Yu Qiuyu - Philosophical Thoughts on Life

Author: Yu Qiuyu
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-08-01
Features: Yu Qiuyu, who has "stopped writing" three times, recently released a new work—Yu Qiuyu's Life Philosophy! What is noteworthy is that nearly a quarter of the book consists of new writings added by Yu Qiuyu after his "stop writing" periods to make the book more complete. In this book, Yu Qiuyu no longer remains silent about the phenomena he despises but delivers fierce criticism with considerable intensity. Yu Qiuyu's Life Philosophy took two years from planning to publication, with Yu Qiuyu personally selecting the essence from all his works and adding nearly a quarter of new content. The entire book revolves around the theme of "life," showcasing Yu Qiuyu's insights and reflections on life from different perspectives.
In the winter season, when all trees wither and mountains lose their color, only the leaves between the pages retain some memories for people. Even outside winter, many people have neither the time nor the energy to roam the mountains, so a few leaves can still be considered an extraordinary gift. If different leaves can even be pieced together to form magical patterns, that would be even more interesting. The book before you is a collection of leaves I plucked from the trees in the mountains. They have detached from the branches that once nourished them but have now been pieced together to form a pattern called "life." If you lean in close and sniff carefully, you might still catch a faint scent of the mountains.
That day, I was truly captivated by the poplar forests on the western side of the Mongolian grasslands. The twilight hues illuminated the clusters of amber-like, translucent leaves in infinite layers, yet they remained so simple. As the mist spread faintly, a white horse appeared, its rider dressed in wine-red clothing, slim and young, exuding a heroic aura. But beneath the poplar forest, the rider's figure was just a small silhouette, breaking the tranquility. The horse stopped beside me because there was a pond nearby where it could drink. The young rider greeted me kindly and asked where I was going. He smiled shyly and said, "No particular reason." "If there's no particular reason, why are you riding so fast?" I asked. He hesitated and replied, "We were playing cards in the tent, but we're missing a few cards. I'm going to the town to buy a new deck." It was indeed no big deal. But then he added that this time, he would ride eighty kilometers.
The rider mounted his horse and rode away, his figure dissolving into the night as it passed through the poplar forest—a scene as ethereal as smoke. I squinted at the distance and thought: He doesn’t know how beautiful the path he has traveled is; he doesn’t even know that because of him and his horse, the path has become even more beautiful. The unparalleled beauty of eighty kilometers weighs more than a deck of playing cards. It is precisely the difference in how people answer this question that distinguishes a cultured individual from the ordinary. I will use this scene to compare life. The process of life is often far more important than its purpose. But people tend to overlook the white horse passing through the amber-like, translucent poplar forest in the mist, focusing only on the deck of cards.
Some say that every process exists for the sake of a purpose. I disagree. Can the breathtaking beauty of a path that has dazzled for millions of years have been born only because of a deck of cards? Don’t overvalue the gamble between the starting point and the destination of the horse. Beyond the gamble, the autumn colors are already deep. Every morning, the flocks of geese take flight. Crossing the morning glow, piercing the clouds, braving the wind, and plunging into the twilight, they finally rest in the reed marshes of the dark night. Can we say that darkness is their daily? True, the morning glow, the clouds, the wind, and the twilight all come and go in haste, but they cannot be a. But is darkness eternal? For the geese, what motivates them to act is everything that stands in opposition to darkness. Action is more important than a, and a is merely for the action of tomorrow.
Don’t set too many destination-oriented goals in life. All goals are dark, at least vague, while only action accompanies the light. Our scholars only bow their heads to search for geese nests in each reed marsh, never looking up to see the true living space of the geese. They say, "Wings are no longer visible in the sky, only feathers have fallen in the nests." They say, "The endless sky is too empty, only the muddy feet can be considered knowledge." P3-4