Su Dongpo, the great writer with the most fans in ancient and modern times, tells you: how can Chinese live happily

When people in the world look at Su Dongpo, most of them value Su Dongpo as a literary artist, and What Makes Su Dongpo more worthy of our reference and learning is that he has the ability to live happily. In the Fudan Humanistic Wisdom Classroom, Huang Yufeng, principal of Fudan Wupuhui Experimental School and a special teacher of Fudan Affiliated Middle School, told su Dongpo's life experience of being optimistic despite the ups and downs and his enlightenment to us today.

Huang Yufeng (Image courtesy of the author)

"Fun Work and Writing"

Aristotle has a maxim in the Nicomachean Ethics: "Happiness is man's ultimate purpose." "A truly successful person must be a person who can feel happiness from life." Although Su Dongpo had a bumpy career in his life, with ups and downs and ups and downs, he was always a person who could discover happiness and create happiness.

First of all, from serving others and contributing to society, Su Dongpo has gained great satisfaction and happiness.

Su Dongpo had a wealth of political experience, he served as a local official in Fengxiang, Hangzhou, Xuzhou, Yingzhou, Ruzhou, Dengzhou, Yangzhou, Mizhou, Huzhou, Dingzhou, Huangzhou, Huizhou, danzhou, and also served as an imperial division, deputy prime minister, national defense minister, and president of the examination court. Su Dongpo always seems to have a steady stream of vitality and creativity, and he has simply turned being an official into an art.

He reformed the one-size-fits-all policy of labor in front of Fengxiang, and the result was that "the harm of Yaqian was halved". Organized flood relief in Xuzhou, and fought hard for more than 70 days to save xuzhou city. After the flood, the people lacked firewood and charcoal, he consulted the literature, explored the geology, and finally found coal that could replace firewood, which was called "charcoal" at that time, for which he also wrote a poem "Charcoal". In order to resist the plague, he donated funds to run the first charity hospital in Chinese history, "Anle Fang", to accommodate poor patients. The silt and water grass of the West Lake were blocked, and he actively dredged and built a long causeway, "the embankment was formed, planted with hibiscus and willows, and looked like a picturesque picture, and the Name of the Hangzhou people was Sugong Causeway" ("Song Shi Su Shi Lie Biography").

Whether it is a matter of duty or a matter of duty, he takes the initiative to take it. Degraded huangzhou, seeing the local phenomenon of drowning, he organized a charitable foundation to subsidize families who had children. Relegated to Danzhou, Hainan, he entrusted the people to bring seeds from the Central Plains, teach the local people to plant grain, and promote mechanized rice planting. He carried out a large-scale education and cultivated the first person and soldier in Hainan's history... It was in active work and dedication that he experienced the joy of life.

Secondly, writing is the source of Su Dongpo's endless fun and the embodiment of the value of his life. Su Dongpo not only wrote a lot, but also had a wide range of subjects, and all aspects of daily life could be included in poetry. Su Dongpo once confessed to a friend: "The joy of my life is that when I write an article, I have intricate feelings in my heart, and I can reach them with my pen." I call myself the joy of life, and I have never had it before. "His style of writing strives to be natural and smooth, and he is not a bard. He writes happily, and so do the readers. After the completion of the famous "Jiangchengzi Mizhou Hunting", Su Dongpo wrote to a friend with great pleasure: "Recently, it is quite a small word, although it does not have the flavor of Liu Qilang, it is also a family." Oh, a few days ago, hunting in the suburbs, I got a lot, I made a lot of work, so that the heroes of Dongzhou sang with their hands, played the flute and drums for the festival, quite spectacular. The laughter of "huh" in the text is from the heart of pleasure and self-confidence.

"Harmonious and Beautiful Interpersonal Relationships"

Harmony in interpersonal relationships is also a necessary condition for having a sense of well-being. There used to be a scholar who defined "happiness" this way — and you can maintain a good relationship with the people you care about. An important reason why Su Dongpo can remain optimistic in the midst of suffering, in addition to his open personality, is that he has a rich emotional life and a harmonious family.

Su Dongpo grew up in a scholarly family in Meishan, Sichuan Province, where the family was harmonious and harmonious, and was carefully nurtured by his grandfather, father and mother. The brotherhood between him and his younger brother Su Rui is even more touching, and many of Su Dongpo's moving poems are written for Su Ru, such as "I hope that people will be long, thousands of miles together" ("Water Tune Song Head"), and such as the "Desperate Poem" he once wrote in prison: "It is a green mountain that can bury bones, he Chinese New Year's Eve rain alone to hurt God, and he is a brother with the junshi world, and he is married to the cause of the next life." After Su Dongpo was arrested, Su Zhi wrote to him to request that his official position be used to atone for his brother's sins, and he was indeed demoted to Junzhou because of his brother. After Su Dongpo's death, Su Rui wrote a touching epitaph, saying that his brother "caressed me for my brother, and taught me to be a teacher."

Su Dongpo's relationship with his children is also very harmonious. His education of his children was always based on encouragement, and every time he read the poems of his younger son Su, he was full of joy and proudly said that Su's articles were "impressive". When he was later demoted to Huizhou and Danzhou, Su Guo separated from his wife and children for 7 years in order to take care of and accompany his father, which is also a rare filial piety today.

Su Dongpo had three partners in his lifetime. His original wife, Wang Fuxianshu, was considerate and introverted, which complemented Su Dongpo's frank and straightforward personality. Su Dongpo did not have a heart for making friends, and his wife was worried about him, so she hid behind the screen to "check" for her husband. She was particularly intelligent and was Su Dongpo's right-hand man, but unfortunately Hongyan died early. Exactly ten years after her death, Su Dongpo wrote for her "Jiang Chengzi Yi Yi Zheng Yue Twenty Night Dream". The second wife, Wang Yanzhi, had a soft disposition, and she gave birth to two sons for Su Dongpo, Su Kui and Su Guo, and regarded Su Mai, who was born to Wang Fu, as her own, and Su Dongpo praised her as "three sons as one, love from heaven". The third partner, Chao Yun, was originally a yakuza, but she became Su Dongpo's spiritual best friend in his later years and was the one who could understand him best. Chaoyun died of an infectious disease in Huizhou, Guangdong Province, at the age of 34. Su Dongpo built the "Liuru Pavilion" for her, and personally inscribed the inscription: "It is not timely, only chaoyun can recognize me; playing the ancient tune alone, every time the twilight rain times Siqing." ”

Su Dongpo has a wide range of friends, and some people have counted that his friends have thousands. He had good personal relations with his political rivals Sima Guang and Wang Anshi. After Wang Anshi fell, Su Dongpo did not care about his previous suspicions, went to visit him, and also wrote a poem that "it has been ten years late since the public has been realized". And his friends outside the court were all over the three religions and nine streams, and even introduced monks, Taoists, and singers and prostitutes as confidants. After Su Dongpo was demoted to Lingnan, many close friends traveled thousands of miles to visit, including the Hangzhou monk Samson Zi, the Changzhou person Qian Shixiong, the Taoist strange man Wu Weiqian, and the fellow Taoist Lu Weiqian. The most touching thing is that chaogu, a 73-year-old old friend, actually hiked thousands of miles from Meishan in Sichuan to visit the Su Shi brothers.

With such a harmonious family and so many close friends, Su Dongpo can still feel warm and happy despite the ups and downs of life.

"A good mindset of "nothing is necessary""

The road of life is bumpy and bumpy, and there is a normal heart in good times, and a good attitude in times of adversity. Only those who are full of heart have the energy to resist the storms of the outside world. Su Dongpo's life's setbacks were rare among the ancient literati, who once summed it up like this: "Ask Ru Ping's life deeds, Huangzhou Huizhou Danzhou." In fact, Huangzhou, Huizhou, and Danzhou are the ladders of Su Dongpo's life cultivation.

Huangzhou is the trough of Su Dongpo's life, but it is the peak of his art. Because of the Wutaishi case, he was nearly killed, which was the first blow given to him by fate. After being degraded to Huangzhou, he visited Chibi Mountain outside Huangzhou city many times, precipitating, reflecting, and writing famous works such as "Chibi Fu", "Post-Chibi Fu", "Nian Nu Jiao Chibi Huaigu" and so on. There is also the famous song "Ding Feng Bo": "Don't listen to the sound of the leaves beating through the forest, why not groan and walk slowly." Bamboo cane mango shoes light victory over horses, who is afraid? A cloud of smoke and rain is a life of peace. The steep spring wind blows wine awake, slightly cold, but the mountain head obliquely illuminates each other. Looking back at the place where it has always been, returning, there is no wind or rain or sunshine. Obviously, he had reached the realm of detachment.

Being relegated to Huizhou, Guangdong, was the second blow to him. He wrote in the "Jiyou Songfeng Pavilion": "Yu Yu lived in The Jiayou Temple in Huizhou, and walked under the Songfeng Pavilion, exhausted, and the desire stopped in the pavilion. Wangting Yu is still at the end of the wood, which means how to get it? For a long time, I suddenly said: 'There is no place to rest here!' 'By being like a fish hooked, suddenly liberated.' If people realize this, although the soldiers are connected in battle, the drums are like thunder, the enemy is dead when advancing, and the method of death is dead when retreating, and it may as well be familiar when it is not easy. This attitude of living with the situation allows him to be at peace even in the land of Lingnan Miasma.

It is said that in the Song Dynasty, exile to Hainan was only a lesser punishment than the crime of copying the door. When he was demoted to Danzhou, Hainan, Su Dongpo was already 62 years old and felt that he "had no hope of survival", but he quickly adjusted his mentality, "This peace of mind is my hometown". There was no official house, he built his own house; the price of rice was extremely expensive, so he went to the countryside to eat taro and oysters... When he was rehabilitated for the last time and was about to leave Hainan Island, he and his local friends said goodbye: "I am a native of Hainan, parasitic in Western Shuzhou, and suddenly crossed the sea, such as a long trip. He said that he was originally from Hainan, returning to Middle-earth, but it was like a long trip.

Lin Yutang said that what Su Dongpo is most worth learning from is the good mentality of "nothing is indispensable". Huangzhou, Huizhou and Danzhou are the most disappointing places for Su Dongpo, but it is these three stages that make his life more exciting and complete.

『Colorful Amateur Life』

Hu Shi once said, "To look at the civilization of a country ... See how they use their leisure time." If we look at how Su Dongpo arranges his spare time, we can truly understand the meaning of this sentence.

One of Su Dongpo's favorite things to do in his spare time is to read. Under the strict supervision of his father, Su Dongpo developed the habit of reading from an early age. He summed up his reading experience as "reading on eight sides of the enemy", a witty name that is very su Dongpo's style. He said: "And he learns every day, and he is attacked on all sides, and he cannot speak the same day as the hunters." He emphasized intensive reading, reading a book several times, focusing on only one aspect each time, and studying it from different angles.

Su Dongpo is a very fun-loving person, and every one of his hobbies has reached the pinnacle, and the "five masterpieces" of poetry, literature, calligraphy and painting have become a family. Lin Yutang said that he was "talented and full of energy", not a false reputation.

Immersing oneself in the world of art can generate a positive mindset, as evidenced by modern psychology and medicine. Su Dongpo is well aware of this. Once, he wrote to Mi Fu in Lingnan: "Nian Wu YuanZhang stepped towards the Spirit of Lingyun, the qingxiong peerless text, the super wonderful and divine zigzag, when to see it, in order to wash away my accumulated miasma and poison and evil!" His calligraphy ranks first in Su Huangmicai's "Song Four Houses", and the "Cold Food Post" is known as the "Third Book under heaven". He is also proficient in painting, and his "Dead Wood Strange Stone Diagram" and "Ink Bamboo Diagram" are now national treasures. However, no matter what the height reached, his attitude towards art is always to cultivate and be pleasant, with a playful mentality, enjoy these hobbies, and never fall into the fire. He did not pursue the title of "master", but only sought "to come up with new ideas in the Dhamma, to send wonderful reasons beyond extravagance", and he was satisfied.

In addition to art, he was proficient in tourism, sports, medicine, gastronomy, health, music, antiques, Buddhist scriptures, and Zen. He was even a pioneer in surfing in China. In a place called "People's Hong" in Xuzhou, the water was turbulent and set off huge waves, su Dongpo asked the boatman to design a small sampan to surf, and also wrote a long poem "Hundred Steps Hong".

What is not known is that Su Dongpo also has a strong interest in scientific research. He co-authored a medical book, Su Shen Liangfang, in collaboration with Shen Kuo, the author of Mengxi Pen Talk.

The rich amateur life stimulates his unlimited creativity and brings him more happiness.

"A Happy Model To Learn"

Today, how can we live happily? We first need to answer two questions: First, what is happiness? Second, how to improve personal happiness?

Humanistic psychology holds that happiness is an experience of satisfaction that accompanies self-actualization. That is, the process of attaining happiness is consistent with the process of perfecting oneself. The process of cultivating oneself is the process of pursuing happiness; the process of self-improvement is the process of continuous improvement of the happiness index.

From the perspective of modern psychology, Su Dongpo can be used as a typical case, and his happiness model is regular and can be imitated and learned by ordinary people.

Maslow, the pioneer of humanistic psychology, once studied historical and contemporary "ideal figures", and he believed that there was an "ideal personality" in the world. Maslow's list of "ideal figures" includes Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, the 17th-century Dutch philosopher Spinoza, the physicist Albert Einstein, and so on. It is not difficult for us to find that these people and Su Dongpo have many similar personality characteristics: kindness and kindness, leniency, studiousness, spiritual independence, versatility, a sense of humor, inexhaustible creativity and so on.

Su Dongpo's happiness model is a successful model bred in China's cultural soil. And his path to self-actualization can help us answer a question - how can Chinese live happily?

First, the basic needs of the individual must be safeguarded, such as the need for survival, the need for security, the need for love and belonging, and the need to be respected. The Northern Song Dynasty was a relatively rich and stable era, born in Su Dongpo, a well-off family, and the entire childhood era was warm and safe, which set the tone for the formation of his personality. Even in the case of displacement and even lack of food and clothing in the future, his Lotte personality has always remained unchanged. Warm family, marriage with beauty, and the traditional Chinese "fatherly kindness and filial piety, brotherhood and brotherhood" have also created a solid backing for Su Dongpo.

Under the premise that these basic needs are met, a person's need for self-development will naturally arise and become a powerful driving force. Driven by this dynamic, human potential is irrepressible. Su Dongpo's achievements in literature and art are the best proof.

In addition, we must also learn the virtues of Tolerance, Kindness and Helpfulness of Su Dongpo. Su Dongpo often gives free medical treatment to ordinary people, he said, seeing others dissipate, he seems to be able to be light and healthy. This is known in social psychology as "prosocial behavior", which not only brings a strong sense of self-efficacy to helpers, but also promotes the secretion of dopamine, the so-called "happy substance", of the brain.

In the preface to the book "The Biography of Su Dongpo", Lin Yutang wrote eighteen aspects of Su Dongpo in one breath, and added a sentence at the end: "This is not enough to tell the whole of Su Dongpo." He said that Su Dongpo was an ancient man with a modern spirit. He embodies the unique cultural essence of China and is completely a great man of "original" Chinese culture. His existence fully proves that China's traditional culture can give birth to real "people", and China's traditional culture can nourish a sound, happy and complete life.

Today, the reason why we want to "perfect the law in ancient and modern times" and the reason why we want to preach Su Dongpo is that we hope to understand the happiness code of Su Dongpo's life, get inspiration from it, and put it into action, so as to live out the self-confidence and happiness of Chinese.

Column Editor-in-Chief: Gong Danyun Text Editor: Xu Bei Title Image Source: Visual China Image Editor: Yong Kai

Source: Author: Huang Yufeng