3.b 最好的工具——纸笔

Make Time Your Friend 3.b: The Best Tool: Pen and Paper

> By Li Xiaolai · 2008-05-18 · [Original (web archive)](https://web.archive.org/web/20111113112650/http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/428.html) (Chinese)
> Our translation from the Chinese original.

I call my "event-time log" my "time ledger"; in it I record the time spent on every important thing I did each day. As for its benefits, there is no longer much need to go on about them. However, forming such a seemingly simple recording habit is far from as simple as it looks.

In fact, forming any habit that isn't innate is something that can only be done through struggle. We have only one innate habit—"laziness." For everyone, laziness was once perfectly natural and right—everyone has to go through a longer or shorter period of "holding out your hands for clothes and opening your mouth for food" before they can grow up. During that time, everyone does as they please. However, no one can always "do as they please." The "doing as one pleases" that was once genuinely possible is nothing more than a reality in childhood, a fantasy in youth, an anguish in adulthood, and a despair in old age.

Western religion defines seven deadly sins, all so-called "original sins"—gluttony, greed, sloth, lust, pride, envy and wrath. They have appeared repeatedly in the Bible, in famous paintings, and as the subjects of sermons by medieval churchmen, especially famous. [Translator's note: the sentence 特别是著名 ("especially famous") breaks off in the original without saying what is especially famous; translated as written] At the end of the last century, these "original sins" also became the basis of one of the most successful and most representative psychological thrillers in film history, "Se7en," directed by David Fincher and starring Kevin Spacey, Brad Pitt and Fagen Freeman. [Translator's note: the original writes 费根•弗里曼 ("Fagen Freeman"); the actor in Se7en is Morgan Freeman; translated as written]

The ancient Chinese, on the other hand, took a more open-minded view, holding that "appetite for food and sex is human nature." The others—"greed," "pride," "envy" and "wrath"—if you dig into their roots, all ultimately come from one inherent flaw in human nature, one that it would not be going too far even to call an "original sin"—"laziness." I'd guess there is no one who isn't lazy. Some time ago I read a passage by Scott Parker and was shaken beyond measure. [Translator's note: the original writes 斯科特•帕克 ("Scott Parker"); the views given match those of the psychiatrist M. Scott Peck, but the original does not say so; the name is translated as written] He likewise held that "laziness" is the most ultimate "original sin." And his definition of "evil" was: "So-called evil is the most naked, shameless laziness." This reminded me of Thomas Sowell's comment; he said, "Those called unpardonably wicked people are not 'bad,' they're 'stupid'—their minds are simply unsound."

The opening of the mind begins with realizing that one can discipline oneself, and the process of the mind's development is the process of overcoming laziness. We often hear that "your most terrible enemy is yourself"; if this saying makes sense, that "most terrible enemy" should actually refer to "your uncontrollable laziness." Sun Wukong can take seventy-two transformations; laziness is more formidable than Sun Wukong and can take countless forms. It wears all kinds of masks, tempting you to abandon your friend, time.

Nearly twenty years ago, when I first started keeping a Li Ao–style "event log," what I ran into was exactly the same situation that many people have run into. I kept records for roughly a little over a month in a row, and used up only about one tenth of a thick notebook. About a year and a half later, while tidying my bookshelf, I suddenly found that black hardcover notebook and was aghast—"How could I have forgotten?" Then I looked at the date of the last entry and got goose bumps all over again—"What? More than a year!" I felt only that, apart from that one tenth, the rest, although not a single word had been written on it, recorded nothing but shame, page after page of it, and I wished I could throw it away at once.

A few years ago, I once successfully quit smoking—not the kind where you quit once every half hour; I went about half a year without smoking a single cigarette. And my method of quitting was rather fierce: all the cigarettes at home were left lying around just as before; I said I wouldn't smoke, and I didn't. Then suddenly one day—I remember I was sitting in front of the computer writing something—Windows' automatic update reminder said it needed to restart, so I clicked the "OK" button, and the computer restarted. [Translator's note: the original writes 重新启动以下 ("restart below"), a slip for 重新启动一下, "restart"; translated by the intended sense] But the "beep" from the motherboard's little speaker when the computer restarted gave me a fright—because a cigarette in my hand, lit long before, had already burned down to the butt and scorched my fingers…… "Good heavens, how could that be!"

Half a year ago, I was chatting with a colleague and told him that "we can use our brains to control our brains." He was greatly shaken at the time and said, "That makes so much sense; I really feel freed all at once." Two weeks ago, we had a meal together and chatted. In the middle of talking, he suddenly gave an awkward laugh and said, "That day, after I heard you say all that, I was really especially shaken. …But just now it suddenly occurred to me: how did I just completely forget? I'm still the same as before…… Sigh!"

I say over and over that "people are, more or less, empiricist animals." Perhaps everyone's misfortune is the same: the experience they have most of in their lives is "giving up halfway"—"giving up halfway" of every kind and in every respect. We have so many experiences of giving up halfway in our lives that wanting to give up "giving up halfway" is much, much harder than "persisting to the end and finally succeeding"—most people don't have even one experience of "persisting to the end and finally succeeding." When we resolve to change, "laziness" directs that "self-protection function of the brain" of ours—"forgetting"—to make us stop changing without our noticing.

The tools for fighting laziness, stopping forgetting and persisting in change are paper and pen. That day, looking at that black hardcover notebook and staring at the date of the last entry from more than a year earlier, I couldn't help sitting there dazed: it was precisely because I knew that "the tools for fighting laziness, stopping forgetting and persisting in change are paper and pen" that I had started recording. But now, how could I have forgotten even the recording itself! This left me rather crestfallen and endlessly annoyed with myself.

In the end I did find a solution. I ran to a stationery shop and bought lots of 3M sticky notes (Post-it), and even downloaded from the internet a free program called "3M Post-it Notes Lite." I stuck the important matters I needed to remind myself not to forget, especially the habits I had recently decided to form, everywhere, including on my computer desktop. But I found that this still wasn't enough: the slips torn off 3M sticky notes have glue on them and are very uncomfortable in your pocket. So I ran to a business-card shop and bought two boxes of blank business cards. That way I could write some important matters on these blank cards and carry them with me. During that period, there were several cards in my pocket with the same sentence written on them—"Don't forget to record your time spending every evening!"

It worked very well. It bore out the saying, "Problems are always complicated; solutions are always simple." I remember one of my primary school teachers often saying, "A good memory is not as good as a worn-out pen." More than ten years later I finally understood the deeper meaning of this saying; unfortunately, I have already forgotten that teacher's name. In any case, I ought to thank him at least a little.

Forming any new habit is not easy. How long does it take for it to truly become a habit, as natural as an innate one? My experience tells me it generally takes five years. Yes, five years. I have seen many books say that a habit can be formed in two weeks; I suppose maybe I'm just slow.

Recording your time spending every day can, on the one hand, cultivate your sense of achievement, and on the other hand keep you from forgiving yourself too easily. Every night before going to bed, looking at your notebook, if you find you did a lot of things today, you will certainly be very happy. As the days go by, you will feel more and more settled inside; even without leafing through it, just seeing the part of the notebook whose edges have turned slightly darker getting thicker and thicker will give you a great sense of achievement. But if you don't write things down and rely only on your unreliable memory, it's impossible to have this kind of solid feeling.

Conversely, if you open that notebook and find to your surprise that the date of the last page's entry is several days ago or even last month, you will feel panicky and guilty, and this feeling is the most solid motivation for you to go and do some "proper business." But, but, if you don't write things down and rely only on your unreliable memory, you will very easily forgive yourself and go on indulging yourself, letting time pass in vain without bringing you the slightest return. The deadliest result, and the one more likely to come from your not recording, is this: you simply don't feel you have any reason to reproach yourself—because you don't know what it is you have lost.

Giving up the habit of recording your daily money spending is easy, because you can always very easily find an excuse that seems very reasonable: "A thousand pieces of gold scattered will come back again," and of course you can also puff out your chest and add in front of this line something like "Heaven made my talents, and they must have their use." But once the habit of recording your daily time spending is formed, you will find it very hard to give up. Because, although "a thousand pieces of gold scattered" may indeed "come back again," you know for certain, and have to admit, that "time rushes by like flowing water; once it goes" it most truly and certainly "never returns"!

Such a habit can bring unimaginable benefits. In my blog of June 30, 2007, I recorded the following passage, which can show what exactly this habit has brought me:

> Recently, because of some things, I've been in low spirits and wasted quite a lot of time—because I've had no heart to do anything.
>
> I mentioned before that humanity's awkward predicament is this: while humanity as a whole has developed to an unprecedented height, each individual's mental growth has to start from zero—so many people never end up evolving into human beings in the true sense. And what is even more awkward is that even when you understand all the principles, sometimes you will still, in a moment of carelessness, be controlled by your own brain. [Translator's note: the original repeats 会 ("will") twice here, 还是会会; translated once]
>
> Very often, we are surprised to rediscover some important principles—simply because we had, temporarily or long ago, forgotten these principles completely—for all sorts of reasons. One of these reasons can be made clear with an analogy: it's as if a baffling thread that consumes an extreme amount of memory suddenly appeared on your computer and pushed CPU usage up to 100%, so your computer starts playing "dead" or really "dies"…… Unfortunately, our brains have no "Reset" button, and our lives have no Ghost recovery software. [Translator's note: the original writes 及其耗费内存 ("and its memory-consuming"), a slip for 极其耗费内存, "consuming an extreme amount of memory"; translated by the intended sense]
>
> Long ago, I made myself a "Reset" button. I have a notebook in which each page usually has just one sentence, such as:
>
> - Happiness is a skill.
> - You must not punish yourself for other people's mistakes.
> - Normal people all have selfish motives; slightly nobler people are merely able to control them and not turn them into action.
> - Getting angry is a waste of time.
> - Encourage others at all times.
> - ……

On some pages, below the sentence, some dates and some notes are recorded—that is, the times, reasons and results of my using that sentence to "Reset" my brain. (Incidentally, paper and pen are, very often, simply more reliable than a hard drive.)

Last night, I turned to this sentence: "Happiness is a skill." I suddenly realized that I had forgotten happiness for quite a long while. My brain had crashed.

Starting today, form the habit of recording your daily time spending. This is the first step; many other good habits of using time will form naturally because of it. If you are already used to recording that day's time spending every night before going to bed, then the next morning you will very naturally start planning the whole day's time in your head—if you don't believe it, just try it and see! [Translator's note: the original writes 记录以下当日的时间开销 ("record below that day's time spending"), a slip for 记录一下, "record"; translated by the intended sense]

You need not care at all about the way you record, either. You can use a neat list format, or you can write all over the page in every direction; you can sit at a desk and copy slowly with your fine fountain pen, or you can grab any old pencil and write it out in your own special "new running script" or "new cursive script"—as long as you really do record every day.

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