but they can't produce any evidence for what they believe, and I know that there is such a big difference between science and religion. Science provides the public with information about its views. Religion does not have to provide public evidence for its views, but only provides something to those who are willing to believe. It seems to be a completely personal relationship, even Mahayana Buddhism, which particularly emphasizes self-sacrifice and saving others. In order to see supernatural powers and see the world described in Buddhist books through supernatural powers, I traveled here and there, and even went to Seda, which is located at the junction of Sichuan and Qinghai, but found nothing. People who study Buddhism have a certain understanding of supernatural powers. This is a strange explanation, that is, they must have it, but they cannot show it to others, so as to distinguish it from the heretics. Unfortunately, the heretics have nothing to show, and the various worlds shown in Buddhist books The description is completely impossible for people to see or feel with their own eyes. This incident finally made me discouraged from studying Buddhism. I understand that I can’t believe in this religion anymore. Speaking of which, I am willing to believe in some miracles or myths, because that will bring some comfort to my luck. Unfortunately, for me, the hope of trying to surpass life is always there, but it will never be realized.