把时间当作朋友

Make Time Your Friend (table of contents)

> By Li Xiaolai · 2008-05-19 · [Original (web archive)](https://web.archive.org/web/20110903073925/http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/464.html) (Chinese)
> Our translation from the Chinese original.

This book was formally published by [Broadview (Publishing House of Electronics Industry)](http://blog.csdn.net/bvbook) (博文视点（电子工业出版社）) on June 1, 2009.

**Supplement**:

> On May 30, 2010, using the proofs of the book's third printing provided by Ms. Zhou Yun (周筠), I made a [PDF edition](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/9456).

［Image］

[Douban page](http://www.douban.com/subject/3609132/) | [Joyo](http://www.amazon.cn/mn/detailApp?prodid=bkbk906367) | [Dangdang](http://product.dangdang.com/product.aspx?product_id=20613821) [China-Pub](http://www.china-pub.com/192536)

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Note: the formally published edition added to and revised some of the content.

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"[Make Time Your Friend—Using the Mind to Gain Liberation](http://www.lixiaolai.com/archives/464)" (《把时间当作朋友——运用心智获得解放》) is a collection of roughly eighty or ninety articles that I began writing around February 2007. At the end of 2006 I submitted my resignation to the director of New Oriental's overseas test department, and only really left in August 2007. During that time I felt that from then on I might rarely have the chance to lecture again in a classroom with so many listeners (New Oriental's big classrooms are unique in the whole country)—unless one day I had a fit and went off to be a pastor (actually absolutely impossible, because I am basically a rather firm atheist). Six or seven years on the big lecture stage, tens of thousands of students, and I was deeply struck by one thing: **the great majority of success in learning has nothing at all to do with IQ; all failure has to do with, and only with, the limits of time**. So I couldn't help it—I just had to write out some simple principles, hoping more students would see them.

At the end of 2007, around October, Ms. Tian (田女士) of a certain publishing house proposed that this series could be collected and published. So I spent roughly two-plus months reorganizing it, adding and cutting some content. Writing articles is the work from which I myself benefit the most; during that time I changed endlessly and progressed immeasurably. In the end, because I had no time to write another companion volume I had originally agreed on with Ms. Tian, the publishing process was put on hold for the time being. But I still want to thank Ms. Tian and her publishing house; without her urging, these manuscripts might very well not exist now. The essence and the fun of life lie in "Who knows what happens next?"

[On May 18, 2008, my blog's database was accidentally damaged](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=4)—nearly 700-plus articles and more than 20,000 comments from three years vanished like smoke. My friend [Huo Ju](http://blog.devep.net/virushuo/) (霍炬) fiddled with it for a whole afternoon without any result—later he told me he felt quite guilty about it. This counts as a bad thing, yet it also counts as a good thing. The 700-plus articles—I never had time to reorganize them, and my laziness, deep in my bones, was indulged again and again on this matter; now that the database is broken, there's no longer any reason to keep being lazy, so I might as well take this chance to reorganize the earlier book manuscript and just publish it directly online.

There is a key word in this book—"rebirth." Now my blog adds this word too, so its new name is "Pure Pleasure – Reborn"—the subtitle is "Read, Observe, Think, Write, Share … Reborn, Adapt, and Evolve."

Excerpts

> ……The phrase "managing time," or "time management," is somewhat like those common oxymorons (Oxymoron) such as "an open secret," "quality education," "value investing"……Nobody can manage time—time is not under anybody's management.
>
> ……But when I suddenly realized that I could actually (and should in fact) control my own brain, I felt that I could, without even having to die, start over from the beginning—rather miraculous.
>
> ……Most effort is really nothing more than simple and seemingly dull repetition.
>
> ……Many people are afraid of thinking and often say, "Why think so much? Isn't that exhausting?" And then they live in the most exhausting way in the world without knowing it. The great philosopher Russell once observed this phenomenon, found it strange, and sighed, "Many people would rather die than think."
>
> ……These examples can clearly tell us how astonishingly large the difference in mental power between one person and another can be. What is even more frightening is that this difference is too hidden—because it is not at all the kind of obvious difference such as looks, figure or wealth. So this difference will either simply be ignored, or be denied in all sorts of ways.

Make Time Your Friend—Using the Mind to Gain Liberation

- ### Table of Contents

- [Preface](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=484)
- [0. Everyone's Predicament](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=421)
- ### Chapter 1: The Power of the Mind

- [1.a Understanding the Power of the Mind](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=422)
- [1.b Differences in Mental Power](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=423)
- ### Chapter 2:. Opening Up Your Own Mind

- [2.a The Starting Point](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=424)
- [2.b Controlling Your Own Brain](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=425)
- [2.c Controlling Your Own Emotions](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=463)
- [2.d Delaying Gratification](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=426)
- ### Chapter 3: How to Make Friends with Time

- [3.a Perceiving Time Precisely](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=427)
- [3.b The Best Tools—Paper and Pen](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=428)
- [3.c Start Recording Your Time Spending](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=429)
- [3.d Making a Time Budget](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=430)
- [3.e Auditing Your Time Spending](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=431)
- [3.f Using Lists to Reduce Mistakes](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=432)
- [3.g To Plan, or Not to Plan, That Is the Question](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=433)
- ### Chapter 4: Expanding Your Own Mind

- [4.a The Basic Ways of Acquiring Knowledge](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=434)
- [4.b Breaking Free of the Limits of Experience](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=435)
- [4.c On the Ability to Teach Yourself](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=436)
- [4.d Treating Teachers Correctly](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=437)
- [4.e Learning How to Take Exams](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=438)
- [4.f Learning How to Take Notes](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=439)
- ### Chapter 5: Beware of So-Called "Success Studies"

- [5.a Everyone Can Succeed—Only a Fool Would Believe It](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=440)
- [5.b The Definition of Success—The Core Flaw of "Success Studies"](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=441)
- [5.c The Methodological Flaw of Success Studies—A Case Analysis](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=442)
- [5.d Emphasizing Effort Is Laughable](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=443)
- [5.e The Most Time-Wasting Illusion—I Am Unique](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=444)
- [5.f Pay Attention to What Successful People Say](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=445)
- [5.g Don't Believe in "Luck," and Even Less in "Opportunity Knocks but Once"](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=446)
- [5.h Building Yourself Beats Building Connections](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=447)
- [5.i A Final Bit of Nagging About "Success Studies"](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=448)
- ### Chapter 6: More Thoughts

- [6.a On Efficiency](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=449)
- [6.b Slow Down the Pace of Your Life a Little](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=450)
- [6.c On Being Late](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=451)
- [6.d Increase Income and Cut Spending](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=452)
- [6.e Don't Waste Time "Proving Yourself"](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=453)
- [6.f The Most Time-Wasting Sentence Pattern: "If Only……!"](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=454)
- [6.g Stop Feeling Inferior](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=455)
- [6.h Time Is Not Necessarily Money.](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=456)
- [6.i Our Misunderstandings About Time and Money](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=457)
- ### Chapter 7: The Real Solution

- [7.a Everything Can Be Prepared for in Advance](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=458)
- [7.b The Benefits of Preparing in Advance](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=459)
- [7.c The Core Quality of Success—Patience](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=460)
- [7.d The Earlier You Wake Up, the Better](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=461)
- [Make Time Your Friend—Reader Comments](http://www.lixiaolai.com/?p=464)

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