Controversy Project
Zeng Guofan's success has a lot to do with his ambition.
After entering the Hanlin Academy, Zeng Guofan was influenced by Yangming Xinxue, and was also determined to be a person of "inner saint and outer king", and devoted himself to cultivating himself, making rapid progress, and it only took 7 years to let himself grow from a seventh-grade ** to a second-grade member of the court.
Judging from Zeng Guofan's successful method, determination is actually the greatest desire in life, as long as you are good at using it, you can make a difference.
Many people fail in the pursuit of desire, Zeng Guofan pursues the greatest desire in life, why can he succeed?
There are two reasons that are worth learning and learning from:
The pursuit of desire is the most obvious difference between ordinary people and saints.
Ordinary people just stay in the pursuit of fame and fortune, for them, as long as they get benefits and gain fame, it is the most perfect ending.
Judging from Zeng Guofan's pursuit of desire, he is fundamentally different from ordinary people.
Zeng Guofan wants to be a person who is an "inner saint and outer king", which is actually a desire, but this is a great desire and a spiritual realm.
When a person has lofty ideals and a very big desire, he will get rid of the pursuit of fame and fortune.
Zeng Guofan is a person who aspires to be an "inner saint and outer king", he does not have too much concept of fame and fortune, even when he eliminated the Taiping army and made high achievements, he also put forward the idea of "subtracting a few points from fame and fortune".
Moreover, in the whole process of being an official, Zeng Guofan has never been benefited, even if he has power in the world, his life is very simple, and even poor.
When Zeng Guofan worked in the capital in his early years, even if he achieved the position of a second-class official, he often relied on usury to get by, until he became the governor of Liangjiang, Zeng Guofan's income increased, and he paid off the old debts.
It can be seen that Zeng Guofan's pursuit of desire is not to stay in fame and fortune, but a realm.
Many people have had the process of making a decision, but why can't most of them succeed? The biggest reason is that I don't think of aspiration as ability.
If you keep your ambition in your mouth, you will never succeed.
Judging from Zeng Guofan's method, there are at least two abilities required to aspire:
First, you need to have the ability to improve your own virtues. A person who is unwilling to improve his virtue, no matter how high his ambition is and how high his position is, the final result will be in ashes.
The way to Zeng Guofan's success is the practice of virtue, and he will reflect on it every day to correct his shortcomings in life.
The second is to have the ability to improve their knowledge. Zeng Guofan's whole life has been studying, in order to be a good **, he has to read at least 10 pages of history books every day, and over time, Zeng Guofan's knowledge has become richer and richer.
Judging from Zeng Guofan's successful methods, when a person has the greatest desire, fame and fortune are like floating dust in their eyes, and they are not worth mentioning. With ambition, we will naturally find ways to improve, and in this process, as long as we make good use of this desire in our hearts, success is a matter of time.
References: "The Complete Works of Zeng Guofan", "Annals of Zeng Guofan", "Qing Historical Manuscript", "Biography of Zeng Guofan", "Biography of Zeng Guofan", etc. (* is a picture, the picture comes from the Internet, if there is any infringement, please inform us to delete).