Full text of "Facing the Real World" by Lao Dongyan, a professor at Tsinghua University in China

1. Introduction

After hesitating for a long time, I still don't know where to start writing the summary for 2021.

For me, the past year has been peaceful, with less visible slander and less disappointment than I could have wished for. However, the depression in my heart has not dissipated, and at the same time, the sense of confusion is increasing day by day.

I remember reading a sentence in 2019, to the effect that 2019 was the worst year in the past ten years, and it will also be the best year in the next ten years. At the time, it was only teasing, but looking back now, it seems to have some insight into the opportunity.

Under the epidemic, it is finally difficult to maintain the good imagination of the years, because the days of war and chaos are almost only one step away from everyone. Not long ago, yet another city was under siege. Who can guarantee that what Wuhan and Xi'an experienced will not happen to us? Even if there is no siege, under the tide of economic downturn and unemployment and salary cuts, who knows what will be waiting for us ahead?

In a society full of positive energy discourse everywhere, the sense of uneasiness spreads rapidly throughout the society like a tide. Dominated by a sense of insecurity, the pursuit of freedom has often become the object of ridicule, while people are increasingly concentrating power, various controls in the name of security, and technological rule based on big data tracking. Take an indifferent or even welcome attitude.

In 2020, my indignation and lamentation mainly revolve around my own experience, trying to fully accept the middle-aged mentality that came unexpectedly; after all, many of us will enter middle age sooner or later, From physiology to psychology. In 2021, I seem to be more aware of the changes around me, and I am forced to go through a process of re-understanding the world and many things around me.

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