Be Grateful to Those Who Give Us Hard Problems

When I was in high school, I often scored full marks in math. There was a math teacher at our school who was not my own teacher but especially loved setting hard problems for me. He would often hand me a note on the road with a difficult problem he had just found and thought could stump me, and ask me to solve it. Every time there was a monthly or midterm/final exam, if the压轴 (final) problem on the paper was his, he would smile and say to me on the road: "Zhiyuan, let's see whether you can do this exam's final problem."

Every problem he gave me was hard; sometimes it took me several days to solve. But I especially loved solving these hard problems back then, and as I solved them, my logical reasoning improved greatly. This teacher was surnamed Chen and was obsessed with teaching; he must have been driven by the joy of obtaining the finest talents under heaven and nurturing them, to teach me math across classes. Through these exchanges we became friends across the generations; though not formally teacher and student, we were in substance. When I graduated, I once met an old classmate who told me that Teacher Chen had suddenly died of stroke; I grieved for quite a while.

Recently I have been reviewing high school math, physics, chemistry, and biology, and naturally thought of him while solving problems. I had forgotten most of the high-school curriculum; when I opened a difficult paper, I was completely blank and could hardly solve a single problem. But because I had once had that experience, I knew how to learn to solve problems I could not originally solve. So I was not at all flustered; I calmly reviewed the relevant knowledge points and, in a very short time, made the transition from not solving a single problem to having virtually no problem I could not solve.

Those who set hard problems for us can quickly raise our ability. This has a premise: that we are willing to solve those problems. If we are unwilling, and instead think others are deliberately making things difficult for us, we will gain nothing.

When I was in second-year high school, I encountered an even harder problem. My class and a first-year high-school class got into a mass brawl. It later escalated into fights between the two grades, with vendetta after vendetta; the brawling lasted several weeks and grew worse. The homeroom teacher of the first-year class, my own homeroom teacher, and the school leaders all looked to me; they thought only I could end this protracted brawl, and they all came to find me.

The first-year class's homeroom teacher said to me: you are the spiritual leader of all our students; as long as you are willing to step forward, you can surely solve this. I said to him: Teacher Lü, you are mocking me; how did I become the school's spiritual leader? I cannot solve this. I refused him outright.

Looking back now, I know he was not wrong, because our school was then promoting me as a role model, so I did have prestige among the students. I refused to step forward for two reasons: first, if I solved the problem rather than fighting alongside my classmates in the brawl, they would treat me as a traitor and isolate me; second, the fighting had already reached such a pitch that I had no good way to stop it.

The school's security officer was my geography teacher, a short man; together with the vice principal he asked me to step forward to end the brawl, and I refused again.

My acting homeroom teacher was my physics teacher, Teacher Song, a white-haired old man. He invited me to his home for a meal, and over the table told me a story from his own life. During the Cultural Revolution, someone in his village wanted to hoe a struggle session victim to death, and he risked his life to stop him.

After the Cultural Revolution ended, both the man who had been about to kill someone with a hoe and the struggle-session victim thanked him. The assailant said that without my teacher's intervention he would have committed murder; the victim thanked my teacher for saving his life.

Teacher Song said to me: "Zhiyuan, the same matter, which you now see as a bad thing and a hard problem, ten or twenty years from now, when you look back, will be neither. By then your classmates and you will all be very grateful for what you do now. Go and resolve this brawl in your own way!"

I went alone to that first-year class, bowed and apologized on behalf of the second-year students to the juniors, and told them that continuing to fight would both delay everyone's studies and cause safety problems; if someone were seriously injured by a careless blow, it would be bad for everyone.

Teacher Song held a class meeting in our class and affirmed what I had done. He said that a civilized, courteous person should be the first to apologize, showing that our素养 is higher than others; as second-year seniors we should yield to the first-year juniors. Other classes presumably held class meetings on the issue as well.

After this handling, the matter truly subsided. For a sixteen- or seventeen-year-old, dealing with such a complex matter was indeed a hard problem, with many trade-offs to weigh. But once I crossed the inner barriers and handled it successfully, I changed greatly as a person.

When I failed the college entrance exam and missed my first choice, I was deeply hurt. When I arrived at school, I happened to see the white-haired Teacher Song and other teachers standing below the teaching building, saying angrily that a student like Zhou Zhiyuan should, because of one exam failure, miss the finest university - what use is this talent-selection system? What is the point of our teaching? He did not see me standing behind him, but I heard his words clearly; my eyes filled with tears, deeply grateful for his recognition. So although struck by the failure, I did not collapse.

In fact, today I can tell my teacher that the exam failure was the best arrangement fate ever made for me. Precisely because of this turning point did I become who I am today. Had I had the halo of a famous university, would I be the person I am? Perhaps not. My wife (also Teacher Song's student) holds a master's degree from Tsinghua's Department of Thermal Engineering and now works in teaching and research in a government institution; I have a deep understanding of the internal friction endured by people doing such routine teaching and research. Although our work is similar in nature, she cannot study as freely, easily, and single-mindedly as I do. The exam failure was a hard problem fate set me; in solving it, my psychological resilience grew and my overall ability improved as never before - a harvest that even the world's top university could not have given me.

When I was young, there was a period when I was rather conceited about my talent; after writing some articles I thought brilliant, I became carried away. But my brother and my high-school Chinese teacher rarely affirmed my writing. Once I showed my teacher some poems and essays I had written; he read them and said nothing. Knowing I had not won his approval, my arrogance instantly subsided, and from then on I read and wrote even more assiduously, striving to improve. My brother on several occasions bluntly told me I was far from the level of a first-rate writer; after hearing this I burned some of my old manuscripts. Had my brother and teacher not set me such hard problems, my insight and writing would have stayed at the level of my early twenties. Now I no longer think about whether I have talent; instead I immerse myself single-mindedly in the joy of scholarship and writing, and keep making progress.

My mother also set me a hard problem: she was diagnosed with cancer over ten years ago. I was just in my twenties then, my career was booming, and my annual income was roughly what most people earn in a lifetime. Because of my strong technical skills and knack for solving hard problems, I was highly respected by peers, and many paid handsomely to learn from me. But because of my mother, I began to realize that all this meant little. If the skin is gone, to what is the hair attached? With life slipping away, what use were money and social status? So I hit the brakes in time, picked up my boyhood dream again, and studied the treatment of cancer - studying medicine to save lives.

Imperceptibly, I became known in oncology circles. Many cancer patients and medical colleagues came to know me. Three years ago, an uncle of mine (both a chief physician and a long-time civil servant) set me another hard problem: he strongly urged me to retake the college entrance exam and replan my life, entering the grand hall of medicine, becoming an authority, and offering better solutions to more patients. To this end he repeatedly prodded me; when I tried to dodge the difficulty, he criticized and exhorted me without politeness, never letting up until the goal was reached. Now I finally understand his pains and have steeled myself to gnaw this hard bone.

Most of my life has been spent solving hard problems that daunt ordinary people. Along my road there have always been people like Teacher Chen setting problem after problem. It was in solving these problems that I grew, step by step. Today I can handle the various difficulties of life with ease, at peace in body and mind; the people I should thank most are exactly those who set me hard problems, for they made my life not wasted.