Every Teacher’s Day, I receive greetings and words of thanks from many of you — mostly expressing gratitude for my ongoing sharing and guidance.
Honestly, I don’t feel I deserve this gratitude.
By any measure, I fall far short of the title “teacher.” A true teacher imparts unquestionable wisdom and truth to their students. What I share with you is mostly a personal perspective drawn from my own life experience — inevitably a mix of the insightful and the flawed.
Our relationship is better described as that of an upperclassman and his juniors. I don’t know that much more than you do — I simply have the nerve (three parts cheek, seven parts spirit) to speak my mind openly.
If we must give thanks to anyone, that gratitude belongs to Life itself — for Life is the true lifelong teacher of us all.
Once we step into the world, Life is the only force that never stops educating and pushing us — relentlessly, until our very last breath.
Some students are naturally perceptive — they take every joy, hardship, blessing, and calamity and break it apart, examining it carefully. Most people, however, simply swallow whatever life throws at them whole, barely pausing to chew. This is precisely what creates the gap between people.
If there is one thing Master Chi wants to share with you this Teacher’s Day, it is this: on the path of life, there is a distinction between core subjects and elective ones.
The core subjects — the ones I have always urged you to truly master — are these three: politics, economics, and human nature.
Understand politics, and you will know how to effectively work with the people and resources around you — which relationships must be cultivated, and which risks and crises must be kept at arm’s length.
Understand economics, and you will know how to align what you have with the best opportunities — continuously building your wealth and earning the right to enter higher levels of the world.
Understand human nature, and you will know why you sometimes make emotionally driven mistakes — and be able to avoid them entirely. You will also sharpen your ability to detect every opportunity around you and grasp the hidden logic behind events.
These three subjects may seem distant and abstract — as if they are sophisticated arts reserved only for those already powerful and privileged.
But look carefully, and you will realize that everything in life is ultimately composed of these three. Office dynamics, managing your savings, marriage and friendship, career choices — all of it contains lessons to be continuously learned and refined.
Once you grasp this, you will naturally invest the effort to study and develop yourself — becoming better and better, climbing steadily upward, one step at a time.
Of course, this road will be hard and lonely at times. But that is alright — Master Chi will be with you every step of the way, the kind of upperclassman who jokes and argues with you one moment, yet always has your back.
And finally — may our time together be long, and our bond enduring.