Chapter 1: Human Nature Is Both Great And Despicable
Before you start reading or listening to this book, a friendly reminder! This book is about breaking illusions and cultivating immortality as a whole, so be prepared, because it will challenge your usual habitual cognition. If your immortal cultivation fate is poor, you fundamentally won’t understand what is being said and will get caught up in illusions and argue. Conversely, those with high comprehension for immortal cultivation will gain inspiration from it.
Friends who are watching this book, please do not blindly imitate the content in the book, because everyone’s circumstances and understanding are different, and it may not be suitable for everyone.
The most important point! If you cannot persevere through the first fifty chapters, then you can leave now, because as it challenges your cognition, many places will surely be very different from what you previously understood. Reading only a few chapters will not only be useless but harmful, so it’s better to leave early to avoid wasting your time.
If you are still prepared to continue reading after seeing the reminder, then I will first boast a real lie to open your eyes.
（ After my leg was injured and disabled, permanent screws and steel plates were put into my bones. Medical experts gave me a prognosis, saying that even with the best recovery, I would only be able to walk, and my leg could only bend to ninety degrees at most, no more. But I only took three years to recover completely, and I can run and jump. The book describes how I recovered.）
Alright, the boasting is done, let’s begin.
It is said that each person eats for themselves, and each person endures their own suffering.
Worldly people experience their own circumstances under their respective environments, producing their own cognitions.
These cognitions have interconnectedness but are not exactly the same.
Simply put, everyone lives in their own world.
This is also the root cause of what is called “everything is created by the mind,” what the mind manifests.
Let’s first talk about the origin of thought and consciousness. When humans are first born, they do not have self-thinking. Or rather, before the age of three, they have no thoughts. All their joys, anger, sorrows, and happiness operate purely on instinct, even defecation and urination are operated by instinct.
Gradually, through the education of their parents and becoming gradually familiar with this strange world, self-thinking consciousness, that is, thought and cognition, gradually emerged after the age of three.
From then on, humans began to control their own bodies, slowly controlling their actions, and some physiological states.
After the age of five, they began to stop wetting their pants and wearing diapers.
At this time, people begin to distinguish between family, friends, relatives, good and bad, right and wrong.
Of course, these were not brought with them before birth, but were instilled through acquired education.
Then, from this point, it is not difficult to see that the appearance of individual humans is not innate but acquired.
For example, if you were raised in the countryside, all your habits and cognitions would be formed in that environment, which would cultivate you into a country person’s way of thinking.
If you were raised in the city, you would develop a thinking pattern of city life.
Observant friends can check online reports about humans raised by wolves or monkeys. Apart from having a human appearance, everything else is determined by the environment they were in. Humans raised by wolves have the habits and thinking of wolves, and those raised by monkeys have the thinking and habits of monkeys.
In other words, humans are like a carrier. From infancy, whatever you instill in them, they will become.
I once had an experience raising pigs. For some reason, at a certain stage, the pigs I raised started to fight amongst themselves, with several bullying one.
I didn’t think much at the time, I just felt very angry because the bullied pigs were almost beaten to death, and they were worth thousands of yuan! Moreover, I had taken care of them and raised them with my own effort. If one or two died, I would have felt heartbroken.
They fought for three consecutive days, and the plot was the same every day, with a group bullying one.
After that, I separated the three bullied pigs into other pigsties, and the problem was resolved.
During this time, my maternal uncle’s eldest brother said something that left a deep impression on me. He said: “You have personality, and your pigs have personality too, huh? Other people raise pigs for a long time without fighting, but you’re only raising them for the first time and they’re fighting, and fighting so fiercely!”
（ In the Northeast, having personality means being very individualistic, or perhaps a bit rebellious.）
I thought about this sentence over and over. Why would pigs fight? Is it because they have emotions? Do they fight when they are angry?
So, if pigs can get angry and have emotions, does that mean pigs can think? Do they have their own consciousness?
Then, apart from external differences, if pigs can think and have emotions, what is the difference between pigs and humans?
They eat, drink, urinate, defecate, and sleep the same way, and experience joys, anger, sorrow, and happiness with the same ease and contentment.
If there is no difference between pigs and humans, does that mean pigs are humans with a different appearance?
What about monkeys? Horses? Apes, elephants, giraffes, cats, and dogs?
If we view the living beings in the world from this perspective, can I assume that they are merely different from humans in appearance and cognition, with no significant other differences?
What about flies and mosquitoes?
I feel like they are all the same.
I know some friends will say that flies and mosquitoes are pests, and so are rats, and so on.
If I say that our thinking this way is a very selfish act, I know many people will curse me, but it doesn’t matter.
I will continue with an analogy.
You know from childhood that bees are diligent and beneficial, right? Because they produce honey and spread pollen.
But have you ever considered that spreading pollen is passive? They are just collecting materials to make honey, and honey is their food.
You can say they are diligent, but if they weren’t diligent, wouldn’t they starve to death? Don’t you think so?
It’s like farmers. Many people praise farmers for their diligence and honesty. But do farmers want to be so diligent? If they weren’t diligent, wouldn’t they starve to death?
What is honesty? Is it being uneducated? Is it simply being foolishly kind that makes one honest?
Don’t they wish to live a life of abundance and be served, like those who are rich?
Don’t you think so?
Let’s talk about rats again. People say they are harmful, but if you look at the issue from a rat’s perspective, they are actually doing the same thing as bees, diligently going out to find food.
But why are they considered harmful? Because they infringe upon human interests, that is, food, and compete with humans for food, so humans define them as harmful.
If you steal vegetables in the city, people say you are immoral, not harmful. If you steal corn in the countryside, people say you are immoral, and won’t say you are harmful.
However, when it comes to other living beings, once they harm human interests, you will be identified as harmful.
Humans position themselves as advanced animals because they have mastered technology and tools.
Therefore, they evaluate other living beings as having a lower status than humans.
From a human perspective, there is nothing wrong with this.
Tigers eat rabbits, tigers eat sheep; humans consider this normal. But once a tiger eats a human, it becomes unacceptable to humans.
Let me clarify one point: I am also human, because I possess a human body and cognition. The reason I say these things is not out of sainthood, compassion, or anything else. I am merely discussing the matter as it is, viewing ourselves as humans from an objective angle.
Some people say humans are the most noble animals in the world, while others say humans are the most despicable beings in the world.
I do not deny either of these points. Just as cultivators say, humans are beings of both divine and demonic nature, coexisting with both good and evil.
So, allow me to ask, who defines the meaning of good? And who defines the meaning of evil? Is it not defined by humans themselves?
One who kills the good is evil, and one who kills the evil is good. In this second, you think of good things and you are a good existence. In the next second, you think of evil things and you are an evil existence.
When one intends to do good but ends up doing evil, and intends to do evil but ends up doing good, how can we distinguish? Do we still need to incorporate our own or empathetic thoughts and emotions before evaluating?
Therefore, from these matters, it is not difficult to see that humans are actually the most selfish beings in the world.
Because human thoughts are complex and humans share commonalities of good and evil, most humans, when considering distinctions or differentiating good from evil and right from wrong, will proceed from their own self-interest.
So, if you ask me, humans are both great and despicable.
What is great is that after feeding themselves, they will strive to create living space for other beings in the world.
What is despicable is that once their own interests are threatened, they will burn, kill, and plunder under the banner of justice.
