Forty, Still Confused
“They say at forty you are no longer confused. I am forty, and more confused than ever.”
The most openly reflective volume in the series: money published to the last yuan, a second escape south, and a man arguing with himself in public about whether any of it was worth it.
— About this volume —
He came back from the south before the New Year and turned forty. The old saying has it that at forty a man is no longer confused. He is forty, and more confused than ever — but the confusion has stopped frightening him, and that turns out to be an entirely different thing.
This is the most openly reflective volume in the series. He writes about money with unusual candour, publishing his actual earnings month by month — roughly ten thousand yuan in eight months from self-media, a personal record, and still a small one. He writes about the absurdity of consumerism, about why the elderly love giving advice, about low desire as a strategy rather than a virtue, and about whether any of this makes him happy.
The year is structured by solar terms again, but it breaks open in the middle: a second trip to Yunnan, then Guizhou, then home to the sea as always. The outside keeps intruding — heat, other people's opinions, the algorithms that decide which writing gets seen and which does not.
What holds the book together is a mind working in public. He argues with himself about whether he is wasting his life, about whether the sea is a home or merely the cheapest quiet place available to him, about what he owes anyone. “Every worry comes down to having no money,” he writes at one point, “and no way out of a life I don't like.” Then he goes for a walk and comes back less certain.
It is the book of a man who has stopped defending his choices and started simply living them — and who, on the evidence of these pages, still argues with them most mornings.
— Table of contents —
14 chapters, as they appear in the book.
— Highlights —
— Quotations —
English first, original Chinese beneath.
“The sea is different every day — that is physics. The sea is the same every day — that is philosophy, and eternity.”
我以前常说，大海每天都不一样，这是物理学的常识，但是大海每天又都一样，这是哲学上的永恒。
from the diary
“They say at forty you are no longer confused. I am forty, and more confused than ever. The good news: I no longer mind.”
都说四十不惑，我四十岁了，却比以往更困惑。好消息是，我不再害怕困惑。
Prologue · 序
“The sea is big enough, the sky is big enough. What is my little suffering in the long river of time?”
大海够不够大，蓝天够不够大，我的那点痛苦在时间的长河里算什么。
from the diary
“My own feelings come first, other people's second. Always second.”
我首先得考虑自己的感受，再去考虑别人的感受，别人的感受永远放在第二位。
from the diary
“This is my fourth year by the sea: my emptiness, my struggling, my resistance. I intend to win.”
这就是我在海边的第四年，我的虚无，我的挣扎，以及我的对抗，我想获得胜利。
Prologue · 序
“Every worry comes down to having no money, and no way out of a life I don't like.”
一切烦恼都是因为没钱，都是因为没办法改变自己不喜欢的生活。
from the diary
“An ordinary person can't do social media. You have to be a little unhinged.”
普通人是做不好自媒体的，你得有病才行。
from the diary