Block What Should Be Blocked, Focus on What Should Be Focused, Accomplish What Can Be Accomplished

At my age, it has become the norm for the older generation to fall ill and pass away. Their sickness and departure remind me again and again that the truly valuable time belonging to me is already running short; every minute wasted is one minute gone, every second consumed is one second less.

My revered teacher once told me that parents are a wall standing between us and death; when they are gone, we must face death ourselves. One generation spans twenty years. When the older generation has passed away one after another, it means that we may have only a little more than twenty years left in this world—and among that, the effective time during which we are full of energy and able to do something meaningful is even less.

In quiet moments, I sometimes reflect deeply: what important tasks remain to be completed in the rest of my life, and how should I dispose of my time so as to make it more valuable? This value should not merely be valuable to me personally or to my family; it should also give an account to my life's ideal. The answer to this question seems, to many people, highly abstract, but to an idealist it is very concrete.

For if we cannot again distinguish the essential from the secondary, and squander our time on things of little significance, we will waste our precious lives and miss the chance to realize our life's ideal. I am an out-and-out idealist; someone like me, who could go to college at nearly fifty, is filled, inside and out, with the unconventional.

Last night, while taking a walk with my wife, I said to her that after wandering all my life, I have returned to the dream of my youth: I am destined to become a medical thinker, not merely an ordinary doctor. I will use the remaining years of my life to complete the construction of my own system of medical thought, and, as far as possible, identify young people who may in the future advance my medical ideas, cooperate with them, and achieve some breakthrough innovations in the medical field. Beyond that, nothing else matters.

An idealist's greatest wish is to exert a certain influence on the world, to change some of the realities that he finds unsatisfactory—and nothing else. Fame and social status are, to me, all floating clouds; I will not waste even a second on them. I want to see my personal efforts truly, tangibly contributing to the progress of medicine.

My wife is both my spouse and my most faithful believer. From her teens, she entrusted her whole life to me; after graduating from university she built a family with me and bore and raised our children. I, in turn, with several times the diligence and effort of ordinary people, laid a certain foundation for our shared family. Thus we trust and support each other; in her youth she admired me, and she still does to this day. She believes that her husband can realize his life's ideal, and she fully supports my pursuits, which frees me from worries behind me.

Over the past eleven years, I have been highly self-disciplined, studying and writing almost every day. I have already written more than three thousand medical articles; though the word count has not been tallied, it should be between five and ten million characters. If published as books, that would amount to dozens or even a hundred volumes. But among these articles, few are truly satisfactory to me, which is why I have delayed publishing.

A responsible author should have this kind of awareness: he should refine his views as concisely as possible, so as not to waste the time and money of future readers. Otherwise, any work he publishes is no more than fleeting wastepaper; before long it will sink into obscurity, and people will be able to find it only among piles of scrap paper. I would rather remain unknown in my lifetime than devote this precious life of mine to such flashy but empty endeavors. If, after my death, the value of my work is discovered by others, then even in the underworld I will smile.

In practice, my understanding of medicine has grown ever deeper. I hope to found a brand-new doctrine, one that can better guide clinical practice and solve many of the disease problems in reality that have not yet been conquered. I am not satisfied with many existing medical doctrines; I believe they still have room to progress. And I also have the courage—and perhaps the ability—to bring about this progress. I have spent many years waiting for this moment, and I fear not to keep waiting; I have also poured much effort into exploration, and I begrudge not continuing to do so.

This moment has gradually ripened. As I returned to university and studied Western medicine, my understanding of medicine has become increasingly complete, and many of the unresolved doubts in my heart have gradually become clear. In the period ahead, I will complete the creation of a new system of medical doctrine and make it public. I will also, among the readership I have built over many years, seek out some like-minded people to jointly advance its application. The value of this work, let time verify. Time is the flame that tempers true gold; silent as it is, it can answer every question.

I am grateful to all the revered teachers I met at every stage of my life, and to those great thinkers and scientists whom I came to know through their writings; together they shaped my inner world. Without them, I would not be an idealist. Most people in this world live amid messy trivialities, while I, throughout my life, have been able to live in exciting idealism, immersed most of the time in the joy of exploration—what a fortunate thing that is!

There is always a certain proportion of idealists among the crowd. Though they have not yet met us, something flows silently among idealists and connects them in some way. Between people there truly exist rare affinities in which a single glance can last a lifetime; a casual remark from someone can ignite a raging blaze in our hearts that does not die out for a long time. That is why I never feel lonely.

I am also willing to continue scattering the sparks of idealism here on earth, guiding more latecomers with idealist potential to set out together on a passionate journey of dreams, and thereby to rise above the trivial right and wrong, gain and loss of this world.

We shall sleep for a very long time; that being so, let us, while awake, live a little more brightly and warmly! However vast the universe, it is not nearly as grand and boundless as the heaven and earth within our hearts!