As the first year after the epidemic, sheep knows that everyone has a lot of expectations for 2023.
However, after the hard work of the past three years, everyone's mentality towards life must have undergone many changes.
The most immediate feeling is that things are impermanent.
This feeling reached its peak when the sheep brushed Zheng Kai and his wife on the same day on a variety show saying that their first child was chopped with pepper fish heads, and Cheng Xiaoyue reached its peak when recording a little pregnant woman with a big belly when she opened the box.
Who remembers the abandoned Weibo trumpet back then?
I really can't help but sigh when I see the sheep, but the relationship between people can develop such a huge change in a few years.
In fact, this situation is happening in everyone's life: people, things, money, everything.
I also have to admit that the time of pursuing miracles in everything has passed, and being too reluctant will only get more tired.
At the moment of resuming work one after another, the sheep today does not encourage everyone to blindly positive energy, and only nags with everyone about the "impermanent" time aesthetics left by the ancestors as a New Year's message.
At the beginning of the new year, perhaps we all need to acknowledge the impermanence of the world and then ask how to deal with it, so that we can reach a new world along the flow of life, let's flow with it!
First originated in Buddhism
After becoming aesthetics
What is "impermanence" in the impermanence of the world?
Impermanence was originally a Buddhist term.
In the Buddhist scriptures, impermanence means that the mountains, rivers and the earth in the world are following a certain law, "the flow of migration is not suspended, and eventually it will mutate, and all are impermanent."
The sutras also explain impermanence from the perspective of karma, where causes and conditions mutate, and therefore the world is impermanent.
But the most widely circulated and more easily understood version is the phrase from the Diamond Sutra:
"Everything that has a way is like a dream bubble, like dew and electricity, and should be viewed as such."
What does that mean?
To put it bluntly, first of all, human beings are not noble compared to everything in the world.
Human beings are also part of matter, existing in the form of matter.
Second, human beings, like mountains and rivers, are constantly changing.
Like the fragile substances of the world, they are easily damaged and not easy to repair.
The concept of impermanence in Buddhism follows the customs of the countryside, and when it comes to different countries, it also derives different aesthetics.
Let's move on.
In short, the aesthetics of impermanence is one of the first schemas of culture at the aesthetic level.
On a shallow level, it contains the beauty of artifacts with an impermanent style.
After Buddhism was introduced to China, it was especially prevalent in the Tang Dynasty, with the emergence of Master Xuanzang and Jianzhen Dongdu.
It also affected the aesthetics of daily life in the Tang Dynasty, and the now popular wabi-sabi style had already appeared at that time.
Source: TV series "Wind from Luoyang"
In the Song Dynasty, brewing tea around the stove and burning incense and arranging flowers were already the daily life of the Song people.
However, the wabi-sabi we mentioned earlier is only an aesthetic on the object.
Impermanence also has many effects on human perceptions.
We mentioned earlier that the idea of impermanence requires oneself to be part of matter.
This requires humans to act in line with nature.
The nature here is not only the leisure that Tao Yuanming pursues of "picking chrysanthemums under the eastern fence and leisurely seeing the South Mountain".
There is also a character that is not reluctant, does not screw, and retains his natural nature.
The most typical are the literati and famous men of the Wei and Jin dynasties.
During the Wei and Jin dynasties at the end of the Han Dynasty, the Sima family came to power, and the son of Sima's courtiers killed Ji Kang.
Ji Kang's son Ji Shao was raised by Shantao.
When he grew up, he struggled with whether to join the Sima Dynasty as a courtier.
Shan Tao replied: "Between heaven and earth, there are still kaleidoscopic changes in the profits and losses of the sun and moon, and the trade-offs of spring, summer, autumn and winter, not to mention personnel"?
The meaning is clear: the world is impermanent, and the change of historical dynasties is nothing.
This is the theory of impermanence.
Under impermanence, Wei and Jin celebrities advocate that as a human being, you must be beautiful to live.
Whether it is Tao Yuanming or Ji Shao, you have to make a choice with your heart.
Before Buddhism infiltrated Chinese culture, it was Confucianism that ruled and disciplined much of people's spiritual life.
However, after the influx of Buddhism, especially the spread of the idea of impermanence, the role of Buddhism in discipline and supervision of people's spirits decreased.
Instead, people began to pursue a casual and open-minded life, and gradually formed an impermanent aesthetic in lifestyle.
From landscape painting to "Jin Ping Mei"
A further development of the aesthetics of impermanence
It is not only the famous men of the Wei and Jin dynasties who advocated the pursuit of a life of interest under the concept of impermanence.
Since then, the literati and inkers have also continued this aesthetic.
Song Dynasty Liang Kai's "Splashing Ink Immortal Picture", the painting style is casual and natural.
Huang Gongwang's "Fuchun Mountain House Map", which depicts his own secluded life, is still a national treasure.
Fuchunjiang is also still a domestic tourist destination.
Zhu Yun of the Ming Dynasty, known as the Eight Great Mountain People, was born into the imperial family of the Ming Dynasty, and later lived in seclusion in a grass house, and dealt with the impermanence of the world all his life.
His paintings are free and white, but with just a few strokes, he can express his inner thoughts through the imagery in the painting.
In addition to painting, in the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, essays and novels appeared, and many story themes also revolved around the theme of impermanence.
The "Okay Song" that began in "Dream of Red Mansions" is actually a song that laments impermanence, and it is also the theme summary of the entire book of "Dream of Red Mansions".
There is also the eggplant with a dozen chickens that Jia Mu loves to eat, and Cao Xueqin, who has always been stingy with pen and ink, written on a whole page, and when studied deeply, it is also describing the peak of the Jia family.
The method of eggplant introduced by Wang Xifeng: first peel the eggplant, cut it into cubes, and fry it in chicken oil; Then take the chicken breast meat and dried fruits of various fragrant mushrooms and cut into cubes, then simmer the chicken broth dry, pour some sesame oil, and then mix it with the juice and marinate, and seal it in a can.
In the end, the family's power and wealth were empty, leaving only a tree to fall and scatter.
The theme of "Jin Ping Mei" is also the same, revolving around Ximen Qing's family history.
At his peak, Ximen Qing had means, wealth, and beauty.
He was not afraid to calculate others, but as soon as Ximen Qing died, none of his wives remained in his house, and his family property was also taken away in the same way of ingenuity.
Not only is money empty, but also the beauty of half a life.
It's good with "Dream of Red Mansions", the song "The world knows that the gods are good, only the wife can't forget it!" Jun's birthday said kindness, Jun died and went with others" is a perfect match.
When it comes to "Awakening Hengyan", it is more direct to say, there is no unbroken banquet in the world.
Why is that?
Because of the wars in the Ming and Qing dynasties, in all periods of change of the times, from the merchants and nobles to the common people, they all lived a restless life.
Regardless of origin, the impermanence of the world is something that everyone has to face.
Therefore, by the Ming and Qing dynasties, the concept of impermanence and the aesthetic lifestyle produced by impermanence had become quite mature.
Whether it is Buddhist metaphysics or philosophy, the concept of impermanence has gradually developed into a unique aesthetic of time in the traditional culture of Chinese.
Since then, every time the world has been turbulent, natural disasters and man-made disasters, people have lamented impermanence, just repeating the cycle.
The beauty of impermanence
It's fun and practice
As we mentioned earlier, with the introduction of the concept of impermanence into China and Japan, the aesthetics and interests of life about impermanence emerged.
In fact, the aesthetics of impermanence is also common in Western aesthetics.
In their eyes, impermanence is an atmosphere close to the end of the century, and it has also derived many phased impermanence aesthetics.
There is an early decadent aesthetic.
There is also a prodigal figure similar to the Wei Jin master we mentioned earlier.
A lost generation during the World Wars.
Whether it is the concept of impermanence or the atmosphere of the end of the world, it contains both a somber and low lamentation and sadness, and also implies a personality that is about to move, which is the psychological dynamics and aesthetic stimulation of a special historical period.
The impermanence of European and American countries was closely linked to the changes at the end of the century, and Bohemia appeared.
Hippies, and earth-shaking rock music.
If the European and American view of impermanence is a fierce cry like rock music, the Chinese view of impermanence is closer to a static practice.
The truth is similar, because impermanence can easily make people feel a deep pathos, or the fear that time is no longer and destiny is impermanent.
People need to cultivate their minds inward to combat this sense of powerlessness.
Chinese tea ceremony, Chinese gardens, and Japanese wabi-shabi style are all this way of internal cultivation.
The aesthetic style they collectively present is also suitable for practice:
In the form of things, it pursues the philosophical realm of prime, emptiness and simplicity.
Taking wabi-sabi as an example, wabi is the embodiment of natural simplicity in simplicity and cleanliness, and silence is the change of things brought about by time.
Wabi-sabi beauty is described as incomplete, unconstant, incomplete.
Wabi-sabi is embodied in architectural design with a large amount of white space and emptiness; Native texture, both natural; The color is cold and silent.
After the tea ceremony was introduced to Japan, you can also pursue the original taste of tea with simple tea sets and simple tea rooms, and experience the happiness of maturity in imperfection.
This is the beauty of the impermanence of the artifacts we mentioned earlier, and it is also an important carrier of the aesthetics of impermanence.
Finally, how does the Dharma practice deal with impermanence?
Whether it's impermanence or doomsday atmosphere, there is a premise that life is disappointing.
The world is impermanent, and people need to cultivate a normal mind, look at everything in the world with a normal mind, and allow everything to happen.
Therefore, compared with the construction of aesthetic concepts, we must also consider what kind of attitude we should use to face all this.
This is also where sheep write so much and want to focus on everyone.
Under the current changing and turbulent environment, the road ahead will not be straighter and smoother than in the past, and we will inevitably feel fear and anxiety in it.
But from another perspective, because impermanence can change, bad can become good, unfortunate fate can be extremely good and time to operate, all laws are without delay, just as living water is always endless, impermanence is opportunity and vitality.
This is also where Chinese have a different view of impermanence than the Japanese, but closer to Westerners.
On a deeper level, Chinese to say that the impermanence of the world is not a fear of the future or a conservatism of the status quo, but also an affirmation of change.
It's an optimism, it's another kind of power, and it will always take us to the life we love.
At the beginning of the new year, the sheep also use this view of impermanence to encourage the treasures together.
The New Year has come, instead of worrying, it is better to look forward to it, I wish everyone can run this year, bright and bright, good health, make more money, strive to become beautiful, and grasp the permanence under the impermanence of the world.