When you are alone, you are your master

Since childhood, I have always felt that I am passively accepting a lot of innocuous, even wrong and deceptive knowledge, such as the negligible content about Leonardo da Vinci, which is so rare as to be a student.

This awareness of vigilance came after I had read many biographies written by foreign writers. This is also the origin of the concentrated reading of the famous American biographer Walter Isaacson series of biographies at the beginning of 2022.

I just finished reading the biography of Steve Jobs and started reading the biography of Leonardo da Vinci today.

When I read the third chapter, I felt two paragraphs, there are more "sensitive words" in it, in order to avoid the article can not be published, I directly replaced the sensitive words in those two paragraphs with the first letter of the Hanyu Pinyin they pronounced, you know.

P s: The following dark green font is the original text, and the reading notes are displayed in normal font.

In an era when second-hand knowledge is widely available, perhaps we should learn from Leonardo how to gain first-hand experience through his own observations and experiments, and use your eyes and hands to find out for yourself that it cannot be the same feeling as holding a mobile phone to consume other people's results - saving trouble always comes at a cost.

This passage in the translator's preface makes all too much sense.

The absorption of second-hand knowledge, most of the time may not be as good as second-hand smoke, at least second-hand smoke will cause "harm" to the recipient, and second-hand knowledge more often becomes a "prop", with some people to complete the process of "pretend learning". It can be said that in addition to wasting time and feelings, the vast majority of second-hand knowledge is the two words that Jobs likes to evaluate - garbage,.

Through deliberate practice, these talents can be enhanced, such as curiosity and nuanced observation. Another example is imagination, we should be as kind to our imagination as Leonardo, and at the same time let our children use their imagination to the fullest.

Reading such words and then reflecting on reality immediately breeds pessimism and disappointment.

Above all, Leonardo's never-ending curiosity and spirit of experimentation remind us that neither ourselves nor our children should stop at absorbing knowledge, but also question it, be imaginative, and dare to "think" differently, just like the outlier geniuses and innovators of any era.

This passage can be seen as the key to reading the biography of Leonardo da Vinci, and with this key, it is possible to open the door of the temple of Leonardo da Vinci.

In addition, this passage is also a practical educational methodology, not only for the education of children, but also for their own education.

Psychoanalysis of people who lived five centuries ago is fraught with uncertainty, and biographers should be particularly careful.

Remember.

When you are alone, you are your master.

This sentence can be used as the title of the reading note: "When you are alone, you are your master." Some people say that loneliness is a luxury, and da Vinci's words can be more or less corroborated.

[You see, I've done it.] 】

Cosimo studied ancient Greek and Roman literature and, as a collector of ancient manuscripts, he exalted the revival of classical culture, which was at the heart of Renaissance humanism. He financed the establishment of florence's first public library and plato's Academy, which, although an informal academy, had a great influence, where scholars and intellectuals explored the classics.

The background of a city or a country is inextricably linked to libraries and schools. The reason for the "Renaissance" in Europe is also inextricably linked to a thoughtful and visionary like Cosimo. This reminds me of dynasties in which rulers built palaces for their own extravagance and revelry, and eventually they could not avoid being destroyed and thus disintegrated.

There is a certain causal relationship between the two.

Lorenzo's mother was a famous poet, and under her careful education, Lorenzo was educated in humanistic literature and philosophy, and also funded his grandfather to establish the Plato Academy.

What is the starting line? Mother is. Of course, I'm not demanding that every mother be as good as Lorenzo's mother.

What I sigh is that in reality, many mothers do not understand the connotation represented by the word "careful" here, let alone practice it. Inevitably, some people simply regard having children and raising children as a "ritual" to satisfy vanity, and children have become "props", and it is only natural that more and more "people" who have "no one to raise" will appear.

The flowing dynamics turn a stationary statue into a narrative, which is no longer a scene, but a story.

It's a static story, and it takes considerable cultivation to taste such a story.

Writing a good person also needs one story after another, and the story that moves people with details is supported. Without such a story, a person is flat and calm, and it is not as good as a statue that can tell a story.

To make imaginary animals look natural and real, such as dragons, you can refer to the head of a mastiff or hound, the eyes of a cat, the ears of a porcupine, the nose of a greyhound, the eyebrows of a lion, the temples of a rooster, and the neck of a turtle.

Reading more books, accumulating more knowledge or common sense, and sometimes similar phenomena will occur - the various images, concepts, and thoughts that have been left in the mind and memory are mixed and collided together - and then it is possible to produce feelings that have never been felt before.

The process is magical and especially enjoyable.

If there is no love, what else is there?

This sentence can also be the title of a reading note. Just, think about it, where is the answer?

Both the X act and the X organ are so repulsive that if it weren't for the beautiful faces, thedor of clothing, and the repressed impulses, humans might have gone extinct in nature.

After reading this passage by Leonardo da Vinci, do you still blindly believe in and even worship the so-called "love"?

YJs sometimes show their intelligence. When you want to make it BQ, it is stubborn and self-contained, but sometimes it is spontaneous and automatic without the permission of the owner. Whether a person is awake or asleep, it goes its own way. Man wants to send it on, but he has other ideas; when he is eager to try, he wants to stop it. Therefore, it seems that it really has life and intelligence independent of its master.

In the eyes of false orthodoxy and false Taoism, this is an incomparably dirty written record. In fact, I am afraid that except for Leonardo da Vinci, no one has ever paid attention to and lamented this almost indispensable human part of both men and women.

Strange and ridiculous, all that is within our reach in reality are hypocrites with mouths full of benevolence, morality, and morality, full of belly, male thieves and female prostitutes.

A good painter should "not be obsessed with the specific position of the body, but first pay attention to what kind of movement can be coordinated with the mental state of the character in the situation."

A good writer should also be inspired by this.

I thought I was learning how to live, but I was actually learning how to die.

Da Vinci's words are both proverbs and prophecies, and looking at this bizarre reality, it is all such people who are stuck in the study of rigid dogma.

The beauty of the notebook is that it allows everything to run free, whether it's improvised ideas, incomplete ideas, unpolished sketches, or unfinished draft papers.

Walter Isaacson's praise for the notebook is touching. This reminds me of the days when I used to record in a notebook with a pen, and even naturally I remembered the scene of keeping a diary when I was a student. In the digital age, we have rarely used paper notebooks anymore, and the various "terminal" display devices we carry with us, whether they are mobile phones, tablets or computers, can conveniently record what we want to record.

In this passage, I see it more as Walter Isaacson's emphasis on taking notes as a good habit in any era. Fortunately, I just kept two of the few habits I had since I was a child, one was reading, and the other was to like to record what I thought and saw. Of course, it is only now that the notepad function of mobile phones or computers is directly used, and paper notebooks and pens have been almost completely abolished.

January 5, 2022