Reflections after reading "Prisoners of the Mind": Seven Principles of the Meaning of Life

Some people say that the meaning of life is to be happy.

Everyone pursues happiness, so what does happiness look like?

Have money, a car, a house, everything is complete, everything goes smoothly...?

Such a life does seem happy. But is our happiness brought about by external material things or by inner cultivation?

Everyone desires that life is controllable: a healthy body and mind, abundant materials, a promising career, a happy family...

It may be difficult for us to imagine that life can be controlled So much has changed in one month that even going out for a hot pot meal has become a dream for many people.

Some people eat and drink at home, do nothing, and sleep until they wake up naturally every day;

But there are still some people who seize the opportunity and regard this time as the most precious time in their lives.

When the epidemic is over, you gain 20 pounds and someone reads 20 books.

In the Wuhan Fangcang Hospital, everyone was chatting and playing with their mobile phones. Only one patient was holding a large book "The Origin of Political Order: From Prehuman Times to the French Revolution";

When everyone had to stay at home, a 48-year-old uncle in Jiangbei, Chongqing, Xie Xingwu, ran 100 kilometers at home and ran more than 2,800 times back and forth in the living room and balcony at home;

There are also many friends who have never been in the kitchen, and they have learned to cook all kinds of delicious food during this time.

Under the epidemic, life with self-discipline is more exciting!

Looking for the meaning of life

This epidemic has given us more time. We didn’t have time to rest before, but now we can take a good rest.

You can stop and sort out your thoughts, rethink your life, and see if there is anything you particularly want to do but have never done.

Do you still remember your childhood dreams? Do you still remember your original intention?

An epidemic has made us understand the preciousness of life, because we don’t know which one will come first, tomorrow or the accident. We can only cherish the present, live in the present, and be kind to ourselves and others. Let your life not be wasted and live more meaningfully.

Speaking of the meaning of life, I have to mention a person, Frankl, who is a famous psychologist. When he was 16 years old, he delivered a very important speech called "The Meaning of Life."

And he has been engaged in the work of helping people explore the meaning of life throughout his life.

During the Nazi period, as a Jew, his whole family was imprisoned in the Auschwitz concentration camp. His parents, wife, and brother all died in the gas chambers. Only he and his sister survived.

With his strong belief and pursuit of meaning, he survived, and wrote his experience into a book "Living the Meaning of Life", encouraging millions of readers to practice faith. do.

Frankl not only transcended this purgatory-like pain, but also combined his experience with academics to create logotherapy, which helped people find the meaning of rebirth in desperate situations, and also left the most glorious legacy in the history of human nature. testimony.

Frankl was full of great enthusiasm for life. At the age of 67, he still began to learn to fly an airplane and received his driver's license a few months later. He climbed the Alps until he was 80 years old.

But because he always missed his wife, insisted on writing and encouraging the inmates, and giving important meaning to his difficult years, he survived. He said:

When we give our lives meaning, we can survive many out-of-control days and regain the motivation to live.

Principle 1: Choose your attitude freely

Recently, Teacher Fan Deng taught a book called "Prisoners of Thought", which is in the same vein as "Living the Meaning of Life" , after listening to it, I like this book very much.

Because in recent years, I have been very concerned about the meaning of life.

I have been thinking: What is the meaning of life? How can we live more clearly, more transparently, and more valuablely? Whose living styles are worth learning from?

In fact, each of us is searching for meaning.

If you are doing something that you think is meaningless, you complete the work step by step and do not find the meaning in work and life. Then, this can easily lead to anxiety, depression, and emptiness.

Perhaps the answer can be found in this book, which is an inheritance from Frankl. It talks about seven principles that can help us find the meaning of life.

Seven principles for living a meaningful life:

1. Choose your attitude freely

2. Achieve meaningful goals

3. Discover the meaning of life’s moments;

4. Never do things against your will;

5. Look at yourself from a distance;

6. Change Your focus;

7. Dare to surpass yourself.

What does it mean to freely choose your attitude?

The hardship and hardship of life,

can deprive mankind of everything else,

but it cannot deprive mankind of its last bit of freedom,

That is, no matter what the situation,

human beings have the freedom to choose their attitude towards the world and the freedom to choose their own behavior.

Frankl must have had the opportunity to complain in the concentration camp, but he did not do so.

Old monk Xuyun once met a Japanese soldier on the street. The Japanese soldier pointed a gun at him and said:

"Are you afraid that I will shoot you today?" You?"

Xuyun said:

"If I am destined to be killed by you, what is the use of me being afraid? What is there to be afraid of? If it is destined that you will not kill me, then there is no need to be afraid, so there is no need to be afraid.”

The Japanese soldier had never seen someone so unafraid of death. He admired the old monk Xuyun very much and hurried. He bowed to him and walked away.

So, face the fact that you can't change it, but you can change your view on it.

Principle 2: Achieve meaningful goals

Many of us confuse goals and desires:

If our goals are only material, just a house, Cars, tickets, and other such things, the mind is always looking to the outside, and you will find that you will never be satisfied in this life, because no one can obtain inner peace through external materials.

Therefore, if we regard all external enjoyment as our goal, even if we achieve it, it will be very short-lived. We need to learn to find meaning.

There is a story in the book:

An old man came to Frankl and said:

"My wife passed away, and we have lived together all our lives. Now She is over 80 years old. My wife passed away, and I feel that I can’t survive. Life is too boring. I live for her, but now that she is dead, I want to die too..."

Then Frankl asked him: "Think about it, if you die first and your wife is still alive, what will happen to her."

The old man said: "Of course she will It will be painful, she will be in pain like me, because she loves me very much." Frankl said: "You see, this is the meaning of your life. You live longer. If she bears these pains, she will no longer have such pains."

Philosopher Mr. Zhou Guoping once said:

"Life is likely to be meaningless, but finding the meaning of life itself. This thing is meaningful.”

Principle 3: Discover the meaning of life’s moments

The meaning of life itself is not important, what is important is that you find meaning in life.

What does it mean to discover the meaning of life moments?

I have not specifically studied flower arrangement, but sometimes, when I inadvertently see small wild flowers and naturally twisting branches on the roadside, I will arrange flowers with great interest to discover the beauty in life. A small blessing.

Use local materials, trim them yourself, and slowly match them to let them show their natural beauty.

One flower and one world. The production of flowers depends on sunlight, rain, dew, soil...? Until everything in the universe is interlocked, they all participate in the production of a flower. Therefore, from one flower, you can see the entire universe. A flower contains the whole world.

When you can feel that you are very focused on the flower arrangement process and appreciate your work, you will think that the mood of the person who sees it will become more beautiful.

So we must be able to slow down and appreciate the meaning of every moment around us.

The method we modern people use is that if we can’t find meaning, we use busyness instead.

I don’t need to be idle every day. As long as I am busy enough, I don’t need to think about meaning.

Especially since the epidemic has been going on for such a long time, almost everyone doesn’t go out. Whenever they have free time, they quickly read the news, their mobile phones, and watch short videos.

In fact, we should have a lot of space to experience, think, and perceive. This is the meaning of the moment of discovery.

Mobile phones do interfere a lot with us, and there are many people who are “played by mobile phones”.

For this reason, one of my teachers proposed the activity of 3S management of mobile phones. After I saw it, I immediately put it into practice. I began to control the time I use my mobile phone and put away the useless photos and videos on my mobile phone. Delete them all, uninstall apps you no longer need, unfollow some subscription accounts...?

After doing this, my phone becomes very simple and refreshing, and I feel very happy inside. So I also recorded the method in my diary that day.

There is also an exercise in the book "Prisoners of Thought" called "Exercise for Excavation of Existential Meaning". When you face a challenge or important moment, ask yourself:

1. How did you respond to the situation? How did you do it? What do you think?

2. How did you feel at that time? What emotions were generated?

3. What did you learn from it? What new knowledge and skills did you learn? How have attitudes changed?

4. How will you grow from the experience? How will you apply what you’ve learned, especially key learnings about yourself, to your personal growth?

The author of this book worked as a professor in a university and was finally promoted to the director of the teaching and research section. When he heard that his superiors were coming to inspect the work, he suddenly became excited. He felt that this was his own fame. It’s an opportunity to make a fortune and make a contribution.

So he did a lot of work, trying to make the superiors' inspections better.

But just because he worked hard to cater to the inspection of his superiors, the result was that all his colleagues and employees were dissatisfied with him.

In the book "Leap", there is a very interesting case:

There was a girl who always dared not fall in love with others because her teeth were very gapped. As long as she opens her mouth and smiles, the gap between her teeth is very big, and everyone will laugh at her, so she covers her mouth every time she talks to others.

She likes a boy in the office but dare not express it.

Later, the classical teacher gave her an idea, saying that since you don’t want to express yourself anyway, you can’t catch up with her, so she might as well break the pot and say:

I don’t want this man anymore. What's going on? You tease him with water between your teeth. You know that if there is a big gap between your teeth, you can spit water out, so you put a sip of water in your mouth, and then when you see the man, you spit the water on his face.

Then the girl said, is this okay? The classical teacher said, you won’t chase him anyway, and you can’t be with him anymore, so just treat him like buddies.

Then when the girl went to work the next day, she licked the boy's face with a mouthful of water...

On the contrary, the boy found this girl very interesting, and the two often communicated together.

Later the two got married.

When the bad things are exposed, this is called paradoxical intention therapy. ?

Don’t do things against your will, and accept yourself.

Principle 5: Look at yourself from a distance

Learn to look at yourself from a distance.

Don’t just live in your own body. You can become a camera on the wall and watch your life.

At this time, you can care for yourself, understand yourself, and find a direction for yourself. "Onlookers know clearly, but those in authority are confused." This is the truth, so you can jump out and no longer become that authority.

It may be hard for everyone to imagine, because usually when we watch movies, concentration camps appear, and everyone is extremely nervous, and they are in a state of being about to die every day.

But Frankl said that it may be difficult for you to imagine that in concentration camps, there were often joke performances, where a group of people made a fire and stood in the middle.

After the daily work is done, everyone tells jokes together. You tell a joke, and I tell a joke.

Almost all the jokes were about life after leaving the concentration camps, and many of the jokes were about food.

He said that one of the jokes that impressed him the most was that a man told him that he had a dream last night, in which he dreamed that he had left the concentration camp and his neighbors cooked for him. When the soup was being served, he told him: "Get it from the bottom!"

What does it mean to get it from the bottom? This is a concentration camp term. The soup itself doesn't have much vegetables. If you fish it out from the bottom, you might find one or two vegetable leaves or something.

So he dreamed that after he got out of the concentration camp, he kept talking to others about fishing from the bottom. This is why these people can still find fun and the motivation to laugh at themselves in the concentration camps.

Principle 6: Change your focus

There was a senior white-collar worker who couldn't find a job after losing his job. As a result, he went to a golf course and found a job as a caddy.

In his life, he was originally the person who played golf, but now he has become the person who carries golf clubs for others, pointing out golf courses to others all day long.

After becoming a caddy, he slowly began to find the joy of being a caddy. Think about it from another direction, I used to tip others, but now others tip me.

I can now understand the mentality of these golfers more clearly. Through my service, they are very happy, and I also find my own happiness in it.

As long as you serve people well, this is a pretty good job, and you can listen to these successful people chat and learn from their life experiences. Becoming a listener who is constantly learning is a completely different experience than in the past.

So think about other things, divert this attention, and change the focus of life. This is our ability.

We all read a story when we were children:

An old lady gave birth to two daughters. The eldest daughter married an umbrella seller, and the second daughter married a straw hat seller. .

Whenever it’s a sunny day, the old lady sighs and says, “It’s hard to sell umbrellas under such a strong sun, and my eldest daughter’s life will definitely be difficult.”

When it’s a rainy day, She thought of her second daughter again: "It's raining so hard, how can my second girl's straw hats be sold?"

So no matter it's sunny or cloudy, the old lady always has a gloomy look on her face.

Later, a wise man listened to the old lady’s worries and consoled her: “Old man, you should be happy. Do you think your eldest daughter’s umbrella will be easy to sell on rainy days? On a sunny day, your second daughter’s straw hat business will be very good.”

The old lady thought about it, yes, and she will never be sad again.

Many times, if we change our state of mind, all problems can be easily solved.

Principle 7: Change the focus of your attention

Frankl had a guard in the concentration camp. They all hated the guard at first, thinking that the guard was a German who bullied them.

However, they later learned after they came out of the concentration camp that in order to keep many of them alive, the guard spent his own money to buy a lot of medicines and distributed them to these Jews.

In fact, he is a person with good intentions, and he is a person who hopes to keep these Jews alive.

But because he is a German officer, he has to fulfill those duties.

So Frankl said, we cannot easily judge this person by his appearance. This person is very likely to be different from what we imagined.

I am from Hubei. During this epidemic, my father and I attended a meditation class before the Chinese New Year. When it was about to end, we planned to return to Shenzhen.

I heard from relatives at home that if we come back, we will be quarantined at home for 14 days, and people in Hubei must be quarantined for 14 days. We are from Hubei. Although we have not returned to our hometown in Hubei during the Chinese New Year, we still have to go to the hotel for quarantine.

My lovely father started a series of imaginations. He thought that the quarantine meant locking us in a room and not caring about it, and that we might all be infected by others.

The more he thought about it, the more upset he became. He thought this was unreasonable and that he should just take his temperature. If there was no problem, there was no need to be isolated like this.

Seeing him anxious and aggrieved every day, I persuaded him that in the hotel everyone lives in a single room and will not be infected, and there are volunteers who will help us. But he just didn't listen, thinking that what I said was not as good as what I said.

He continued to be worried and upset about this...

For safety reasons, we finally decided to postpone the trip for half a month before going back until the epidemic was under control and the situation stabilized. Intend.

Only at this time did I truly realize:

Sometimes we live in our own thoughts and cannot see the essence of things clearly. Clinging to one's "imagined world", which is full of imaginary "imaginary enemies", unable to see the truth, makes oneself fall into pain and cannot extricate himself.

The author has met a postman who delivered letters. He was very dedicated and had a great attitude. No matter it was windy or raining, he was always optimistic and positive.

This is what the postman said:

"I'm not just delivering letters, I'm helping people stay connected and contribute to community development. Moreover, people need me, and I can't Let them down. ”

When we connect with others, we are more able to achieve ourselves. Only in self-transcendence can we discover the deepest meaning. If we only focus on ourselves and meet our own needs, we are our own thoughts and needs. Prisoners of behavior.

Finally, review again.

Let’s review the seven principles put forward in the book "Prisoners of Thought". These seven principles are an important manifestation of Rankel’s thoughts and are his reflections on the meaning of life at the most difficult moment of his life. and summary.

1. Freely choose your attitude: In any situation, you have the freedom to choose your attitude. People's destiny should be in their own hands.

2. Achieve meaningful goals: No matter what problems or challenges we encounter, we cannot sit back and wait for solutions to miraculously appear on their own. Instead, we should actively participate in the search and become the solution. part.

3. Discover the meaning of life moments: Only you can be responsible for your own life. No matter what happens, be good at finding meaning.

4. Never do things against your will: Only by pursuing what you really want in your heart can we discover the deeper meaning of life.

5. Look at yourself from a distance: switch your perspective to a camera on the wall to look at your life.

6. Change your focus: When you are under high pressure at work, learn to change your focus and think of other things that can relax you and be positive.

7. Dare to surpass yourself: Don’t just focus on yourself at work, but turn your attention to things and people besides you.

The seven principles are all very operational. As ordinary people, we can make good use of these seven principles when facing difficulties in life.

Actively search for the meaning of life, work hard to find solutions, no longer live passively, no longer be a prisoner of your own thinking, and make life more meaningful.