This kind of problem is very common. In short, you organize an activity, in other words, you start a company, which all apply to the thinking mode of the founder.

How to be a founder and start a career? Faced with this problem, most people will focus on where to find money, where to find people, how to make products and how to realize commercial value.

However, we have to go back to the word itself-"career". All undertakings in human society are a cooperative phenomenon. The bigger your career, the more collaborators you need to participate in. And what is the most important thing for people to cooperate? Of course, there must be spiritual cohesion.

From this perspective, let's look at the "founder's thinking mode". What is the most important thing? It is to tell a story to create an "imaginary identity". It can be said that the premise of career success is the success of the story.

To illustrate this point, I found a very extreme list of cases, which is the reason for the reunification of Germany.

As we all know, German reunification was achieved by Prussian King William I and Prime Minister Bismarck in 187 1 year. However, please note that the situation in Germany is very special. Unlike Britain, France and Spain, it had a formed country as early as16th century.

If you go back to the beginning of the19th century and have a look in Central Europe, you will find that this place is like a mosaic, full of independent feudal countries with a history of hundreds or even thousands of years. The so-called Germany is just a geographical concept, and people in feudal countries do not agree with each other.

If you advocate unifying this place into a country, people at that time will feel crazy when they hear this, because this place has never been unified in history, and it has always been in this mosaic state, and your claim has no historical basis. To make an inappropriate analogy, this proposition sounds like someone said today that we want to unify Asia, which is almost absurd.

However, it sounded ridiculous at first, but the Germans really did it. If you think about it carefully, you will find it incredible. So how did the Germans do it? The first is that they have a very good story.

Let's go back to the specific history and look at this process.

This must start with the French Revolution in 1789. The French Revolution put forward a series of slogans of "freedom, equality and fraternity".

This particularly shocked Europe at that time. German intellectuals and bourgeoisie generally call them the citizen class, and they are all rejoicing when they see the French Revolution. Because they were followers of the Enlightenment and believed in the political proposition of people's sovereignty, and the French Revolution turned this proposition into reality, the German civil class immediately thought that we should also establish the order of people's sovereignty and overthrow the rule of these feudal lords.

Therefore, when Napoleon called, many citizens were very welcome and willing to lead the way for the French. Because they believe that the French will help them get rid of the oppression of feudal lords and establish their own people's sovereign state.

But when the French did call, the Germans found themselves cheated. Because Napoleon's army is only interested in plundering wealth and recruiting soldiers, not helping the people in this land realize their sovereignty.

There is a famous example of this emotional reversal. It turned out that Beethoven wanted to give Napoleon a symphony praising him, but later Napoleon proclaimed himself emperor, and Beethoven changed his name to "Symphony of Heroes" in a rage and stopped giving it to Napoleon.

Then, stimulated by France, the German intellectual elite began to reflect. What shall we do? They realize that if they want to control their own destiny, they must establish national identity and make themselves strong so as not to be bullied by others.

Think about it, you can only unify this pile of mosaics. But the problem is that this mosaic has never been unified and has no historical basis. If people don't approve, you can't.

Unless the concept of "the German nation should be unified" is created in theory first, and then it is instilled in people's hearts. As long as this work can be completed, it will be much easier to promote unity in details.

Having said that, you will understand that in the process of German unification, knowledge first invented ideas and invented an unprecedented German nation, and then ideas in turn influenced the historical process of reality. This is a process from concept to reality, which is different from the logic we are usually used to.

To make conceptual inventions in theory, the most basic work is at the philosophical level. It is necessary to establish a Germanic nation that has never been seen in history from the philosophical level, and then demonstrate the greatness of this nation, so it is necessary to unify.

Many philosophers have made efforts in this respect, and Fichte is a very typical one. He gave fourteen speeches at the University of Berlin, which was occupied by Napoleon's army. Later, these speeches were compiled into a book called "Speech to the German Nation".

Fichte shouted in his speech that as long as the German nation realizes its Excellence, it will see the relationship between the nation and the country and will have the consciousness of resisting foreign enemies. This is doing ideological construction for German reunification. Philosophers' efforts are very successful in theory.

But there is a problem that the efforts of philosophers can mainly influence the upper class, which ordinary people can't understand.

It is not enough to influence the mass society only by the work of philosophers. Therefore, another group of German intellectuals have done some very important work. One of the achievements of the work, you may not think, is a fairy tale book, which is the famous Grimm's Fairy Tales. You probably read this book when you were a child.

In fact, Grimm's Fairy Tales is not a fairy tale book, but actually a collection of German folklore. Brothers Grimm went to Germany to collect a large number of folklore and folk stories, and then deleted some strange and undesirable contents and compiled them together. This is Grimm's fairy tale.

If you have read Grimm's fairy tales, you will find that all the stories in them have a basic structure:

Hard-working, brave, simple and kind, and maybe a little clumsy, Hans went out to work, came to the black forest, strayed into a hut, and was trapped by an old witch with black magic. Later, Hans used his diligence, courage and kindness to influence small animals. Small animals also helped him get rid of the old witch together, with a happy ending.

After such a story book comes out, its mass communication effect must be very good. Therefore, some ideas that German intellectuals want to convey are subtly spread through these story books.

Having said that, we can draw a conclusion that it is very important to tell a story successfully if we want to achieve something. But it is equally important that after the story is finished, you should find effective means to spread it.

If there is only one philosophical Daniel like Fichte in Germany, and his theory is superb, but it is so superb that the public can't understand it, then your story can't be transformed into a big social and historical movement, but just an intellectual game in the study. It is the spread of realism realized in Grimm's fairy tales that transforms philosophical thinking into a great social and historical movement.

The next question is, what ideas do intellectuals want to spread to the public? In fact, Hans in Grimm's fairy tales has a comparison object.

In Grimm's fairy tales, you will find that the image of Hans is hardworking, brave, simple and even a little clumsy, but there is absolutely no intelligent image. Why? This is because the brothers Grimm want to use these German folklore to target a widely circulated French story, the story of Lena Fox.

Raina Fox is very cunning. He used his intelligence to play around with big bears, big lions and big wolves, and at the same time oppressed all kinds of small animals, rabbits and old hens and ate them all. It is comfortable among the strong and has no goodwill towards the weak. Its only goal is to maximize its own interests.

The Germans compared the two stories and concluded, Look, what do the French appreciate? People like lenox. These are cunning chicken thieves, but in fact they are completely degraded and have no future. You may see that the heat seems to be going smoothly these days, but the future of mankind is simply not counted on.

Our German society and our country respect people like Hans. It seems that he is all thumbs, but he is not a chicken thief. If human beings want to have a future, they must look for such a truly simple person. Their spirit of harmony has not disappeared. Like the stem cells of culture, the stem cells of this culture have not been corroded by civilization, so we contain all the possibilities of the future of mankind, and the future of mankind lies in us.

After the whole story is finished, especially through the comparison with France, the intellectual class has established an "other" in the public mind for comparison, that is, the French.

Seeing that the French are so depraved, in turn, the public will feel that the future of mankind really depends on us. We didn't realize it in the past, but today we realize that we are a great Germanic nation. But we are not unified now, and we are bullied by the French who are particularly chicken thieves. Then this is not only our own tragedy, but also a crime against humanity, because the future of mankind depends on us.

What should I do in this case? Of course we should be unified. Thus, an imaginary and unprecedented isomorphism similar to the Germanic nation, and an unprecedented concept similar to "Germany to be unified" have become an imperative trend through this story.

You see, the Germans not only told stories that they were a great and excellent nation, but also created an enemy-France. In order to jointly fight against this enemy, it is natural for Germans to unite closely.

In this process, the construction of France's enemy image reached its peak when Germany was founded:187118. Prussia won the Franco-Prussian War, and William I was crowned as the German emperor. Then the dramatic coronation ceremony was held not in the generally understood Prussian Palace, but in the Palace of Versailles in France.

This scene is a great shame for the French. After the defeat, it was trampled by the Germans, but it was inspiring for the Germans at that time, because they finally defeated their greatest enemy and won the most brilliant victory, and their pride and sense of identity as Germans came into being. So at that time, the European News commented like this:

This evaluation is very vivid. It shows that Germany was stronger than France at that time. It can be said that the founding of Germany not only completed the unification of Germans, but also profoundly shaped the imagination of Europeans on the whole world pattern.

From this, we can draw another conclusion, that is, to construct the isomorphism of imagination, it is very important to have a setting of the other. This other is usually the enemy. By setting the other side, it is easier for the same body to form internal cohesion.

Finally, let's look at the third question. Where is the imaginary isomorphic boundary? How to define.

Many people will wonder why there is a boundary between * * * and the same body. Of course, the more members you join the same body, the better. Many hands make light work. This is actually a trap.

In the initial stage, the founder should focus on the people with the closest values, otherwise your front line will be stretched too long, there will be too many internal contradictions, and the cost of building the same body will be too high.

The Germans made it very clear on this point.

When Germany discussed reunification, there were two factions inside. One school is the Great German School, which believes that Austria should lead the unification of the whole empire. One school is called the Little German School, which believes that Prussia should lead reunification.

What's the difference between the two factions?

If Austria presides over reunification, a large number of non-Germans under Austrian control will become a part of this * * * body, such as Hungarians, Slavs, Italians and so on. However, many people will think that these non-Germans are of poor quality. If they are contained in the same body, what should we do with them? Can we treat them as slaves? When they were slaves, the Germans could not rule. If they were not slaves, such people would be equal to the Germans, and the Germans would certainly not be reconciled.

Then there appeared another school, the Little German School, which advocated that Prussia should preside over it, so that all the burdens of Austria could be unloaded. I only unify the Germans. Of course, I don't care about the Germans in Austria, but I unified everyone else.

In this way, you can see that people who want to be unified by Little Germany are more dedicated and more in line with the so-called Germanic standards before, so in the end, the Germans chose the idea of Little Germany.

In fact, in history, not only Germany did this when it was unified, but the United States also had similar choices during its expansion period. This happened in the middle of19th century.

Texas was originally the territory of Mexico, but later many Americans gradually immigrated to Texas. With the support of the American government, these immigrants rioted in the local area, promoted the independence of Texas, and finally succeeded. After independence, the United States began to plan to absorb Texas as a part of itself.

This is absolutely unacceptable to Mexico. So Mexico began to fight back and fight back against Texas, but the United States quickly sent troops. The strength gap between the two is too big. Mexicans are losing ground, while Americans are pursuing victory. However, after catching up to a certain extent, a question arises: Where did the Americans catch up? Should they chase after the base camp in Mexico? In view of this problem, the US Congress launched a heated discussion.

One faction is very tough, advocating all the way to Mexico City and completely conquering and occupying this country, but the other faction opposes it, saying that it can only reach the Rio Grande and stop there and never move forward. Then why the Rio Grande?

Because the land north of the Rio Grande is vast and sparsely populated, and Mexico has a small population, it is easy for the United States to digest these Mexicans and bring them into the American territory. South of the Rio Grande is densely populated, all Mexican. Once we hit it, do these people want it in America?

If you think about it, in the eyes of Americans at that time, the standard of these Mexicans was not much better than that of blacks, and it was too expensive and difficult to integrate into the United States. But if you don't want to occupy the land there, what should you do with these Mexicans and immigrate them to other places? You can't do it. So in the end, the Americans chose to fight only on the Rio Grande instead of pursuing it.

So you see, in the initial stage of your career, you have to rely on stories to create the same body. However, storytelling is particularly easy for listeners to indulge in it, thinking that it can be perfectly realized according to the prototype of the story.

In reality, stories are always flawed. It requires you to clearly judge the boundaries, retreat a little from the prototype of the story, and compromise before the story can land.

Through the case of "German unification", this paper tells how to create an imaginary isomorphism in the initial stage.

From this, we can draw three cognitions: