Love Life, and Life Will Be Meaningful

The question of the meaning of life has been pondered, throughout history, by countless philosophers, artists, writers, and scientists. Ordinary people like me also ask ourselves: what is the meaning of being alive? The most amusing answer I have seen came from a scientist whose name I have forgotten; he said that thinking about this question is less meaningful than thinking about what to eat for the next meal.

Though the question itself is meaningless, too many people remain stuck on the meaning of life, unable to break free. The classic example is the depressed patient, who feels life has no meaning, cannot see the sunny side, and is irresistibly drawn to suicide. Under stress in particular, the suicidal impulse grows stronger, and some actually succeed.

Recently I had a talk with my son about learning and exam pressure. My deepest takeaway was that the saying "no pressure, no drive" is utter nonsense. So I always tell my child: feel no pressure; if you like something, study it, but do not stress over study or exams; any grade is fine.

My son said to me: Dad, don't worry, I take it philosophically, no pressure. Worst case, I won't get into a good university; wherever you go to live in seclusion, I'll just come along and grow vegetables and eat vegetarian food with you. I burst out laughing when I heard him. The care I have put into him has not been wasted.

My generation was raised entirely on fear. As children, our parents always told us that if we did not get into a good university, we would end up like them, bending our backs to the soil for a lifetime. At school, teachers used the same approach, scaring us that if we did not work hard we would end up at the bottom. So from childhood I felt this kind of study made life not worth living. We have all kinds of educational methods to raise exam scores, but no one cares whether children love life. Not only that, everyone tries to strip away our extracurricular interests. Only one teacher kept emphasizing to me that education is not a matter of chasing quick success, that nurturing the soul matters far more than pouring in knowledge, and that giving students happiness matters more than exam scores.

The patients I see most are cancer patients, then the depressed. To the former I stress that death is not to be feared; to the latter I stress that living is good. Normal people find it hard to understand how there can be people in the world who feel life is not worth living and constantly think of suicide. Frankly, even a gambler is better off than a depressed patient; at least when they are absorbed in gambling they still feel life's joy. The depressed person's gloom makes the whole sky gray. Unfortunately, in our age the number of depressed people is growing, and depression is about to become the number-one disease.

I often urge people to learn some medicine—not for any other reason, but to raise their own awareness and prevent illness in themselves and their families. The causes of mental disorders are complex, but one thing is certain: they are closely tied to a patient's upbringing. People are born loving life; disgust for life is mostly acquired. Of all children's talents, the talent for loving life should come first and be given full weight.

Now I love life deeply and throw myself into everything I do; I am never someone with only three minutes of enthusiasm. I think this comes from having seen through life quite thoroughly. Human vitality has little to do with material possessions or social status; when a person has seen all of life's truth and still lives warmly, material wealth and status are not burdens, but neither are they necessities. Most of the time they are indeed burdens. In his nineties, the scholar Ji Xianlin wrote an article saying that after shedding all the empty titles heaped on him, he immediately felt light and at ease all over.

I never interfere with my son's hobbies, but in daily life I constantly emphasize that life is an extremely simple thing and there is nothing to fear. When he first entered kindergarten, I took him onto the street to pick up mineral-water bottles, telling him that even if one day we are cornered, we can still pick up a few bottles, sell them, and buy steamed buns to fill our stomach; as long as we do not starve, nothing is a catastrophe.

I will not repeat the previous generation's educational model, nor invent lies like "if you don't work hard, you'll end up miserable" to scare my child. Most of the depressed patients I have seen share a deep-seated fear, a fear from the depths that makes them uneasy all their lives.

When I was in university, teachers mostly did not care about students' psychological problems, crudely dismissing them as problems of ideological character. Today there is a professional term for this: stigmatizing mental illness. One of my university teachers only realized, when her own child developed psychological problems, that her way of educating students had been flawed; she even apologized to me, repenting that she had known almost nothing about students' mental health. She had once thought there was something wrong with my character, and felt guilty about it. She worried too much; I had not even realized she had thought that. I have always been grateful to her, because in my hardest times she helped me tirelessly; she was such a good teacher that I have only ever felt grateful.

Now my son's school has psychology counselors, and reportedly some top high schools have an astonishing number of them. I once went to the Peking University Hospital (campus clinic) for counseling about my son's adolescent rebellion; the counselor I saw was named Zhu Jie, and she told me my son was perfectly healthy and that this was just normal adolescent rebellion.

She often counsels students from Peking and Tsinghua. She says that among students at these two schools, some have serious psychological problems: though they got into Peking or Tsinghua, they cannot find a direction in life, and some cannot finish their studies because they have come to hate learning and simply cannot go on. The root cause may be excessive pressure and suppression in middle school, which leaves many people without a love of life. Today's trending news includes a story about a former gaokao top scorer who is now a homeless man. I understand this guy; he was only one year ahead of me. When pressure reaches a certain point, a person swings to the opposite extreme.

If a person's love of life is taken away, no amount of compensation is worth it. So the most important principle in my worldview is putting interest first, with everything else giving way. When a person loves something purely—not for what it brings—nothing worldly affects him.

I have been interested in human physical and mental health since high school, and to this day I enthusiastically learn everything about it every day and write about it, never slacking, never weary. If I had knuckled under to life and abandoned this interest for practical reasons, I believe I would now be living full of grievances, rather than as I do—spirited, fighting, and bright.

I once hoped my son would study medicine with me, but he is more interested in math. I did not force him; I support him in math. He can recite the personal histories and academic achievements of famous mathematicians like a catalog. Whenever he hits a problem he cannot solve, he loses himself in working it out. His talent may be limited, and he may not become the most outstanding mathematician, but with such enthusiasm for math, I believe it will bring him endless joy.

So over the years I have only done one thing for him: taught him to adjust his mindset, steady his emotions, love what he loves, and not care about future wealth, poverty, success, or failure—nor feel he must win the Fields Medal to be vindicated. Like me, his father, who never dreamed of a Nobel Prize in medicine or literature, nor of the title of professor or academician: does not winning an award or a title mean one cannot love medicine and literature?

I only hope that, no matter how many buckets of cold water life pours on him, he will remain true to himself, loving his work and loving his life. Because, beyond our own love of life, life has no inherent meaning. Any so-called meaning of life that can be listed can be easily dismissed; only love is real and true. I have lived my whole life purely because I love life—unpretentious, fearless, happy, and joyful. I hope my child will live the same way, and I hope everyone can live this way and find a joy that wells up from within, beyond anyone's power to take away.