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Only after reading the 2022 college entrance examination essay questions can you understand: A real master may walk slowly, but never back down

A true master may walk slowly, but never back down

By davidPublished 2 years ago 14 min read
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The 2022 college entrance examination essay questions have been released, causing heated discussions on the Internet.

This year's National New College Entrance Examination I Volume I used three Go terms, "master hand, master hand, and vulgar hand" as the material for essay questions.

Life is like a game of chess, the hand is the foundation, and the skill is the creation.

The so-called hands-on refers to the knowledge and experience summarized by predecessors in an industry and professional field.

Young people often fail to learn professional knowledge and experience, and blindly pursue the so-called "innovation" shortcut.

The result is that "wonderful hands" without solid basic skills are stepping on the pits that their predecessors have long avoided.

How can a person achieve a real master state in a certain field?

Before answering the question, let me tell you a technical term for playing chess.

People who often play chess must have heard a sentence: there is no good hand in everything.

The original saying is called "good chess players have no good hands" - that is to say, people who are very good at chess often play a whole game of chess, and you can't see that kind of magical move or a move that can turn the tide.

This is a bit different than expected, why is it so?

1. "There is no skill" in playing chess

There is a Go player in South Korea named Lee Chang-ho. He is a world-class top player in the Go world, and everyone who plays Go knows him.

Li Changho won the world championship at the age of 16, and is considered to be the next best player to Wu Qingyuan. He swept the players of China, Japan and South Korea at his peak.

The biggest feature of Lee Chang-ho's chess game, and the feature that gives his opponents the most headaches, is that he never pursues "excellent moves".

Instead, each move only seeks a 51% win rate, commonly known as "half-eye win".

Usually, there are 200-300 moves in total in one game. Even if each move only has a little more than half of the winning rate, at most more than 100 moves will be able to secure the victory.

That is, as long as each move is a little bit better than the opponent, it is enough to win.

Lee Chang-ho once told reporters: "I never pursued a good hand, and I never thought of defeating my opponent in one fell swoop."

The number one chess player in the world actually only pursues a 51% win rate, which makes many reporters and industry insiders feel incredible.

This is precisely the strategy of the masters, the so-called "excellent hand", although it looks cool, but there is a problem - when giving a fatal blow to the opponent, it often exposes its own flaws.

Moreover, the "excellent hand" is unstable and unsustainable, and it is impossible to accumulate skills through deliberate practice. Once the "inspiration" is exhausted, it is inevitable to be at a loss.

Just like guarding a city, it is not enough to rely only on "special soldiers". After all, it must be protected by deep trenches and high fortresses.

In contrast, "no magic hand in all" seems to be bland, but the victory is accumulated bit by bit, the crisis is invisible, and finally the victory is won steadily, which reflects another kind of wisdom different from "excellent hand".

The real masters are not very good at doing things that look beautiful, because things that look beautiful are actually very risky and have a high error rate.

Buffett's partner Munger said: "If I knew where I was going to die, I would be fine if I didn't go there for the rest of my life."

These people look at problems from a global perspective, eliminate hidden dangers in advance, and make threats invisible.

Lee Chang-ho

2. Billiard's "No Skill at All"

If you have played or watched snooker, you should know that it is a sport like this:

There are balls of different colors on the table, representing different scores, and two people take turns hitting the ball according to the rules.

And as long as the ball is scored, you can keep playing until you miss a ball, and then switch to the other side to hit the ball.

In the end, see who gets the most points.

The very important thing in the game of snooker is to keep the continuity of your shots.

Therefore, when playing, the golfer must have an overall analysis and planning of the situation of the whole set of balls, and each shot must prepare the ground for the next shot, so as to play more smoothly.

Throughout the history of snooker, there are two types of players who are very top and often win major championships:

The first category is that the golfer is very talented, he hits the ball very accurately, and he can score even a ball that is very difficult for others.

The other type of golfer has a perfect control of the situation, and every shot and every calculation is in place, leaving a lot of leeway and foreshadowing later.

There is one biggest difference between these two top players—the latter tend to have much longer careers than the former.

The former type of talented players will be very dazzling in the peak years, but they will decline quickly, and they will fade out of the public eye after a while.

3. The goalkeeper's "all in all"

We all know that the goalkeeper is a very important position in football.

The level of the layman's goalkeeper often pays attention to those particularly wonderful saves, but the knowledgeable person evaluates a goalkeeper to see if he can make the problem invisible.

For example, some of the great football goalkeepers in history are actually commanders of the back line.

He will observe the opponent's offensive lines and patterns, and then help the entire back line to make overall plans, and eliminate many problems invisibly.

This is the height of a football goalkeeper.

4. The doctor's "all without skill"

There is an old Chinese saying: "A good fighter has no great achievements, and a good doctor has no reputation."

It means: "People who are good at war often have no great achievements, and good doctors have no great reputation."

Bian Que was a famous doctor in the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. He had two older brothers, all three of whom were proficient in medicine.

King Wen of Wei once asked Bian Que: "All three of your brothers are skilled in medicine. Who's medicine is the best?"

Bian Que replied: "The eldest brother is the best, the second brother is worse, and I am the worst of the three."

The King of Wei asked inexplicably, "But your fame is the greatest."

Bian Que explained:

"The elder brother treated the disease before the onset of the disease. At that time, the patient hadn't found out that he was sick, and the elder brother prescribed medicine to eradicate the root cause of the disease. Therefore, his medical skills are difficult to be recognized, and he is not well-known, but is highly respected in our family.

"My second brother treated the disease in the early stage of the disease, when the symptoms were not very obvious, and the patient did not feel pain, and the second brother was able to cure the disease, which made the villagers think that the second brother was only a small ailment.

"I treat illnesses when the condition is very serious, the patient is in great pain, and the patient's family is anxious.

"At this time, they saw me puncture the meridians, bleed blood with a needle, or apply poison to the affected area to fight the poison, or perform a major operation to directly point at the lesion, so that the condition of the seriously ill patient can be relieved or cured quickly, so I am famous all over the world. "

The King of Wei was enlightened.

Bian Que (407-310 BC)

Throughout the five thousand years, in Chinese history, only "two and a half" people can be called saints.

One is Confucius, the other is Wang Yangming, and the "half" is Zeng Guofan.

Zeng Guofan was born in an ordinary peasant family in Xiangxiang County, Hunan Province. Later, he became the governor of Liangjiang, the governor of Zhili, and the scholar of Wuyingdian University in the Qing Dynasty. He was awarded the first-class Marquis of Yiyong.

Zeng Guofan's life counterattack is exactly the same as the phrase "there is no skill in everything".

Zeng Guofan's life can be divided into three stages:

The first stage is the literati career.

He studied at the age of 6, was a jinshi at the age of 27, and has always achieved a bachelor's degree. He was an academic leader at that time.

The second stage is the military career.

During the Taiping Rebellion Movement, the Hunan Army was formed and fought with the enemy for 13 years, but was stunned to pull back the Qing Dynasty on the edge of the cliff to continue its life.

The third stage is the introduction of Western scientific culture.

He organized the construction of China's first ship, established the first military engineering school, introduced the first batch of Western books, and sent out the first batch of students studying in the United States.

The two stages before and after are all a matter of literati, but how did a scholar defeat the Taiping army whose combat power exploded at that time, this is an interesting strategic study.

Those who do not understand the situation must think that Zeng Guofan is a strategist who is familiar with the art of war and resourceful. In fact, on the contrary, before he led the Hunan Army, he did not have much experience in leading troops to fight, nor did he understand how to use troops.

The reason why we can win is actually just six words - build a strong fortress and fight a dull battle.

Zeng Guofan never fought head-to-head with the enemy, and even when the odds of winning were high, he never took the initiative to attack. Instead, he camped outside the city wherever he went, and then dug trenches and built high walls to turn offense into defense. Put yourself in an invincible position first.

The Taiping Army was very brave and good at fighting, and always wanted to fight with the Hunan Army, but the Hunan Army just kept its position and did not move.

As long as there is time, the Hunan army will continue to dig trenches, one after another, until the city is blocked, grass and food are cut off, and when the city runs out of ammunition and food, it can be easily overcome.

In this way, one city after another, digging trenches bit by bit, and arching forward step by step, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was completely destroyed.

Every time the Hunan army hit a city, it didn't take a day or two, but a year or two, and most of the time was digging trenches. At that time, the Hunan army looked more like a construction team, which had been attacked by the Hunan army. In cities, such as Anqing, Jiujiang, etc., the landforms outside the city have been changed by the trenches dug in those years.

The Hunan Army and the Taiping Army fought for 13 years. Except for a few occasions such as the attack on Wuchang, there were more than 3,000 casualties. At other times, the war was almost always won with minimal casualties. Tough fortress, fight dumb battles.

"Sun Tzu's Art of War" says: "First, be invincible, and wait for the enemy to be victorious."

The so-called "build a strong fortress and fight a dull battle", in short, is to occupy an invincible position first, and then slowly gain a small advantage.

Zeng Guofan is a person who likes to use "stupid" methods. He doesn't like tricky things, and he doesn't believe in things that make a lot of money.

Because the fruit of victory never comes out by force, but when it is fully ripe, it falls on its own.

Meituan Wang Xing told reporters in an interview:

"Most people's understanding of war is wrong. War is not composed of hard work and sacrifice, but patience and suffering."

Whether it’s war, business, or personal level, the truth is the same. To get out of a difficult situation or to win, it is all about patience, not a sudden miracle.

Many times, you just need to do what you need to do step by step, and when the time comes, everything will change, but until then, you have to have enough patience.

Let me share with you a story that happened more than a hundred years ago.

Before December 1911, no one on earth had ever reached the South Pole, so this was what all the greatest explorers, all the most adventurous and dreaming people wanted to do a hundred years ago.

Finally two competing teams intend to accomplish this feat:

One is the Amundsen team from Norway and the other is the Scott team from the UK.

Their departure times were similar, but it turned out that the Amundsen team reached the South Pole first, on December 15, 1911, more than two months later, and planted the Norwegian flag.

Although Scott's team set off at the same time, they arrived more than a month late.

This is the difference between success and failure. As the first team in human history to reach the South Pole, the Amundsen team will go down in history forever and receive all the honors.

Roald Amundsen (1872-1928)

But the story is not so simple, because they not only have to go to the South Pole, but also go back alive.

After the Amundsen team reached the South Pole first, they returned to their original base smoothly.

And Scott's team arrived late, not only did not win the honor, but also because the weather on the way back was very bad, and finally the entire team survived.

Research on this matter may be helpful and enlightening for us to do things.

First of all, an expedition to Antarctica requires not only people, but also supplies. Afterwards, someone summarized and analyzed the strategies and preparations of the two teams, and we can see a very important difference.

Amundsen's team was very well prepared, they had three tons of supplies, while Scott's team only had one ton.

Is a ton of supplies enough? If you don't make any mistakes along the way, that's enough. But the reality is that people inevitably make a lot of mistakes.

And the Amundsen team left itself room for error.

In addition, the successful experience of the Amundsen team can be summed up in one sentence: no matter the weather is good or bad, keep moving forward 30 kilometers every day.

On the contrary, according to their logs, Scott's team is a more freewheeling team. The weather is good and they go very hard, maybe 50 kilometers or even 60 kilometers. But when the weather is bad, they rest in tents.

There are a few details to this story that are worth thinking about as well.

First, Scott's team used ponies to pull the sled, while Amundsen's team used huskies.

In contrast, horses walked faster at the beginning, but were not cold-resistant enough, and froze to death halfway; although huskies walked slowly, they could survive in very cold conditions, thus ensuring the speed of travel.

Second, the Amundsen team lived with the Eskimos for more than a year in order to explore the polar regions, just to learn from them how to live and survive in the ice and snow.

Third, the Amundsen team's plan was very thorough, and even special arrangements were made for lunch.

They used a newly designed thermos to pack hot meals in the thermos before heading out each day.

During lunch, the team members sat on the sleigh while enjoying the bizarre scenery of the polar regions, while eating hot rice in a thermos.

Someone later commented that Amundsen's success was due to good luck, and his answer was:

"The most important factor is how prepared you are for the expedition, you have to anticipate the difficulties that may arise, how to deal with them or how to avoid them. Success waits for those who are in order - people call this good luck.

"Failure is inevitable for those who can't foresee difficulties and respond in a timely manner - people call this bad luck."

Robert Falcon Scott (1868-1912)

Finally back to our previous question:

What is a real master? In a certain field, how to do to reach the realm of masters?

I replied with one of Lincoln's words: "I walk slowly, but I never back down."

No matter what the external environment is good or bad, no matter how good or bad luck is, don't blame anyone, just follow your own plan, move steadily and step by step.

Make a little progress every day, and when you look back at this time next year, you'll find that you've come a long way.

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