Book of Laughter and Forgetting

  There are hundreds of songs in my computer. One thing I love to do is to play them randomly. However, since my moods varies from time to time, sometime I always skip songs which may not cater to my emotion. There is one song, nevertheless, I never jump over. It is a Chinese song called "Book of Laughter and Forgetting" by Faye Wang.

  Like other songs by Faye, this one is soft, implicit and vacant. The theme is quite ambiguous. Rather than to say that it is a song of inspiration, I prefer to consider it as a monologue from one's heart. The melody is amazing, but attracts me more is the lyrics. "Never make the same mistake in the future; write that feeling down and send it to myself as a love letter." Whenever I feel upset, I always listen to that song and I can feel the word to inspire me to be stronger, to be independent, and to be indifferent about those obstacles and difficulties.

Impossible Is Nothing

  Few things are impossible in themselves; and it is often for want of will, rather than of means, that man fails to succeed. 

　 -La Rocheforcauld, French writer

  Personally, I think that the meaning of the sentence is very clear. Like the Adidas’s advertisement: “Impossible is nothing”, anything is attainable. As long as people have strong determination, they will achieve all the accomplishments. Although sometime the environment plays an crucial role, yet we still can conquer the difficulties with strong minds.

  I strongly agree with the proverb. Actually, in our daily life, there are lots of things, which we abandon at last, can be done perfectly, unless we have determination strong enough. Sometime we blame on the external factors, but from our hearts, we know that it is because of us, instead of the thing itself. My experience of learning Japanese is the purest example: When I was in junior, I wanted to learn Japanese and made particular schedules. At the first several days, I can always follow the schedule. But later, I became tired of it and often skip the study. I told myself that the reason why I did not spend time learning it was that my school study was so busy that I had no time on Japanese. However, I know that the real reason is my laziness. I did not have strong will to support me. From the history we can see that lots of people, whom we defined as successful people or masters, achieve success exactly because they have a firm attitude. They believe that they can make it, and then they do. 

About Justice

  Personally, I do not think that there is absolute justice in the world. Maybe that’s why Aristotle says that people are “speaking of a limited and partial justice”. Just as same as that motion is absolute while stagnation is relative, justice is a relative thing. In my point of view, justice is for certain group of people. What some people consider as justice is not just viewed by the other people.  In the article, Aristotle talks about how to achieve justice in a state. There is a solution that rich people should give their property to poor people. He mentions that that the majority divide anew the property of the minority is not evident to be justice. I agree with his ideas. This solution reminds me of what happened to China when the new government was established by Mao. He said that poor people should also have their own lands, and then he urged farmers to fight against the “evil” landlords. The landlords, unfortunately, were defeated and their land was split, even though they worked hard to get the land or they inherited from their hardworking ancestors. I am afraid that I cannot consider that as justice. Just imagine that you have been working really hard, to earn money and to get better life, and someday, when you find out that you already have some deposit, suddenly some people, such as jobless hobos and idle people, come to your house and say, “Hey, we are all people, why you get paid more than me?” and then take away your money. Absolutely you will feel unfair. But in the eyes of the people who rob your things, they think what they do is to achieve justice.  Justice is a white lie.

What does independence mean to you?

What does independence mean to you?

  Personally, independence means that I follow myself. Independence is different from freedom. If a person is independent, it does not mean that he can do whatever he wants. Independence is a word to describe a certain kind of people who own their particular perspectives and values that guide their lives.

  For me, since I am independent, I no longer have to ask my parents for permission before doing something. Furthermore, I do not need to follow what other people say. However, this does not mean that what others say is wrong. I still need to listen other people's words even I am independent. Nevertheless, the point is that I will judge whether their words are true or not, worthy or not. And then I will decide to obey or not. Most notably, I do not think that there are absolute independent people, because humankinds are social animals. We depend on each other, and we found our values through other people. To some extent, everyone is independent, but they are just relatively independent. In general, we still rely on each other, for that’s how the society works.