Adjusting focus: There is an indispensable methodology. 调整焦点：有一种不可或缺的方法。

13273792437 seven years 124 2025年10月15日

Sometimes, we need to learn how to switch modes, while at other times, we need to learn how to shift focus. When a new phenomenon occurs or a new trend emerges, the majority of people’s mindset is typically: Wow! This thing is amazing! How can I make use of it?
有时，我们需要学习如何切换模式，而在其他时候，我们需要学习如何转移焦点。当新现象发生或新趋势出现时，大多数人的心态通常是：哇！这东西太神奇了！我怎样才能使用它？

For example, in the past few years, the WeChat public platform has created a new trend, a new force, and many people have grown along with it. However, why are the people who can grow with the trend always so few? Generally speaking, when faced with this fact, most people explain it by saying: they are lucky, they caught the wave. In fact, the majority of these lucky individuals also feel and think this way: it’s just pure luck, who would have thought this would happen to me?
比如这几年，微信公众平台创造了一股新潮流、一股新力量，很多人也随之成长。然而，为什么能顺势成长的人总是那么少呢？一般来说，面对这个事实，大多数人的解释是：他们很幸运，他们赶上了浪潮。事实上，这些幸运的人中的大多数也有这种感觉和想法：这只是纯粹的运气，谁会想到这会发生在我身上？

Most people do not have such good luck. When a major trend emerges, the vast majority of people, even if they rack their brains, cannot figure out how to make use of that trend to their advantage.
大多数人都没有这么好的运气。当一个主要趋势出现时，绝大多数人，即使他们绞尽脑汁，也无法弄清楚如何利用这一趋势来发挥自己的优势。

Suppose during the rise of the WeChat public platform (2013-2015), I was still a TOEFL training teacher (in fact, I left that industry several years ago). I would have wondered how I could use the WeChat public account to increase my personal enrollment. I would have begun researching various WeChat promotional methods, only to find that most methods were not suitable for me as a TOEFL training teacher… For example, sharing messages like “Forward immediately to prevent friends from being deceived,” might seem effective, but it would likely not lead to conversions for me. Similarly, creating large WeChat groups might seem suitable, but I would soon discover that teaching complex content through voice messages without a whiteboard or live videos is not very effective. Even if I found a promising tool like “Red Dot”, it might not support live video streaming… In short, nothing seemed to work. Watching those lucky individuals surge forward with the trend while feeling stuck myself, I would conclude that this was not suitable for me – of course, other similar but different conclusions could also be drawn, such as “Sigh, I am too old, I can’t understand what young people are doing…”
假设在微信公众平台兴起期间（2013-2015），我还是一名托福培训老师（事实上，我几年前就离开了这个行业）。我想知道如何使用微信公众号来增加我的个人注册人数。我本来会开始研究各种微信推广方式，却发现大多数方法都不适合我这个托福培训老师……例如，分享诸如“立即转发以防止朋友被欺骗”之类的消息可能看起来很有效，但对我来说可能不会带来转化。同样，创建大型微信群似乎很合适，但我很快就会发现，在没有白板或实时视频的情况下通过语音消息教授复杂的内容并不是很有效。即使我找到了像“红点”这样有前途的工具，它也可能不支持实时视频流……简而言之，似乎没有任何效果。看着那些幸运儿顺势而为，同时又觉得自己被困住了，我会得出结论，这并不适合我——当然，也可以得出其他类似但不同的结论，比如“唉，我太老了，我不明白年轻人在做什么……”

However, during the rise of the WeChat public platform, I was no longer a TOEFL training teacher but resting, studying, and occasionally investing in seed-stage or angel-stage entrepreneurial projects… Therefore, although I witnessed the rise of the WeChat public platform, I did not have the same concerns as described above – I just felt it was temporarily not very relevant to me.
然而，在微信公众平台兴起的过程中，我不再是托福培训老师，而是休息、学习，偶尔投资种子期或天使期创业项目……因此，虽然我目睹了微信公众平台的兴起，但我并没有像上面描述的那样的担忧——我只是觉得它暂时与我不太相关。

By the end of 2014, I started telling my friends that in a little while, “WeChat entrepreneurship” would be no different from “Internet entrepreneurship” that we used to talk about years ago, and it might be even more powerful, but few people believed me. By mid-2015, there were occasional expressions of disdain in the WeChat moments, “Nowadays, young people think they are entrepreneurs just by opening a WeChat public account!” I found this evaluation quite superficial. However, from another perspective, the appearance of such superficial evaluations made me feel that the tide was really beginning to have an impact. In a sense, Jack Ma’s summary was very accurate:
到了2014年底，我开始跟朋友说，再过一会儿，“微信创业”就和我们多年前说的“互联网创业”没什么区别了，甚至可能更强大，但很少有人相信我。到2015年年中，微信中偶尔有人表示不屑，“现在的年轻人只要开一个微信公众号就认为自己是创业者！我发现这个评价很肤浅。然而，从另一个角度来看，这种肤浅的评价的出现，让我觉得潮流真的开始产生影响了。从某种意义上说，Jack 马的总结非常准确：

Many people lose because they fail to see, respect, understand or catch up with emerging trends…
许多人失败是因为他们没有看到、尊重、理解或赶上新兴趋势……

When a sufficient number of people look down on a behavior pattern resulting from a new trend, it is usually when that trend is about to gain momentum.
当有足够多的人看不起由新趋势产生的行为模式时，通常是该趋势即将获得动力的时候。

So, I started thinking. At such times, I always have to use a tried and tested methodology, shift focus:
于是，我开始思考。在这种时候，我总是不得不使用一种久经考验的方法，转移焦点：

Not to ask oneself, how can this trend be used for my benefit? Instead, ask oneself, what is the most cost-effective thing to do within this trend?
不要问自己，如何利用这种趋势为我谋取利益？相反，问问自己，在这种趋势中，最划算的事情是什么？

The difference between these two questions is…
这两个问题的区别在于……

The focus of the first question is on oneself, and then start thinking. The result of this train of thought is often that almost all trends actually have nothing to do with me…
第一个问题的重点是自己，然后开始思考。这种思路的结果往往是，几乎所有的趋势实际上都与我无关……

By focusing on the trend itself and then considering, the result of the thought process is often the same: must cross boundaries – the things I am currently doing often have no relationship with the trend and are not suitable to coexist with the trend. When a trend appears, there are always certain things that are more suitable for “taking advantage of the situation” than others, in the event that those specific things happen to be what I am currently doing, or what I am best at, that is truly lucky. But this kind of luck has never happened to me…
通过关注趋势本身，然后去思考，思维过程的结果往往是一样的：必须跨越界限——我现在正在做的事情往往与趋势无关，不适合与趋势共存。当趋势出现时，总有一些事情比其他事情更适合“趁势而为”，如果这些具体的事情恰好是我目前正在做的事情，或者我最擅长的，那真是幸运。但这种运气从未发生在我身上……

The problem is, there are other people, probably a very few, like me, who have a way and the ability to make themselves lucky enough – it comes from us having a different operating system:
问题是，还有其他人，可能只有极少数人，像我一样，有办法和能力让自己足够幸运——这来自于我们有不同的操作系统：

  • We constantly upgrade concepts and methodologies
    我们不断升级概念和方法
  • We multitask 我们同时处理多项任务
  • We switch different modes in different situations
    我们在不同的情况下切换不同的模式
  • We also transition different focuses at different times…
    我们还在不同的时间转换不同的焦点……

We are the kind of people who are diligent in thinking deeply, and more importantly, we are practitioners. When we think of something, we need to understand it clearly; once we grasp it, we start taking action, continuing to think during the actions, constantly adjusting during the actions, getting more inspiration during the actions, and actively creating various good luck during the actions… This is what is called “making proactive choices”.
我们是那种勤奋深入思考的人，更重要的是，我们是实践者。当我们想到某件事时，我们需要清楚地了解它;一旦掌握了它，我们就开始行动起来，在行动中继续思考，在行动中不断调整，在行动中获得更多的灵感，在行动中积极创造各种好运……这就是所谓的“做出主动选择”。

In August 2015, I started writing articles on a public account. I think I surprised some people around me again – more than one person told me, “You’re really something, you post long articles every day…”
2015年8月，我开始在公众号上写文章。我想我又让我周围的一些人感到惊讶——不止一个人告诉我，“你真是个东西，你每天都发长篇文章……”

But on the other hand, I think if I didn’t do this, wouldn’t that be abnormal? Haven’t we always been like this in our work? Since I’ve started, it means I’ve thought deeply before, so once I start, I must give it my all!
但另一方面，我想如果我不这样做，那不是不正常吗？我们在工作中不是一直都是这样吗？既然我开始了，就意味着我之前已经深入思考过了，所以一旦开始，我就必须全力以赴！

There are several reasons why I jumped in and started writing myself:
我跳进去开始自己写作有几个原因：

  • I want to know every detail of this ecosystem. If I don’t jump in and only watch others do it, everything would seem shallow to me…
    我想知道这个生态系统的每一个细节。如果我不跳进去，只看别人做，一切都会在我看来很肤浅……
  • I’ve always known the importance of a personal brand, so even though I started late in this matter (due to a period of rest), I still need a channel for information dissemination. Since WeChat public platform has become a trend, I shouldn’t let it leave me behind.
    我一直都知道个人品牌的重要性，所以即使我在这件事上起步较晚（由于一段时间的休息），我仍然需要一个信息传播的渠道。既然微信公众平台已经成为一种趋势，我就不应该让它把我抛在后面。
  • I want to verify a hypothesis. In the absence of “early initial dividends,” what kind of IP can still quickly gain traffic? My guess is: those unique contents – the ones that carry the unique imprint of the author, the ones that readers can tell who wrote it at a glance, the ones that natural pullers would take away but still carry the unique imprint of the author – on this point, I am lucky enough because I happen to know how to produce such content…
    我想验证一个假设。在没有“早期初始红利”的情况下，什么样的IP还能快速获得流量？我的猜测是：那些独特的内容——那些带有作者独特印记的内容，那些读者一眼就能分辨出是谁写的，那些自然拉扯者会带走但仍然带有作者独特印记的内容——在这一点上，我很幸运，因为我碰巧知道如何制作这样的内容……

I think if I can accumulate enough traffic in the short term, then I definitely have a way, or encounter an opportunity, to produce something completely different.
我想如果我能在短期内积累足够的流量，那么我肯定有办法，或者遇到机会，生产出完全不同的东西。

In early September, after opening for half a month, there were only 2,000 subscriptions; early October, 7,000; early November, over 40,000; by the end of December, over 80,000; during the Spring Festival, over 130,000… Of course, during this process, I want to sincerely thank every friend who recommended my public account. Thank you, Finance Gossip Girl, Yah Jun, Huo Chui, Feng Dahui, Zhang Hui, Peng Ying, Luo Zhenyu, as well as many friends who occasionally reposted my articles…
9月初，开盘半个月后，只有2000人订阅;10月初，7,000人;11月初，超过40,000;截至12月底，超过80,000人;春节期间，超过13万人次…当然，在这个过程中，我要衷心感谢每一位推荐我公众号的朋友。谢谢财经绯闻女郎、叶军、霍翠、冯大慧、张辉、彭英、罗振宇，还有许多偶尔转发我文章的朋友……

Indeed, in this process, many thoughts previously in a vague state began to clarify, many nodes previously unconnected in the mind began to collide, many thoughts from yesterday had already started to ferment today, and many people who were originally impossible to know (especially the appropriate ones) seemed to have “popped up” suddenly from all directions…
的确，在这个过程中，很多之前处于模糊状态的念头开始理清，很多以前在脑海中没有联系的节点开始碰撞，很多昨天的念头今天已经开始发酵，很多原本不可能认识的人（尤其是合适的人）似乎突然从四面八方“冒”了出来……

I started to seriously consider a concept: “IP Multidimensionality”. An IP with only one dimension cannot have sufficient commercial potential and ultimately becomes a slave to “advertising to make a little money” – this is almost the most hopeless business model. Good IP has always been moldable into multiple dimensions, it’s nothing new. Compared to the popular film “Inception”, the “Star Wars” IP has more potential, because the latter has long been a multidimensional IP; the market for action figures alone is huge and enduring, in the past, present, and future; while the former is not impossible to be multidimensional, it is clearly at a significant disadvantage in comparison.
我开始认真考虑一个概念：“知识产权多维性”。一个只有一维的IP不可能有足够的商业潜力，最终成为“广告赚点小钱”的奴隶——这几乎是最无望的商业模式。好的IP从来都是可以塑造成多维度的，这并不是什么新鲜事。相较于热门电影《盗梦空间》，《星球大战》IP的潜力更大，因为后者早已是多维IP;在过去、现在和未来，仅动作人物的市场就是巨大而持久的;虽然前者并非不可能是多维的，但相比之下，它显然处于明显的劣势。

By November, I had figured out most of it. Then, further action began and I created several Alipay funding groups… I’m still thinking and continuing to act. By December, I had confirmed that I had made an innovation that didn’t look very new (because I am, after all, a “patchwork expert”), but is somewhat disruptive at its core – at least, “a paid community of shared creation books”, is a completely new form.
到11月，我已经弄清楚了大部分。然后，进一步的行动开始了，我创建了几个支付宝资助小组……我还在思考，继续行动。到 12 月，我已经确认我做了一个看起来不是很新的创新（因为我毕竟是一个“拼凑专家”），但其核心有点颠覆性——至少，“共享创作书籍的付费社区”，是一种全新的形式。

Speaking of which, changing focus is the starting point of the whole journey. In fact, this is the fundamental reason why I couldn’t be a TOEFL training teacher many years later. Whenever I realize that there is a certain trend and ponder deeply on it, the conclusion is always the same: I need to leave, I need to exist. In reality, applying Cui Jian’s lyrics here: I want to leave, I want to exist, I want to start from scratch after death… I know that old Cui is expressing something else, but those lyrics actually fit here. When we focus on the existing trend and delve into it, the desire to leave becomes very strong, the desire to exist in the new world becomes indomitable, since there is a chance to start over, going through death again for incarnations like us is just something we are already used to and have already adapted to.
说到这里，改变焦点是整个旅程的起点。事实上，这也是我多年后无法成为托福培训老师的根本原因。每当我意识到有某种趋势并深入思考它时，结论总是一样的：我需要离开，我需要存在。现实中，套用崔健的歌词在这里：我想离开，我要存在，我要死后从头开始……我知道老崔在表达别的东西，但这些歌词其实很适合这里。当我们专注于现有趋势并深入研究它时，离开的欲望变得非常强烈，存在于新世界的欲望变得不屈不挠，因为有机会重新开始，对于像我们这样的化身来说，再次经历死亡只是我们已经习惯并且已经适应的事情。

But, isn’t “going with the flow” always a derogatory term?
但是，“顺其自然”不总是一个贬义词吗？
This is just a matter of frequency. Real trends seldom occur frequently, especially for individuals, the number of trends they can perceive is even fewer. It’s like in the stock market, some people are “day traders”, who want to trade many times a day; some are weekly traders, some are monthly traders, and some are yearly traders… everybody’s attributes are different. If I had to be classified, I would basically be a “seven-year trader”… over the years, I have encountered only a few situations where I felt “the trend has come” and where I knew where I was going.
这只是一个频率问题。真正的趋势很少经常发生，尤其是对于个人来说，他们能感知到的趋势数量就更少了。这就像在股票市场中，有些人是“日内交易者”，他们一天想交易很多次;有些是周交易者，有些是月度交易者，有些是年度交易者……每个人的属性都不同。如果非要归类的话，我基本上就是一个“七年交易员”……这些年来，我只遇到过少数情况，我觉得“趋势来了”，我知道我要去哪里。

Well, changing focus is a sharp methodological tool like that. In fact, I’ve had a public course on changing focus before: it’s not about convincing others with reason, but convincing yourself. In reality, choosing to live in the future rather than the present, when studying new things, you should focus on the advantages rather than the disadvantages, and so on, are all important applications of the methodological tool of changing focus. Upon closer observation, you’ll realize that when people comment “someone’s perspective is different”, essentially they are referring to the fact that person’s focus is different.
好吧，改变焦点就是这样一种敏锐的方法论工具。事实上，我以前上过一门关于改变焦点的公开课程：这不是用理性说服别人，而是说服自己。在现实中，选择活在未来而不是活在当下，在研究新事物时，应该关注优点而不是缺点，等等，都是变焦方法论工具的重要应用。仔细观察后，你会发现，当人们评论“某人的观点不同”时，他们本质上是在指这个人的关注点不同。

This is a good example to explain how “plain and precise descriptions bring clear and accurate understanding”. “Perspective” is a concept that is hard to define, so it’s not easily understood; “different focus” is a plainer and more accurate description, so it’s relatively clear to understand.
这是一个很好的例子，可以解释“简单而精确的描述如何带来清晰准确的理解”。“透视”是一个难以定义的概念，因此不容易理解;“不同的焦点”是一个更简单、更准确的描述，所以理解起来比较清楚。

Take the methodology of confidence, for example, it’s like this: we should be more confident in our future, based on the premise that in the past, present, and future, we are all struggling to make progress.
以信心的方法论为例，它是这样的：我们应该对自己的未来更有信心，前提是在过去、现在和未来，我们都在努力进步。

In other words, when it comes to confidence, our focus is more on our future rather than, or not just, our past or present.
換句話說，當談到信心時，我們的關注更多的是我們的未來，而不是或不僅僅是我們的過去或現在。

For example, when we focus on the future, should we pay more attention to our own future?
例如，当我们着眼于未来时，我们是否应该更加关注自己的未来？
Or
Should we focus more on the future of this world?
我们是否应该更多地关注这个世界的未来？
These are two different points of focus. Since childhood, we have been forced to write “My Ideal” countless times without anyone reminding us that there are at least two points of focus: ourselves and the world.
这是两个不同的焦点。从小，我们就被逼着无数次写下《我的理想》，却没有人提醒我们，至少有两个焦点：我们自己和世界。

If the focus is on oneself and one believes that it “should naturally only be on oneself,” without considering that the focus could be on the world, then everything is a mirage, essentially grounded in baseless imagination. From this perspective, most people have never really had ideals, only imaginations. What they have longed for is actually just a meaningless illusion.
如果把焦点放在自己身上，并且认为它“自然应该只放在自己身上”，而不考虑焦点可以放在世界上，那么一切都是海市蜃楼，本质上是建立在毫无根据的想象之上的。从这个角度来看，大多数人从未真正有过理想，只有想象。他们所渴望的，其实只是一个毫无意义的幻想。

In life, when discussing the future of this world, the most common response is: “Stop thinking about that useless stuff, focus on yourself first!”
在生活中，在讨论这个世界的未来时，最常见的反应是：“别再想那些没用的东西了，先关注自己！

This seemingly reasonable advice has actually been tormenting people, and will continue to do so for life. The world is changing, and if so-called “ideals” remain unchanged, they will be eliminated. Then, why complain? Ironically, they complain perpetually. Ultimately, it comes down to personal choice. (They had it come.)
这个看似合理的建议，其实一直在折磨着人们，而且会持续一辈子。世界在变化，如果所谓的“理想”保持不变，它们就会被淘汰。那么，为什么要抱怨呢？具有讽刺意味的是，他们一直在抱怨。归根结底，这取决于个人选择。（他们来了。

In my opinion, we should not only prioritize focusing on the future of this world, but also live in the future rather than the present. Why are we so confident that we can live in the future? The reason is simple yet clear: we are people who have mastered methodology. Once we have researched and contemplated, and discovered an upcoming trend that belongs to the future, we have already adjusted our focus:
在我看来，我们不仅要着眼于这个世界的未来，更应该活在未来而不是现在。为什么我们如此自信地认为自己可以活在未来？原因很简单，但很清楚：我们是掌握了方法论的人。一旦我们进行了研究和思考，并发现了属于未来的即将到来的趋势，我们已经调整了我们的重点：
Instead of asking ourselves, “How can I use this trend to my advantage?”
而不是问自己，“我怎样才能利用这种趋势来发挥我的优势？
We ask ourselves, “What is the most beneficial thing for me to do in this trend?”
我们问自己，“在这种趋势中，我最有益的事情是什么？

People’s average life expectancy is increasing — I believe that in a longer life (spanning several generations), everyone actually has the opportunity to achieve something significant. If they don’t, they shouldn’t blame others.
人们的平均预期寿命正在增加——我相信，在更长的寿命（跨越几代人）中，每个人都有机会取得重大成就。如果他们不这样做，他们就不应该责怪别人。

Originally posted 2024-04-06 08:56:38.

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