Life is never a calm pool of stagnant water. Even an ordinary life has its own meaning.
The journey of life is not smooth sailing. Sometimes it can go straight up, and sometimes there are ups and downs. Sometimes, reading Jia Pingwa's articles, you can also see a little bit of starlight from ordinary life. .
Through the long loneliness, life will always bloom.
Jia Pingwa, born in 1952, has always had a high reputation in the literary world over the past few decades. His thoughts on life and history can always make people feel relaxed and happy.
A qualified literati usually does not need a life experience of ups and downs. What they need is just the ability to see the world. Many people hang out in the market and can also write many popular sayings. .
In 1973, Jia Pingwa published "A Pair of Socks". Since then, his creation has gone through a history of more than forty years, and during these forty years, his creative process has also been able to Divided into three stages.
During the period from 1973 to 1992, his language was quiet and simple, and his evaluation of society was mostly positive. His representative works at that time were titled "Impetuous" and "Shangzhou". Series" novels, this was also the period of fame and development of Jia Pingwa's novel creation.
From 1993 to 2004, it was the second period of Jia Pingwa's creation. The landmark event was the publication of "Abandoned Capital", but "Abandoned Capital" has always been controversial. It can also be regarded as the development and exploration period of Jia Pingwa's creation.
From 2005 to 2014, Jia Pingwa's literary skills have entered a very mature stage, and he has published novels such as "Happy", "Ancient Furnace" and "Laosheng", which have caused a stir in society. The film received a huge response, and this was also Jia Pingwa’s formative period.
Among them, "Qin Opera" directly helped Jia Pingwa win the 7th Mao Dun Literature Award.
After Jia Pingwa gradually became famous, he stopped caring about worldly things and began to search for the true meaning of life.
When he was 67 years old, the book "Ten Enlightenments of Life" came out, which subverted many people's views on him. In the minds of many readers, at this stage, he could be "sealed". God".
In "Ten Insights on Life", readers can realize at a glance that life is a one-way journey, life is destined, and the world is real. No matter whether life is good or bad, the meaning of life is ultimately It's your own.
In fact, his early creations are also related to Jia Pingwa's life experience. For example, from "Tiangu", "Shangzhou" and "Mountain Notes", we can see the simplicity and kindness of rural people. This is also It is reflected in the spirit of the times in "Ten Enlightenments of Life".
The barren rural areas of the last century also gave birth to Jia Pingwa’s cultural genes. It can be said that his views on life are always derived from traditional Chinese cultural thoughts. He has been creating for decades and remains consistent. It seems that There is a profound Buddhist realm.
This feeling is also the feeling of "great destiny is determined by heaven" in his "Ten Enlightenments of Life".
He also pointed out in the article that everyone’s life background is different. Some people’s final pursuit is in Rome, while some people are in Rome when they are just born. Apart from life, it seems that Many things are not created equal.
This kind of "enlightenment" does not mean that people find ways to change the status quo, but that they learn to adapt to life and calm down, such as "what era were they born in", "what kind of changes they encountered", and even "What diseases are hereditary?" etc. These are all fates. If you actively deal with your current life, maybe the journey of life will be smoother.
Just as Jia Pingwa wrote in "The Bright Moon and Clear Spring in My Heart": In a person's life, whether it is bitter or happy, the most important thing is that the clear spring in the heart cannot be without the moonlight.
Life is always full of exhaustion and running around, and there is no need to "force yourself to worry about writing new words." A weak mind is also a major philosophy of life, and you must maintain an open-minded attitude at all times.
The transition from the first "enlightenment" to the second "enlightenment" is in the same vein.
Jia Pingwa also believes that history has always been written by the victors. This has always been the case with kings and losers since ancient times, and this is also true in cruel social reality.
Therefore, the second "enlightenment" is called "natural selection, survival of the fittest".
These are not only based on reality, but also reflections on history. From ancient times to the present, there has been struggle in society. For those who have achieved success, status is a pass. For those who have failed, A few years later, it was as if he had never appeared in the world.
And the "Qin Opera" that won him the award also contains many similar things.
In this article, Jia Pingwa "erected a monument for his hometown" and wrote very thoroughly about the decline and decay of the countryside, profoundly showing the undercurrents of the social transformation period. However, this phenomenon also It is extremely normal. Old things are like water being thrown out, but new things have not yet arrived.
Although he wrote "survival of the fittest" in "Ten Insights from Life", which seems to be full of strong "offensiveness", in Jia Pingwa's writing, it is a world without heroes. None of the characters are "free"; the men and women in them carry with them heavy cultural abuses and burdens.
Because Jia Pingwa also said that he really loved the world and the nation too much. Because he loved so deeply, his nerves would be extremely sensitive, to the point where he could not hold a grain of sand in his eyes. In this state, even a little bit of filth in life will turn into an extremely hot calmness, and his eyes are always full of tears and melancholy.
Therefore, when he gradually became calmer, he came to the third realization: "There are advantages and disadvantages, both good and bad."
This is actually a kind of dialectical thinking. Everything has two sides. In the process of dealing with people and things, you must not be biased or generalize. An optimistic attitude can often yield optimistic results.
What successful people say cannot be regarded as "imperial edict". This sentence is also applicable today. It seems that sometimes, as long as you are successful, you seem to be qualified to go on stage and say something. A few words, but if you fail, then you are nothing.
But life is not something we can learn from. Everyone’s life is very unique, each has its own way of living, and will encounter various scenery along the way. Choose what you like and include it in your bag. In fact, that's fine.
Maintaining a peaceful mind is also a lifelong subject. Whether it is good or bad, it will change with the development of time, and the two can also be converted into each other.
Mentioning the relationship between success and failure, Jia Pingwa wrote "the road to success, the loss of failure".
The words "success" and "failure" are also the words that trouble everyone the most. However, if there are winners, there will inevitably be losers. Everyone in the world wants to pursue success, but who is willing to be a failure? What about those?
Jia Pingwa gave the example of King Gou Jian of Yue. He worked hard for decades, and finally came to the end of his hardships, defeated the State of Wu and avenged his previous humiliation.
Gou Jian, King of Yue
There is nothing wrong with pursuing success, but the road to success is also full of doubts and thorns. Only by enduring one's loneliness and loneliness can we welcome the most brilliant dawn.
Who dares to say that Jia Pingwa does not have a sense of accomplishment? And his writing process also came step by step.
Since the new century, Jia Pingwa has had a sense of mission to "establish a destiny for China" in his novels. As time goes by, the narrative concepts of writers are constantly changing, and they are not willing to No longer satisfied with the "scar novels" of the 1980s, but adhering to the artistic techniques of neo-realism to restore daily life.
The forty years of Jia Pingwa’s creation were also an extremely extraordinary forty years. Chinese society and the Chinese literary world have undergone tremendous changes. That kind of persistence is rare in the history of contemporary Chinese writing in China. But Jia Pingwa finally succeeded. He found the meaning of his life and persisted. This is commendable.
The first four enlightenments of life are actually relatively easy to understand. The last six enlightenments also give readers a lot of space for thinking.
In the fifth "Enlightenment", Jia Pingwa mentioned the experience of truth and falsehood.
This is actually a cyclical issue. As for the evaluation of true or false, try not to make a final conclusion. Instead, it needs to be continuously proven through time and practice. There are too many such cases in reality. example.
In the literary world, there are many "young people" who have become "lower people", and there are also many "lower people" who have become "younger people". As time goes by, gold is destined to shine.
Jia Pingwa also mentioned that if you just let it go and never practice it, then the "treasure" shelved in the cabinet will never have real value. Only practice can "test the treasure". Anything that has passed the experiment The truth is worth testing.
In the process of pursuing the truth that you agree with, you must also have moderation. The sixth "enlightenment" is that everything has moderation.
Pursuing the road to success is a persevering process. Most people who are eager for quick success will not have any good results. Everything in the world has a most appropriate "degree".
Seriousness, sensitivity and the pursuit of perfection have always been good qualities of human beings, but if taken to the extreme, they will become the characteristics of patients with depression. People have been taught since childhood: "Eat 80% full" .
However, no matter how you maintain inner peace, there is always a goal to pursue in life. Most people will continue to struggle for money, honor, status, etc. when they are young. Only when they are old will they realize that Simple is best.
No matter how much wealth one has, a person’s life is just three meals a day and four seasons. He will experience birth, old age, illness and death, and ultimately “come naked and go naked”.
Jia Pingwa’s seventh “enlightenment” is also to tell himself: You must learn to do subtraction in life.
Many people have had deep feelings. Even if they have heard a lot of truths, they still can’t live their lives well. The source of the problem is not because of whose truths they listened to, no matter whether they choose The Sunshine Avenue is still a lonely road. People will age in their lifetime. Age does not mean right or wrong. No matter how much experience you have, you cannot place it on others.
When too many pursuits cannot be realized and become pavilions hanging in the air, then subtraction is undoubtedly very wise.
Too many people have forgotten the carefree childhood. After entering the society, everything will become extra complicated, but when it is really time to rest in peace, everyone will suddenly realize It turns out that money is just a number.
This is not to make people "not seeking improvement", but to change their mentality.
The eighth "enlightenment" of the ten enlightenments in life is: the quality of your mentality is very important.
In life, compared with the long history, no matter how long you live, it seems very small. An optimistic attitude of "affordable and easy to let go" is enough for people to face various challenges in life. .
Only with a good attitude can people accept various challenges. In life, you do not need to force things that do not originally belong to you. As long as the mind is relaxed, everything will have its own destination.
The ninth "enlightenment" is also related to the mentality, which is called "Don't panic when misfortunes and blessings depend on each other."
Even if we are in adversity, we must realize that life experience is our touchstone and the cradle of success. When life is safe and smooth, we must also be grateful with a heart. Give back to society as much as possible.
For the same bouquet of roses, some people will see that the bottom of the flowers are all barbs, and some will see that the top of the thorns are all flowers. Some will complain about the unfairness of fate and blame their own life. Being so unlucky, some people regard all experiences as experiences. The more twists and turns, the more hardships, but life will be more exciting and extraordinarily rich.
So, what kind of life is good and what kind of life is bad? Jia Pingwa gave the answer at the end: success is relative.
From the perspective of the entire world, very few people hold a lot of wealth, which seems unfair. The difference between the rich and the poor seems self-evident. .
However, people who are high-ranking officials are always cautious, and people who make a lot of money have to be smart and have trouble sleeping and eating because of the latest changes. But people who make a small amount of money, as long as their family is happy, Isn't this one way to live a successful life?
Especially when Jia Pingwa was at that age, he had a more thorough understanding of the relative definitions of success and failure.
Furthermore, no matter who you are, you may have nothing tomorrow. There are many talented people in poor families, and there are many corrupt people in rich families. Even the most impoverished people have a blueprint for their future. rights.
Jia Pingwa’s works incorporate many of his own thoughts and are condensed in his writing. Most of the characters in his works have an "autobiographical" color. He walks alone in the storm of life, and also Away from the crowd, like a lonely beast, looking for its own way.
According to the ideas of his article, even if his life insights can bring some enlightenment to people, these are definitely not textbook meanings. Everyone still has to find their own way.
1 Watch and Change——On the trajectory of Jia Pingwa’s novel creation over the past forty years Li Yuchun, Central China Normal University
2 "Ten Enlightenments in Life" Jia Pingwa