I want to describe my mood using a line from “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”: “Surrounded by a desolate sorrow.”
Recently, my actual work output has been minimal, with most of my time spent familiarizing myself with the business. Unsurprisingly, the technology used in the job isn’t beyond imagination, so I can confidently believe I’m still at a passing level. However, the business is quite complex and not very friendly to those without experience. The online trading system and the production database fields truly correspond to specific business processes and operations. Developing in ignorance may be gratifying, but once it goes live, it’s a disaster.
Experienced programmers work meticulously and cautiously, which indeed taught me a lesson. At school, people asked me questions that I found simple, and I solved them straightforwardly. Now, in the workplace, I’m the one being solved. I used to wonder about my classmates’ technical skills. Are my skills really better than theirs? If so, in what ways? Do I have a core competitive advantage? The answers to these questions mostly revolve around “experience.” Experience cannot be quickly acquired—my classmates can’t do it, and neither can I.
My experience comes from hobbies and habits, perhaps just by chance, having early exposure to the internet. Wang Yin once mentioned the issue of experience and insight, which is profound and thought-provoking. I don’t have so-called insight, and insight, like learning ability and comprehension, is a reflection of a person’s overall quality and cannot be easily acquired. Without sufficient experience, how can one see through appearances to the essence? Guo Degang aptly said that what makes people grow is not time but experiences. It can be understood that time fosters experience, and experiences foster insight.
An incident brought me some reflection. I took a few days off, but there was a ticket for testing that was not completed. When I said I would be away for a few days, a colleague in testing asked why I was leaving. I said I’d be back in a few days, and he said, “I don’t care about that; I care about how my ticket will be tested.” It’s not that his words were hurtful—we barely knew each other, and our relationship was purely work-related, which I understood. What I cared about was his ability to directly express his needs, a skill that requires both ability and courage.
The conversation lasted only a few seconds, and being able to quickly organize language to clearly describe one’s thoughts is a skill I currently lack. The courage aspect refers to how such directness slightly deviates from typical Chinese conduct, which traditionally includes politeness, saving face, insinuations, and hidden meanings.
Seeing people flaunt their jobs and starting salaries on social media is quite annoying. However, for now, I have no urge to seek new opportunities. A harmonious work environment, not overly stressful work, and growth opportunities in business needs are enough to satisfy me, except for the salary. A former teacher’s motto was that growth is more important than achievements. This isn’t absolute but makes sense. For someone just starting their career, having the ability to earn money is more important than how much they can earn, as ability can continually convert to money, while temporary money cannot ensure continuous growth in ability.
996 is a choice. Logic Thinking once had a view that when the brain is idle, it involuntarily considers various interpersonal relationships. Hence, some phenomena can be explained this way: smart people are often easily angered and have low emotional intelligence because they spend much of their time on purpose-driven issues, leaving little idle time for interpersonal considerations. A certain top internet company promotes meditation activities—just sitting there doing nothing—where the brain, although without clear thoughts, will wander about who treats me how and vice versa. This could be an activity inherently needed by humans, derived from cultivating good karma.
I jokingly told my classmate that my company practices 996. My classmate asked, “Really? Your company is 996?” I could sense his joy even before he spoke, as he found a job in a third-tier city with a low salary, but after expenses, his savings were about the same as mine. Ignoring the amount of social insurance and housing fund, the quality of life, social circle, and vision, and the aforementioned growth opportunities are what I care about. I suddenly felt disgusted by simple salary comparisons. Stop speculating my situation with such a “petty” mindset. We have different needs and ideals. I am interested in exploring a certain world personally; how could a sparrow know the ambition of a phoenix?
Many years ago, people studied hard to get into better schools for better educational resources and to meet more “high-end talents.” Today, because of the internet, distances in various dimensions are no longer far. Many of the information you want can be obtained through the internet, not just book knowledge, but also long-term experience in certain fields and unique insights into some issues.
Therefore, I can trust my own decisions more than those of my parents or other elders. Compared to them, although I lack age and life experience, I can continuously obtain various information through the internet, which might make my decisions more accurate.
Of course, not everyone who can go online can effectively use the internet to obtain information. It’s essential to search, filter, analyze, and deduce the information you want from a vast information network.