Some Reflections After 150 Check-ins

First, please accept my sincere bow of thanks — to every friend who liked and commented! Without you there would be no this article, and no better version of me today.

Here are a few loose reflections

On self-discipline

In the history of my public goal-setting on WeChat Moments, I have publicly fallen flat twice: (1) learning the splits in 2020

(2) reading 100 books in 2021

Looking back, neither goal was easy to monitor or check progress on at any given moment, and both were the kind of thing where if you don't do it today, tomorrow is fine too. So I made the mistake every man and woman makes 🤷‍♀️.

People really are short-term animals. For any long-term goal, breaking it into small goals and confirming you complete them step by step is crucial!

Using my "circle" for my own ends worked remarkably well — it's a superb self-discipline tool. — The power of friends' encouragement, plus the vanity and pride of "not letting my persona collapse," make a remarkably strong driving force, and everyone should put it to good use.

On goals

The bolder you dare to be, the more the land will yield. — At the start of the year, I went too easy on myself. Afraid I wouldn't make it, I set 150 times. From experience, 200 or 250 would also have been (possibly) achievable. Being ahead of schedule halfway through actually made me slack off for a few months.

In his book How to Avoid a Climate Disaster, Bill Gates shows us perfectly the "endgame thinking" that people who drive the world's development and change should have. On carbon neutrality, he says: "Setting a goal of merely reducing rather than eliminating greenhouse gas emissions is not enough. The only sensible goal is zero." I can't describe how stunned I felt when I read that.

No matter how hard a goal looks, don't let the fear of failure tie our hands and feet.

On reading

Reading truly enriches the soul. — On the few days I didn't read, I clearly felt empty.

How to read "useful books" — input alone isn't much use; I'm past the age of studying, and forgetting what you've read is normal. You need to read systematically in connection with what you're doing, thinking as you read and testing it as you work. Books like this are like a senior veteran in a field: if you want to understand an industry or a subject, first find the one you can most easily follow and let them walk you through it systematically; after that, even casual conversation will be rewarding, and when you have a specific question, just ask or look it up.

How to read "useless books" — useless books are the most "useful" of all, for nourishing the soul, broadening your horizons and discovering your own ignorance.

On the future

A habit that took so much effort to form shouldn't be thrown away. I'll try to keep up my self-discipline and early rising offline, keep good records, and report back once a week. Also, I need to be tougher on myself — it can't just be input; it's time to pick writing back up too.

So here are my goals for 2022:

250 times: up before 7:30 to read, pushing on in one go to lock in this habit.

52 articles, in theory one a week. Any topic, any length, as long as I'm not too embarrassed.

I have to challenge myself. I plant this 🚩 as proof — please hold me to it.

Finally, let me share a passage from my diary. I had just experienced a state of flow while reading and was still in a daze. But it was a genuine feeling after a year of reading.

Suddenly an image appeared in my mind:

I was like a naive child with no ability to protect myself, wandering lost across the land of the Trisolaran planet. The world was like a desert, and I was walking naked through it, with far, far too much that I didn't know.

The only thing I had was a tiny tool, perhaps a spoon, a scrap of cloth to cover myself, or a walking stick as thin as a matchstick, almost useless. It symbolised the education I had received since childhood, that pitiful little bit of critical thinking. But it was all I had, and I could only rely on it as I pressed forward, directionless, through this chaotic and dangerous world. Barely picking myself up after each fall, occasionally with its help climbing a not-very-high peak, or scooping a mouthful of water from a spring by the road, barely moving on.

Wherever I went, the territory of my thought expanded, but in the end I could take nothing with me and leave nothing behind. Even if I spent my whole life, I could never expand the map of my thought far enough to see clearly the continent I am standing on.

This is both a sad and a happy thing.

A truth about life — the truth is that no truth is enough to give us a sense of security, enough for us to rest the whole meaning of our lives upon. Every truth is just a float, letting us rest and catch our breath for a while. When I have the strength, I can only keep paddling forward. The continent of ultimate meaning, that legendary continent — when will I ever catch a glimpse of it? Or perhaps the truth of life is this vast sea, a boundless ocean, with the endless sky above and mysterious waters below.

Whichever direction I go, what awaits me will be endless surprises, and endless void.

So what?

Cowards never set out, the weak die along the way; only we are left moving forward, and we cannot stop for a moment.