Su Xin's Shallow Reading Vol.55

The author Pique Yale was born in England from 65438 to 0957. He has studied at Eton College, Oxford University and Harvard University, and has multiple identities as a writer, journalist, traveler and scholar.

The Power of Silence is one of the "Power Series of TED Thoughts" published by CITIC Publishing House. The author shared many views that are contrary to our common sense.

He believes that everyone needs a blank in his bones and a pause, just like a song can only make people pause to sing.

But this book is not a meditation guide book or a religious propaganda pamphlet, but advocates a way of life, that is, turn off the computer, throw away the mobile phone, escape from the noise of the city, and enter the inner world through long-term meditation.

And this lifestyle is the lifestyle and working style that many Internet companies, including Google, are advocating. ? "Endless" is not isolated from the world, but pulled away from the world from time to time.

02

Fill in a picture first.

A 29-year-old young man works in a skyscraper only four blocks from Times Square in Manhattan, and lives in an apartment at the junction of Park Avenue and 20th Street, where the super-rich in new york live. His job is to report international current affairs for Time magazine, a top magazine.

Colleagues are a group of like-minded young people and have no family burden. They can go to the airport with backpacks at any time and appear anywhere in the world at any time. Free, exciting and full of unknowns, doesn't this life sound great? This is almost the rhythm of running for the road. It sounds really exciting, but everything has two sides. Running too fast is easy to get lost.

Looking back, most of our lives, although not necessarily so exciting, are probably just busy working overtime dogs? Work often takes up rest time and there are no weekends. Then after winning a project, either get drunk or go shopping to celebrate, but this joy is often short-lived, because the meaning of work and life is not just to find satisfaction, but may be emptiness, loss or even confusion. When friends get together, they often hear the phrase "I don't know what I really want?"

Modern people are confused by city life, just like doctors in emergency rooms, who are always on the move, but when they have to heal themselves, they can't find a prescription. What should I do? This young Manhattan man who traveled around the world encountered this problem decades before us. How did he break through himself?

This method is very bold. He fled his dream life, left the bustling and noisy new york, moved to the ancient city of Kyoto, and lived in a small room in a backstreet for more than a year, and began to experience a kind of quiet power. He called the prescription "endless", and the original English text used the meaningful word Nowhere.

03

Endless can help people find their true direction, let them see the world more clearly and love it more deeply. Then, he wrote a book, which is the Power of Silence. A book that takes you to experience the static power, a lifestyle respected by Google. He is the man in our brain map just now, and now he is an outstanding presidential scholar at Chapman University.

Some media praised this book as a contemporary version of Walden Lake, saying that this book led readers to start a spiritual journey of exploring themselves. Pique Yale also gave a TED talk, in which he shared his endless adventures with hundreds of thousands of audiences, which is also the content of this book. This book is not chicken soup for the soul, nor a meditation guide book, nor a religious propaganda booklet. It is just an invitation from the author, inviting you to embark on an endless journey of exploration.

04

The Power of Silence is explained in simple terms from three aspects:

First, the angle we choose, not where we go, ultimately determines where we are;

Second, the way to reach the finish line is not necessarily asceticism, but can be carried out in daily life;

Third, in the era of information flood, the ability to screen information is more important than collecting information.

05

The perspective we choose, not where we go, ultimately determines where we are. In many people's minds, vision determines the quality of life, probably like this. But the understanding of vision is often narrow and simple. It seems that the more things you do, the more places you go and the bigger the world you see, the more you know about life and what happiness is.

? But this is not the case in real life. A large part of our life happens in our minds, because in fact, a person's biggest trouble is that he can't get along quietly with himself. This is not to say that physical travel is meaningless. When Pique began to seek strength from "endless", he still went to many places in the world. It's just that he found that only by taking some time to sit down quietly, recalling and digesting what he saw and felt on every trip home can the meaning of the whole trip emerge and deepen.

This may be different from ordinary people's understanding of happiness. Maybe after you have experienced some other happiness, you will understand the meaning of stillness. We can look at the story of Canadian leonard cohen, who was famous for his poems and novels in his early years. Later, he joined the folk music circle, matched his poems with simple chords, started his wandering career and achieved great success, and even won the Grammy Music Award for Lifetime Achievement. It is such a Leonard who should have been on the road all the time, but chose to come to the bald mountain meditation center in California in the western United States, while serving the 88-year-old Japanese host Sasaki, while letting himself live a quiet life and simplifying his life as much as possible.

During the week when the author visited him, this 6 1 year-old man, who had tasted all kinds of human beings, sat motionless in the empty meditation room for 7 days and 7 nights. His nickname "Idle" means being in a quiet state between two kinds of thoughts. Leonard said that he gained a kind of focused happiness through meditation, which, in his own words, was "an extremely profound, attractive and wonderful entertainment. Meditation contains the most authentic experience. " He lives in this remote and quiet place, not out of piety, nor in pursuit of purity, but in order to get rid of the confusion and fear that have plagued him for a long time, the most practical way he can find. Sitting quietly with old Japanese friends, tasting Napoleon cognac and listening to crickets outside in the middle of the night is the closest way for Leonard to find lasting happiness and a way to love everything in the world.

Leonard seems to have everything, but now only by abandoning it can he get his own happiness and freedom. In Leonard's meditation, there is no stage, no performance, nothing to do, just observing the feeling of surging and tumbling inside, which will arouse something deeper than this moment or myself. You will find that making a living and living are sometimes far apart.

06

Let's look at the story of Matthew ricard from China. He is a doctor of molecular biology. When he was 2 1 year old, he went to Nepal and was deeply moved by the happiness and insight brought by the lamas living there. Five years later, he simply gave up the promising road of scientific research, moved to the Himalayas, lived as a monk for a long time, and later became the protagonist of the best-selling Monk and Philosopher.

Later, Mathieu was often called "the happiest person in the world" and was invited to talk about how happiness, like muscle, can be obtained through practice all over the world. He explained his ideas very thoroughly. For example, he would say that a person who tries to find happiness is hard to get when he is entangled in trivial matters, just like putting his hand into a fire and seeing it burn violently, hoping not to get burned.

Years later, Matthew published a photo album, more like the ultimate travel guide. During the year when he was preparing this photo album, he studied in a hut on a high mountain in Nepal. He came out once or twice a week to take pictures of what he saw in front of his house. These scenes are similar, but they will change because of the change of sex, including the change of seasons, and even because of the ups and downs of the photographer's mood. The name of this book is Travel Still.

But it actually depicts a person's inner picture, from which we can see what a person's inner life is like when he enters infinity, full of new colors and beautiful scenery, but the picture has not really changed. Tired of the fast-paced city life,

The writer Pique decided to change his life. In addition to a short quiet trip to monasteries and other places, he also moved to Kyoto, Japan for a long time. At that time, he and his wife lived in a small apartment, with no car, no bike, no bedroom and no TV. Pique makes a living by traveling and writing, but without the interference of those trivial things, every morning when he wakes up, he feels as if there are endless grasslands and mountains extending far away.

07

The way to reach the finish line is not necessarily asceticism, but can be done in daily life. After reading the previous examples, you may think that "endless" is advocating solitude. Only by living in isolation and practicing in the mountains like Leonard or Mathieu can we feel inner peace and happiness, which is difficult for most people to achieve.

However, what Pique said about going to the "end" is not to live an isolated life, but to get in close contact with one's own senses, which can be done in daily life. In other words, in the busy work, take some time from time to time to let yourself empty, so as to stabilize the direction of progress in this crazy and accelerated world.

Patience is just a stop in the journey, so that it will be a living thing, not just a habit. In fact, Leonard didn't stay in the mountains all the time. During that time, he would drive down the hill to McDonald's for a delicious fish burger, and then return home to Los Angeles and turn on the TV to watch talk shows.

A day or two later, Leonard completely consumed his agitation, so he drove back to the mountains again, but he never made up his mind to spend the rest of his life there. Even at the age of 73, Leonard began to tour concerts all over the world. The tour lasted for six years and passed through many parts of the world, with more than 300 performances, each lasting more than three hours. The way of performance seems to be a ceremony in a temple, which is an art deepened by stillness.

In 20 12, Leonard's new album Old Ideas was presented in a slow and almost static state, discussing all the topics about death, but strangely sweeping the major charts. Maybe people want to find some kind of sobriety and wisdom, which is exactly what Leonard can bring us.

08

Once Pique met Matthew and asked a traveler a frequently asked question, "You often travel around the world by plane. How do you deal with jet lag? " Matthew looked at Pique with some surprise and said, "For me, flying in the air is like a short exercise.

I can't do anything in the air. I'm free. I'm not going anywhere, just sitting there, looking at the clouds and blue sky outside the window. Everything is still, everything is moving, and the scene is so beautiful. "Matthew is not mystifying. Later, Pique once flew from Frankfurt to Los Angeles. A lady next to him sat quietly in her seat for twelve hours, doing nothing and not sleeping, but she was always at ease. When the plane began to descend, Pique finally got up the courage to ask her if she lived in Los Angeles. The lady said no, she is German, and her occupation is social work, which is usually very hard. This time, she plans to spend five weeks in Hawaii to relieve the stressful life in Berlin. The reason why this lady says that she does nothing on the plane is because she likes to release the pressure in her body on the plane, so that when she arrives in Hawaii, her mood will become very peaceful and she can enjoy the holiday immediately. On the flight from new york to California, Pique also learned to try to turn off the electronic screen in front of him, but he didn't mean to do nothing.

When an idea comes, I will take out my notebook and write it down. The rest of the time is just to let my heart wander around or lie on the beach like a dog to relax. It was three o'clock in the morning when I got home, but Pique felt sober and thorough. An hour before going to bed, he turned off the light in the room, let the music drown him out and gradually fell asleep. When he woke up the next morning, Pique felt as brand-new as the outside world.

On one occasion, Pique made a program on the radio, saying that Gandhi took time out to meditate every day. A lady called the radio station and said with great anxiety, "As a mother of a child, who is ready to start a business, how can she have free time to meditate for two hours every day?" This kind of complaint sounds normal and reasonable, but after careful analysis, it is precisely the busiest people who need to give themselves time to relax, because research shows that stress is contagious.

If this mother with low income and complicated housework can let her husband, mother or friends take care of her children for 30 minutes every day and give her a little time to meditate, then her relaxed mind will be clearer, and she will be more willing to share her happiness and troubles with others, and people will become more active.

More often, we can use some very simple methods to get to the end, such as setting up an automatic email reply, turning off the TV during exercise, and finding a quiet space on a very busy day or in a noisy city. These simple things can open up a brand-new space for our ordinary and busy life.

09

In the era of information flooding, the ability to screen information is more important than collecting information. For many years, we have been emphasizing the ability to collect information, and it seems that we are used to this kind of preaching. However, today, we are not in an era of information shortage but information flooding, and the ability of information screening is becoming more and more important. There is a simple reason. The more information we receive, the less time we have to process each piece of information.

Technology has not taught us how to make good use of it. Pique said that the most unexpected discovery of his travel around the world is that people who develop the latest technology know best how to limit the use of technology in their own lives.

Kevin kelly, known as the "Father of the World Internet", is also an enthusiastic spokesman for new technologies. Unexpectedly, Kevin himself doesn't use a smart phone, and there is no TV at home. He sometimes travels in some villages in Asia for several months without a computer, just to take root in the real world. Kevin once said, "I try to keep my distance from all kinds of technologies, so that I can remember who I am more easily."

When Pique visited Google headquarters, he was deeply impressed by the trampoline and indoor tree house there. One fifth of Google employees are free to arrange their working hours. The company also has various activities to regulate employees' body and mind. For example, the chief preacher of Google+ comes from India and has set up a "Yoga Man" project in the company, which can help Google employees who practice yoga to train as yoga teachers.

A software engineer created a seven-week course called "Exploring the Inner Self" in the company, which was attended by more than 1000 Google employees. The course uses a lot of scientific evidence to prove that meditation can help them clear their minds, improve their health and improve their emotional intelligence. In Google, employees can go to the conference room at any time, close their eyes, let go of their thoughts and pursue hidden inspiration, no matter day or night.

? At present, one-third of companies in the United States have "stress reduction projects", and this proportion is still rising every day. For company employees, it will be a wonderful thing to clear the inner channel. For example, Intel tries to set aside four hours every Thursday as a "quiet time" for thinking. During this period, 300 engineers and managers had to turn off their emails and mobile phones and post "Do Not Disturb" at the door of their offices.

This project received a strong response, so Intel launched an eight-week project to encourage employees to think more clearly. For high-intensity science and technology enterprises, this is a preventive intervention measure, which responds to a view of the World Health Organization: "Stress will become an epidemic in 2 1 century." In Silicon Valley, many people have an "Internet Sabbath" every week. For example, from Friday night to Monday morning, they turn off most electronic devices, ready to regain their sense of direction and balance when the new week comes.

Circular focus

To view:

First, the angle we choose, not where we go, ultimately determines where we are; Second, the way to reach the finish line is not necessarily asceticism, but can be carried out in daily life; Third, in the era of information flood, the ability to screen information is more important than collecting information.

In the final analysis, he believes that everyone needs a blank in his bones, just like a piece of music can only be sung after a pause. But this book is not a meditation guide book or a religious propaganda pamphlet, but advocates a way of life, that is, turning off the computer, abandoning the mobile phone, escaping from the noise of the city and entering the inner world through long-term meditation.

Life is like a giant drawing board. When we stand in front of us, we only see complex and rapidly changing pictures. Only by stepping back and standing there can we clearly see the wider picture on the drawing board. The significance of returning to tranquility is not to contribute anything to temples or hilltops, but to bring that tranquility into a noisy and complicated world. Many times, the best way to change your life is to change the way you look at life.