Be a Man and Do Things Pillow Book

Chapter 18: Be a Thinker (2)
Although this is a joke, it taught us a vivid lesson.There are many things in life and work that are not impossible. The key lies in whether we have worked hard to use our brains to think, and whether we have finally put the ideas in our minds into practice.Yes, when faced with difficulties, when faced with setbacks, don’t give yourself any excuses, tell yourself that you will be able to overcome these difficulties, tell yourself what others can do, as long as you master the key skills, you can also do it .In the midst of difficulties, as long as you have such a mentality of not making any excuses, then at least you have taken another crucial step on the road to success.

To have knowledge, but also to have thoughts.

A long time ago, a certain student traveled thousands of miles to visit teachers to study in order to learn real talents, but what troubled him was that the more knowledge he learned, the more he felt ignorant and superficial.Once he met an eminent monk, he poured out his distress to him, and asked the eminent monk to find a way to free himself from the distress.

After the eminent monk listened to his troubles, he thought for a while, and then asked slowly: "Is the purpose of your study for knowledge or wisdom?" Asked: "Is there any difference between seeking knowledge and seeking wisdom?" The eminent monk laughed and said: "Of course there is a difference between the two. , the deeper you understand, the more and more difficult problems you will encounter, so you will naturally feel that the more you learn, the more ignorant and superficial you will be. But it is not the case for seeking wisdom. Seeking wisdom is seeking from within. The more and deeper you understand your inner world, the more complete your mind will be, and you will feel a kind of intelligence from within, and you will not have so many troubles."

The student still didn't understand after hearing it, so he continued to ask: "I still don't understand what the master said. Could you please explain it more simply?" The eminent monk made a metaphor: "There are two people who want to go up the mountain to collect firewood. I set off, but when I came to the mountain, I found that I forgot to sharpen the firewood knife and had to chop wood with a blunt knife. The other person did not rush up the mountain, but sharpened his knife at home before going up the mountain. Which one of these two people is more firewood? How many?" The student suddenly realized after hearing this, and said to the eminent monk: "The master means that I am the one who only cares about chopping wood and forgets to sharpen the knife!"

The eminent monk smiled but did not answer.

In real life, many people think that learning knowledge and learning wisdom are the same thing. In fact, this is a wrong concept, because there is no equal sign between knowledge and wisdom. A person with extensive knowledge does not necessarily have high Similarly, a person with great wisdom does not necessarily have extensive knowledge.To give a realistic example, modern people, even a middle school student, far surpass Confucius and Newton in terms of knowledge, but can you say that their wisdom is higher than Confucius and Newton?Obviously not.So why do Confucius and Newton have less knowledge than modern middle school students, but we think they have high wisdom?This is because the standard for evaluating a person's intelligence is not the amount of knowledge he possesses, but his thinking ability. To put it more simply, it depends on the strength of his brain. People with strong brains are good at learning knowledge, Using knowledge and creating new knowledge, people with weak brains may far surpass people with strong brains in the accumulation of knowledge, but they lag behind people with strong brains in terms of using knowledge and creating new knowledge.With the continuous development of society, we are entering an era of high intelligence, whose main feature is that people need to have a stronger ability to learn knowledge, use knowledge and create knowledge, that is to say, the brain is required to have higher intelligence. thinking efficiency and thinking ability.

As the saying goes, "If a worker wants to do a good job, he must first sharpen his tools." If we want to survive in this era of high intelligence, we must first improve our brain power, that is, our thinking ability.So how can we improve our thinking ability?First of all, what we need is to change the traditional learning concept. We must realize that improving thinking ability and learning knowledge are two different things. The former seeks from within and cultivates wisdom; the latter seeks from outside to accumulate knowledge.

Allow yourself to think a little more than others.

In Europe, there is a country where women have the habit of wearing big hats, even if they go to the theater to watch a play, they don't take off their hats.Sometimes there are too many women in the theater, and the whole theater is like a large piece of colorful giant mushrooms blooming in it, which seriously affects the audience in the back row.For this reason, the audience often gives advice to the theater manager: either let the female audience take off their hats, or give us a refund.The manager had to go on stage to persuade the female audience to take off their hats, but it didn't help every time.Once, when the audience made this request again, the manager had no choice but to go on stage to persuade them again, but the female guests still wore them, and the order in the venue suddenly became chaotic.At this time, a small employee whispered a few words in the manager's ear, and the manager looked at him suspiciously and said, "Is that okay?" The small employee smiled and said, "Try it."

So, the manager said to the audience again: "Well, in order to take care of older female guests, they don't need to take off their hats; younger and more beautiful female guests, I hope you take off your hats." The ladies took off their hats at once.Because no one wants to be called an old woman.

In this story, the clerk used divergent thinking to find another way to let the female guests take off their hats; just saying "take off their hats" doesn't work, why not take advantage of people's vanity and let them take off by themselves with a sentence of "don't take off" ?Unexpectedly, it really worked.

And another story:
In ancient times, there were two brothers who went out with a suitcase each.Along the way, the heavy suitcases weighed the brothers down.They had to switch to the right hand when the left hand was tired, and switch to the left hand when the right hand was tired.Suddenly, the eldest brother stopped, bought a pole on the side of the road, and hung two suitcases on the pole, one on the left and one on the right.He picked up two boxes and started on the road, but felt a lot more relaxed.

Let yourself think a little more than others, let your thinking be different, maybe what you come up with is an unparalleled good idea!
Combs can also be sold to monks.

There is a large company with quite good profits, in order to expand its business scale, it decided to recruit a marketing executive with a high salary.As soon as the advertisement came out, applicants flocked.In the face of many applicants, the person in charge of the recruitment said: "A horse is not as good as a horse race. In order to select high-quality talents, we have a practical test question, which is to find a way to sell as many wooden combs to monks as possible."

The vast majority of applicants are puzzled and even angry: what is the use of a wooden comb for monks?Is this not obvious to make fun of people?So they left in a hurry, and finally there were only three applicants A, B and C left.

The person in charge confessed: "With a limit of 10 days, report the sales results to me at that time."

Arrived on the 10th.

The person in charge asked A: "How many combs did you sell?" The answer: "1." On the way down the mountain, I met a young monk scratching his scalp vigorously while basking in the sun.With an idea, A handed over the wooden comb. The little monk was full of joy after using it, so he bought one.

The person in charge asked B: "How many pieces did you sell?" The answer: "10 pieces." "How did you sell it?" B said that he went to a famous ancient temple. The abbot who found the temple said: "Unkemptness is disrespect to the Buddha. A wooden comb should be placed in front of the incense table in every temple for faithful men and women to comb their hair." The abbot adopted his suggestion.There are ten temples on that mountain, so I bought 10 wooden combs.

The person in charge asked C: "How many were sold?" The answer: "1000." The person in charge asked in amazement: "How did you sell it?" endlessly.C said to the abbot: "Every visitor who comes to pilgrimage should have a pious heart. The temple should give something back as a commemoration, bless them for safety and auspiciousness, and encourage them to do more good deeds. I have a batch of wooden combs, and your calligraphy is outstanding. , you can engrave the words 'Jishan Comb', and you can make a gift." The abbot was overjoyed and immediately bought 1000 wooden combs.The benefactors and pilgrims who got the "Jishan Comb" were also very happy, and they passed on to ten or ten to a hundred. There were more pilgrims and more incense.

Selling wooden combs to monks sounds a little weird, but different thinking and sales techniques have different results.To develop a new market where others think it is impossible, that is the real marketing master.It is really a miracle. We have to admire the person who can sell 1000 wooden combs. The first person can only sell one comb if he wants to break his head. He has fallen into the trap of thinking. If it doesn't come out, people who use the second method have already begun to improve.The third type of person is the most successful.There are many roads to Rome around him, and he knows which one to choose.

Our minds also need a little training.

Thinking training is the most popular and effective method of intellectual development in the world, but it is not a unique patent in modern times. The current thinking training is based on the latest thinking scientific achievements and ancient brain training techniques.As early as in ancient Greece, the famous philosopher Socrates created the famous "brain midwifery".

According to historical records, Socrates was ugly and slovenly, wandering around the market all day long.In the markets of ancient Greece, not only goods were sold, but ideas were also sold.Often someone stands in the market and addresses the audience.One day Socrates met a young man who was preaching about "virtue".

Socrates pretended to be ignorant, and asked the young man: "Excuse me, what is virtue?" The young man replied disdainfully: "You don't understand such a simple question? Let me tell you, don't steal, don't steal. Things like deceit are virtues."

Socrates still pretended to be puzzled and asked: "Is not stealing a virtue?"

The young man replied positively: "Of course! Stealing must be a bad virtue."

Socrates said unhurriedly: "I remember when I was a soldier in the army, once I received an order from the commander. I sneaked into the enemy's camp late at night and stole their troop deployment plan. Excuse me, can I Is this conduct a virtue, or a vice?"

The young man hesitated for a moment, and argued, "Stealing from the enemy is of course a virtue. When I said not to steal, I meant not to steal from friends. Stealing from friends is definitely a virtue."

Socrates still said unhurriedly: "Another time, a good friend of mine was hit by a double blow from natural and man-made disasters. He was desperate for life, so he bought a sharp knife and hid it under his pillow, preparing to die in the dead of night." It is time to end his own life with it. When I heard the news, I sneaked into his bedroom in the evening, stole the sharp knife, and saved him from death. Is my behavior a virtue? , or evil?"

The young man finally panicked, admitted his ignorance, and asked Socrates "what is virtue".

Socrates called his thinking training method "brain midwifery".It means that the correct idea is already in your own head, but when you dig it, you miss the point.Socrates just adopted some correct methods to make them "delivery" smoothly.

(End of this chapter)