Tonight’s dinner was an interesting one. With the new school term just around the corner, several well-connected friends from the Jiangnan region had brought their children along to the meal.
They knew I had a particular gift for developing people, so they seized the opportunity to let their children spend some time with me — to hear my thoughts and gain some perspective.
I have to say, this was an exceptionally wise decision.
Most ordinary parents in this society want nothing more than to see their children drilling practice problems and reading textbooks day after day — filling their heads with problem-solving techniques that have zero practical application in the real world.
Yet they almost never let their children receive any genuine, high-quality education from society itself.
The result is that children from ordinary families, though excellent at solving academic problems, have squandered the full eighteen years of life when the capacity for learning is at its peak — missing entirely the core curriculum called “real-world experience.”
And so the children growing up on this land tend to be simultaneously mature and naïve.
Mature in that nearly all of them possess a level of patience and obedience to authority that foreigners find difficult to believe.
Naïve in that very few have developed their own ideas or genuine initiative — they need to be directed.
In contrast, my own father used to take me along to quality dinner gatherings when I was young, so I could listen to how those elites and influential figures spoke and thought.
His logic was simple: rather than having his child sit through dry, by-the-book classes, why not let the child see early on how real social elites operate — how real money and power actually work?
As a result, by the time I was around twelve or thirteen, I understood that no matter how polished and upright someone may appear in public, at their core, aren’t they all driven by self-interest?
What people show the world and who they truly are — these are simply not the same thing.
I came to understand that in this world, you must actively pursue your own interests.
Only what actually ends up in your hands is real. What others paint for you in glowing words is, more often than not, a beautiful vision that has nothing to do with you.
On the other hand, don’t spend your days thinking that diligently turning the same bolt day after day will somehow produce a brilliant future.
A brilliant future is never built through low-level, repetitive labor.
It comes from constantly upgrading your own capabilities, then solving increasingly complex problems.
Don’t think of this path as particularly grueling — because as you understand more and the problems you tackle grow harder, the rewards that come your way grow larger too. The entire positive feedback loop makes you feel increasingly that the future holds real promise, and your mindset becomes more optimistic and energized.
The opposite — sustained high-intensity labor with low returns — is what truly destroys the spirit. Over time, at best you become cynical; at worst, despairing and depressed.
In the same way, those dinner gatherings helped me understand at twelve or thirteen that capability in this world exists in tiers.
There are many skills you can refine to great depth that are simply foot-soldier work — they cannot change anything, and they will never give you any decisive advantage.
A foot soldier can have exceptional physical fitness and perfect marksmanship — and it still doesn’t amount to much.
The next level up is the capability of a commanding officer: the ability to issue orders, coordinate forces, and deploy formations. Master this, and one person can achieve the effect of hundreds of soldiers sweating and fighting for their lives.
And beyond that, the general’s abilities — commanding, strategizing, and orchestrating the whole — represent a still higher tier. Apply them well, and they can outmatch entire armies fighting through the night.
So it follows naturally that foot soldiers, officers, and generals receive vastly different shares of the rewards, even when all of them are working hard.
Yet the vast majority of people spend their entire lives thinking from the position of a foot soldier. They believe that because they’ve carried the rifle and endured the hardship, they deserve a seat at the table when the cake is being cut.
Or at the very least, they expect the general to remember their hard service and cut them a generous slice as a reward.
This is a rather naïve way of thinking — because how large a slice you get has little to do with your contribution. What matters is whether you are irreplaceable.
If someone else could easily fill your role, your slice will never be large.
But if the whole operation would fall apart — or become drastically less effective — without you, then you naturally have a say in how the cake is divided.
So you see — I, Master Chi, have written so many pieces, and every one of them is sharp, direct, and unsparing in its language. Why?
Because I understand clearly that for many brothers and sisters who have already entered their middle years, the ingrained thinking runs deep.
In most cases, speaking softly and saying pleasant things accomplishes nothing. You need to speak hard truths and deliver a strong dose.
Otherwise, you won’t wake up.
In a few days, the new school term begins.
I hope my younger readers understand: in today’s world, academic credentials matter — but they are far less significant than genuine capability.
And I hope my brothers and sisters in their prime understand: life is, in truth, a small test every single day, and a major exam every year.
Pass the test, and everything you have gets a little better, a little smoother.
Fail it, and your life slips down a notch, grows a little worse.
Clinging to a life playbook that was outdated decades ago and reviewing it on repeat — that is a path to poor results, guaranteed.
So what can you do?
Actively seek out what is deeper, harder, and newer. There is only this one road.
How to understand it? That depends on your own capacity for insight.
Difficult? Of course — during our school years, almost no one was ever permitted to develop the ability to learn for themselves.
That last line is both a hint and a quiet joke.
That’s all for tonight.