During my university years, we visited an elderly professor. We were young and full of enthusiasm, talking animatedly as if we knew everything. The professor listened with a smile, not participating in our conversations.
After our initial enthusiasm subsided, the professor suggested a test, which immediately piqued our interest. He asked, "If you were going to cut down trees on a mountain, and there were two trees in front of you, one thick and the other thin, which would you cut down?" Everyone immediately replied, "Of course, the thick one!" The professor smiled and said, "The thick one is just an ordinary poplar, while the thin one is a red pine. Now, which one would you cut down?" We thought about it, and since red pines are more valuable, we said, "Of course, we'd cut the red pine! Poplars aren't worth much!"
The professor, still smiling, looked at us and asked, "What if the poplar is straight, while the red pine..." "Which one would you cut down, the crooked and twisted ones?" We were a little confused, so we said, "If that's the case, we'd cut down the poplars. The red pines are all crooked and twisted; they're useless!" The old professor's eyes flickered, and we guessed he was going to add another condition. Sure enough, he said, "Although the poplars are straight, most of them are hollow in the middle because they've been around for so many years. In that case, which one would you cut down?"
Although we didn't understand what the old professor was up to, we still started from the condition he gave us and said, "Then we'd cut down the red pines. The poplars are all hollow; they're even less useful!" The old professor then asked, "But although the red pine isn't hollow, it's so twisted that it's very difficult to cut down. Which one would you cut down?" We decided not to consider what conclusion he was trying to reach and simply said, "We'd cut down the poplar. It's not very useful either, so of course we'd choose the easier one!" The old professor, without giving us a chance to catch our breath
, asked again, "But there's a bird's nest on the poplar, and several chicks are hiding inside. Which one would you cut down?" Finally, someone asked, "Professor, your questions keep changing, making us switch between cutting down poplars and red pines. Our choices keep changing as your conditions increase. What are you trying to tell us, what are you testing?" The old professor's smile faded, and he said, "Why doesn't anyone ask themselves why they're cutting down trees? Although my conditions keep changing, the final result depends on your initial motivation. If you want firewood, cut down the poplar; if you want to make handicrafts, cut down the red pine. Of course, you wouldn't go up the mountain to cut down trees for no reason!"
Hearing this, we all seemed to understand something, but we couldn't quite grasp it. The old professor looked at us and said, “Just now, I listened to you discuss world affairs at length, seemingly knowing everything. However, once you enter society, when faced with many challenges, you'll only focus on doing those things, often forgetting your original intentions amidst various variables, and thus frequently doing meaningless things. Only when a person has a goal and a purpose in mind will they not be misled by various conditions and phenomena, and will not stray from the right path. This is my test, and this is what I want to tell you!”
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