A young woman asked me: “Master Chi, how do you tell whether someone is worth committing your whole life to?”
My answer: if you’re not reading their specific destiny framework (格局), the most reliable method is a trip together — roughly 7 days. Works every single time.
Why?
Because travel looks like fun on the surface, but along the way you will inevitably run into all kinds of problems you never saw coming.
Flight delays. Language barriers. Planning the itinerary. Sorting luggage. Choosing where to eat. Navigating routes. Coming down with a headache or a fever. And on and on.
Every one of these is a genuine test of a person’s decision-making, judgment, and ability to handle the unexpected.
What does it actually mean to “test” someone? It means watching them deal with one problem after another in quick succession.
True gold is not afraid of fire.
One trip will lay bare who someone really is — no matter if they’re a man or a woman.
Of course, there’s no need to go anywhere risky. A domestic road trip or somewhere safe and well-traveled is perfectly fine. The key is that it can’t be too short.
Seven days. You’ll see everything you need to see.
If a person — man or woman — stays calm in the face of problems, consistently chooses the most steady and measured response, keeps every arrangement well in hand, and maintains decent hygiene habits even in a hotel room — then that person is at minimum “genuinely solid” partner material.
As for the type who, the moment something goes sideways, throws up their hands and gives you the cold face? Well. I think you already know what to do with that.