Don’t hope for a better future or better world – just be better

These days I’m seldom able to finish reading a book in 3 days, but once I picked up this new work by Mark Manson, I couldn’t put it down。 Like Manson, I’m seeing a world which is so f*cked up to the point that many things just don’t make sense to me, someone born a few years after the second world war when everyone was still struggling for recovery, any more.

Despite the casual language of the title, this book actually makes for very serious reading, as the writer draws on philosophy and human psychology in his attempt to pin down the reasons why everything is f*cked today. He is pessimistic to the point where he thinks we might be better off if Artificial Intelligence rules the Earth one day。

So what can we do? He finishes with this plea:

“Instead of looking for hope, try this:

Don’t hope for a better future or a better world. Just be better.

Be something better. Be more compassionate, more resilient, more humble, more disciplined …”

Incidentally, 反求諸己 – isn’t this what Confucianism called for more than 2000 years ago！？

快樂是一種選擇

(Originally written on Aug 6, 2019)

請看看這兩個case。

Case X: 如果你教小學。幾經一番努力後由CM「升」為APSM, 但由於政府政策轉變，下年度所有CM 自動轉為APSM, 你會不會因此而不快樂？

Case Y: 如果你生了一個autistic 的孩子，你會否因此不快樂？

+++

這三數年間看了不少談論快樂本質的書，今天我便趁機和舊學生探討這個問題。先說Case Y。

今天约舊學生Miss Y午餐敍舊，有好幾年没見面了，因她要照料autistic 的兒子;我原先預料見面時，會看見一個憂傷的舊學生，但她卻是出乎意料的快樂開朗。

我於是請她訴說這幾年的經歷，她回憶當初知道兒子的情況後，的確有點自怨自艾，但不太久，便渡過這階段，隨後的這些年，她努力去訓練兒子，用心探討各種方法幫助他成長，果然逐漸看見他的改變，每次看見他的進步，她都覺得很欣慰，和有滿足感。

九月她的兒子將要升中二，回顧這些年，她沒有不快樂的感覺; 而我聽她興奮地敍述這些年的經歷，甚至覺得她比很多其他媽咪更快樂。

再談Case X。

約了舊學生Miss X下午tea，她是全部CM 轉APSM 的「受益者」之一，但這一刻，她最大的快樂卻是來自養育一個三歲和一個歲半的小男孩; 但就她所知，行內一些奮鬥多年剛升APSM 不久的同事，郤因這個新政策變得很不快樂。

我於是又想到人的快樂和不快樂，從何而來。

想法A: 這真不公平，我辛苦了這麼多年，結果和他們一樣。

想法B: 不錯他們是走了運，但我也没有實際損失; 那麼我就替他們高興吧。
……

這幾年我看過寫Happiness 的作者，都指出快樂是一種選擇，這選擇只是存乎一心，外在的環境沒有決定性，一些遇到不幸的人也可以活得很開心;當然這個存乎一心的「心」，是终身的修為。

Are you happy?

Today, I had lunch with Icy and Olive. Icy had earlier remarked that she had a lot of sympathy with the younger generations today, who had to face a lot more challenges than our generations did. (Of course Icy is much younger than me.) So during lunch, I asked Olive, who is from a younger generation, how she was perceiving and experiencing her life and her future.

When Olive had finished pouring out her mind, I had to agree (with Icy) that I should be thankful that I had been born much earlier.

As someone belonging to the ‘post-fifties’, like my contemporaries, I have always thought that many of those younger than me were born with a silver spoon in their month. They have never gone through the poverty-stricken childhood that I had. They should count their blessings; yet they seldom do. They should be better equipped for the tribulations of life; yet they are so fragile. I have worked very hard to achieve what I have today. And they don’t seem to have any goals in life.

Icy is right. They were born in a world that we have built for them. If we had been born at the same time they were, we would probably perceive and experience life the way they do.

And if you had the chance to listen to Olive pouring out her mind, you would have a lot more sympathy with the younger generations today, instead of simply accusing them of being ungrateful or unmotivated.

Looking back, I think the social conditions of my time have generally allowed people to lead a happy life more easily. Olive was right that generally there were more opportunities, and life was much simpler. In comparison, today’s young people were born much better-off, material-wise. Yet, it is harder for them to lead a happy life.

During the Chinese New Year, I met up with Teresa Wong, a former MA student, who is now teaching at a Band 1 secondary school. She told me that one day, out of the blue, she asked her students: How many of you are living happily? There was no response, instead all her students looked puzzled and lost, as if living a happy life was the most alien concept they had ever heard.

I joked to Teresa: If you walk into the staff room, and ask the teachers the same question, you will get the same response (that is, no response).

OK, I admit that few people, even if they’re truly happy, will confess accordingly. But I do wonder from time to time: How many teachers, how many students, and in fact, how many people in present-day society, are leading a happy life?

We may not want to live 100 years ago: general poverty, war, no flush toilets, no TV, no LV handbags, no Mercedez’s, no decent jobs for women, no iPhones, no Godiva, no vacations in Paris, no airconditioners, …… We should be 100 times happier now; yet few of us are leading a very happy life! What has gone wrong? How can we regain happiness?

Today, when you wander into a bookstore, you can easily spot ten books with a title like ‘how to live happily’. I clearly remember that when I was young (and until I turned forty perhaps), there were no such books. We just lived happily. (Or maybe some of them were not very happy; just that I was not aware of that.)

Hence, the biggest challenge for the post-eighties and the post-nineties, and those who were born after them, has now become: HOW TO FIND HAPPINESS.

Mid-autumn festival: Then and Now

Tonight is the eve of the Mid-autumn festival. Tomorrow is a public holiday, and I guess for many people in Hong Kong (including me), it’s going to be just another public holiday. When did I stop feeling excited about the Mid-autumn festival? Can I ever bring myself to feel excited about the Mid-autumn festival again?

 I’m asking this question because I remember clearly that when I was a little boy, I started feeling excited at least two weeks before the Festival Day. One month prior to the festival, shops began to sell lanterns, and restaurants began to sell moon cakes. The lanterns came in different shapes, and the moon cakes came in different flavours.   Although my family was struggling to make ends meet (like most families in Hong Kong at the time), moon cakes were still a must. And as I was constantly hungry, every ration of moon cake from my mother was welcomed with a watering mouth and a pair of greedy eyes. Other than the Chinese New Year, the mid-Autumn festival was the only time when I could have a bit of luxurious snack food.  

 But lanterns were definitely a luxury, which my mother would not squander money on. However, that didn’t deter me from making my own lanterns. The most common trick at the time for boys was to cut up the skin of an eaten pomelo into slices, attach a string to one slice, put a lighted candle on it, place the whole thing on the ground, and pull it along from one place to another. During those two weeks, you would see hundreds of boys pulling around and showing off their homemade ‘lanterns’ in public places. That was great fun.

 In those days, the Mid-autumn festival was a big day for every child.

 What about today?

 Of course today’s children have too many ‘holidays’ and ‘festivals’ already. They don’t need to wait till a major festival to be treated to delicious snacks. Their parents will buy them whatever fancy lanterns they set their eyes on. But how excited are they about the festival? And for how long?

 Sure, we don’t want to live in poverty. But when we have enough, and especially when we have more than enough, how can we bring ourselves to enjoy what we have? Why is this ability so difficult for us to acquire? Why is having so much easier than being?