When life progresses to a certain stage, we must learn to reduce some things. Generally, after the age of forty, you will start to do subtraction, because you will not have too much time.
Let me give you an example, you are 40 years old this year, assuming you can live to be 70 years old in good health, and you still have a few more years to do things and practice Taoism ?
Thirty years. During these thirty years, ten years are spent on sleep, ten years are spent on work, and only ten years are left. In the remaining ten years, you have to go to the bathroom, eat, fall in love, travel with your wife, get sick, educate your children, socialize with friends… How much time can you have left to do things and practice?
If you still want to participate in some social activities, then there is simply no time. So, don’t fool yourself. If you don’t learn to reduce some things after the age of forty, your life is almost useless. However, there are many people who are deceiving themselves these days.
If you want to be successful, you must cut down some unnecessary entertainment time, so that life can achieve a kind of perfection.
In fact, a real wise man will not wait until the age of forty to do subtraction. He starts to do it very early. When they are in their twenties and thirties, they set goals for their lives. I was earlier, I have been strict with myself since I was a teenager.
You can read “A Man’s West”. After reading that book, you will know why a rural child can come out and why There is a life that is different from others. Therefore, if you want to achieve a complete life, you must subtract those unnecessary things in your life, and it must be as early as possible. Don’t wait for the god of death to catch up with you before you are willing to do subtraction, then it may be too late.
You should also learn to observe the people around you. If there is a person who used to be a section chief with some power, but now he is no longer the section chief, he entrusts all the power to others, and does not study diligently—in the past, he studied MBA, piano, and Guqin, and he learned everything and thought about everything Learning, life seems to be quite fulfilling and exciting, but now I don’t study anything.
In the eyes of others, his life suddenly became dull, and he suddenly became difficult to figure out and understand. Therefore, many people will feel that he has regressed, and will lament how he became like this. At this time, you have to see what he is doing. If he does nothing but sleeps at home all day, then he must be suffering from depression; if he is practicing Taoism, practicing the truth, and actively doing things that benefit everyone, he is making progress, and it is a great progress , because he understands that some things are of little significance to life, and he does not want to spend the little time left to do something of little significance.
Think about it, how much time do we have for ourselves? How much life is your own? not much.
Many people can only come during the “May 1st” long holiday, and they can’t come if they want to, because they don’t have time. Therefore, many times we can’t help ourselves. Life seems to have several decades, but there are too few that we can freely control.
We are lucky and still healthy, what about the unhealthy ones? They simply cannot help themselves. Many people have financial freedom, worth and status, but they don’t have much free time. Therefore, “advance is like retreat”.
The Second Series of “Lao Tzu’s Mind” by Xue Mo
Encyclopedia of China Published by Quanshu Publishing House