Le Daiyun: My understanding of five-character life

I think my life can still be said to embody the five words spoken by Buddhist scriptures and can be expressed by them. Buddhist scriptures believe that five words run through a person's life.

the first word is "fate", you must accept it.

For example, you can't choose what kind of family you were born in and what you grow up to be. Being born in a poor peasant family is definitely different from being born in a rich family. This is fate and you can't choose. It's called destiny takes a hand.

the second one, I think, is "luck" and "luck".

this "luck" is dynamic. If "fate" is predestined and fixed, "luck" is dynamic. I often feel that I have a lot of "good luck" and a lot of bad luck. Many times, you feel that you have done nothing, but some kind of "luck" has happened.

For example, at that time, we just graduated from university and started a publication, Contemporary Heroes. To this end, the anti-rightist movement in 1958 was almost over, and I was still added and classified as the extreme right. I left academia for more than twenty years. Later, when I was engaged in comparative literature, my luck really turned. It was already 1981, and I was 5 years old. It is also very accidental that I don't know how to choose me to go to Harvard. Moreover, I visited Harvard for a year. At that time, someone from Berkeley University came to Harvard for a meeting. When he saw me, he invited me to be a special researcher for two years. I had no idea! You don't say! Berkeley and Harvard are both very good schools.

later, I believed in this "luck", which means "luck turns". "luck" cannot be forced, and it is useless to force it when "luck" does not come. Don't worry when you are unlucky, and don't feel great when you are lucky. It is driven by a force you don't know, not by yourself.

the third word is "virtue", which means "virtue" of morality.

Morality should be "cultivated" at all times. Confucius said, "It's my worry if we don't cultivate morality, don't talk about learning, can't migrate if we are not good at it, and can't change if we are not good at it." If you don't talk about "virtue" and "learning", it will be a great worry.

In any sense, I always feel that I want to be a good person. I think this is a very important factor in the traditional culture of the Chinese nation. As Mr Fei Xiaotong said, it is the gene of China cultural tradition. Ordinary people don't necessarily want their children to be successful, but they want their children to be good people, not bad people. This is a gene that lives in our common people's culture. When I was most difficult, wronged and puzzled, I felt that there were two sentences that were the pillars of my life, and that was: "If you are rich, you can help the world, and if you are poor, you can be immune to it." Although I have been deprived of any rights, I can still be a good person.

when I was supervised to work in the countryside, it was the age of great hunger, and the leader asked me to create a miracle, so that four little pigs could be fattened for the New Year without feeding food. On this task, I was very anxious at that time. Every day, I let pigs feed in the fields and beat pig grass everywhere. Later, the pig was raised well, but it was not fat anyway, but everyone ate happily during the Chinese New Year, and I thought it was good. So no matter what, even in a very difficult environment, I still have to be independent and try my best to be a good person, so my fellow villagers like me very much.

At that time, in the family where I lived, the old man was a shepherd. When he went to herd sheep, he found a walnut and half a peanut and brought them back for me to eat. At that time, all the decentralized cadres got edema because there was not enough food, but I didn't get edema because we often ate walnuts, peanuts and sweet potato heads. Moreover, our aunt keeps chickens, and besides the egg quota, there are always a few left. The three of us have an "egg feast" almost every few months, and the three of us eat eight eggs! So I haven't been swollen and I'm in good health.

If you can't see the future at that time, you will be completely depressed and don't want to do anything, or you are indifferent to the people and resistant to everyone. If you don't have the belief that you are poor, you will feel that you can't live.

the fourth word is "knowledge", which means knowledge.

"knowledge" is what you ask for, that is to say, you should have knowledge and wisdom. At this point, I think I have never given up. Even when I release pigs, I read English words while releasing pigs, without losing all my English foundation. I used to like foreign literature, especially Russian novels such as Turgenev. The revolutionary women he wrote had a great influence on me. On the other hand, I also like China's ancient poems.

I'm surprised. On the one hand, I appreciate the kind of Russian literature that is particularly enterprising, like my favorite, and I am determined to do something for others and the public. On the other hand, China's poems, especially those negative things in Yuan Qu, have a great influence on me. For example, those Yuan songs recited by Lao Bei: "though silken-black at morning, have changed by night to snow", "Going to bed is different from shoes", "Life is limited, several climbing festivals" and so on.

This "knowledge" is very important for me to embark on the road of comparative literature in the future, because I know a little about the West and China, and then I was lucky enough to come to Harvard University and get in touch with the subject of comparative literature, which made me have the desire to engage in comparative literature, especially like this subject, and I also saw that the future development of this subject is limitless.

So this "knowledge" is very important to people, and sometimes it will decide people's life. If you don't have this field of knowledge, haven't read relevant books, and don't touch it at all, it will be impossible to develop in this field, and you will be very isolated and have few roads for you to choose. (m.taiks.com, an inspirational quote) So, I value the word "knowledge".

The fifth word is "OK". Everything mentioned above should be put into practice in the end.

this "line" is actually a choice, that is, how do you choose when you are faced with a barrier. The choices people face are often very complicated and there are many contingencies. Even if you have done well in the first four words, you will still not get a good result in this last step, when you cross out, you take a detour and go to another road, or you walk slowly or fast.

I think I have many such barriers. For example, when I went to the Soviet Union for a meeting at that time, the leader really retained me and told me that you could study in Moscow University and work as a foreign student, but I decided to go back to Peking University. Later, when Mr. Ji Xianlin wrote a preface to a book for me, he said that Le Daiyun made the right choice, or maybe China lost a female diplomat, but China had a very talented pioneer in comparative literature.

This means that the choice is very important. In one's life, sometimes the choice is right and sometimes the choice is wrong! If you make the right choice, you can't do it without luck. I remember when I graduated from college, the mayor of Peng Zhen asked me to be a secretary. I chose not to go, but it was not up to me! Unexpectedly, I lost my file after a while, and I didn't want to look for it, so I forgot about it later. In this way, I still stay in Peking University, which is the combination of choice and fate.

In a word, the five words of fate, luck, virtue, knowledge and action have dominated my life. I have some feelings about this, and I will share them with you.