Youth shines through hardships; life is elevated through hard work.

Xi Jinping, Chinese President

“I don’t think about winning or losing during the competition. I just do my best, and the rewards come naturally,’’ Gu Ailing, freeskier from Chinese Olympic team, said in an interview.

When I had this interview with Gu in 2021, the young skier had just achieved record- breaking wins for two gold medals at the world championships in Aspen, US. But what impressed me most was how she treated her great achievements. While many people consider Gu talented, she believes she is just one of the many sports lovers, who with such pure passion, could overcome any obstacles or setbacks and enjoy doing what they love.

Her words struck a chord with me. As a young journalist covering the youth of today, I have written thousands of reports, digging up inspirational stories among Gen Zers who are born between 1995 and 2010. I also look tor different ways to make their stories known by more people, For example, I have made videos on hot topics while also writing articles.

My efforts have reaped fruits. On April 15, I was awarded as a national outstanding member of the Communist Youth League of China (CYLC).

I am so honored, but what makes me more thrilled is that some of my interviewees are also on the list. We are all exploring different career paths, but we share the same attitude toward our passions like Gu. This award, I believe, is for the spirit of Chinese young people.

For example, the awardees from the Sanxingdui Museum have a passion to bring the 3.000-year-old Sanxingdui relics back to life and reveal a magnificent civilization in history. In October 2021,1 went to the museum and interviewed two young restorers there. Through working with them I got to know that restoration is a long process, and they might repeat one single action carefully every day for several months. ”We are doing ordinary things and we just do our best, "said one of the restorers. This was how they saw their work.

I believe similar situations can be found in the story of every awardee. Just as the lyrics of the popular song Lonely Warrior go, “who said heroes can’t be ordinary souls?’’ We are all ordinary people doing our best for our passions, and together we can make extraordinary achievements.

I first saw a real durian (榴莲) in an Asian supermarket in Queens. That strange-looking fruit was big, heavy, and covered with sharp pricks (刺). I decided to buy one. The Chinese checkout girl carefully wrapped it thickly in a newspaper before putting it into a shopping bag.

On the train home, I cautiously opened the Chinese newspaper and lifted it out. Its strangeness made me think of kung fu, yoga and Taijiquan.

Upon arriving home, I dug out the biggest knife and cut through the tough prickly husk (壳). I tasted the pale-yellow flesh, delicious!

After that, durian was my favourite fruit. My skill at cutting durian open was improving. I showed the skill to my girlfriend.

A few years later, we moved to Taiwan. One day I noticed some durians had begun to open by themselves. The owner tried to get me to buy one but I shook my head, thinking it was far-gone. Instead I selected one whose outer husk wasn’t open.

The next morning I woke up to a strong durian smell. I found a small crack (裂缝) had appeared all on its own. I used the smallest pressure and tasted a more delicious durian. Suddenly, I realized something. I ha felt so satisfied with my own skill in opening the durian that I never thought about letting the durian open itself. The higher art was not in doing but in not doing — letting the thing happen on its own in the way it happens best.

Growth that Starts from Thinking

It seems to me a very difficult thing to put into words the beliefs we hold and what they make you do in your life. I think I was fortunate because I grew up in a family where there was a very deep religious（宗教的）feeling. I don’t think it was spoken of a great deal. It was more or less taken for granted that everybody held certain beliefs and needed certain enhancements of their own strength and that that came through your belief in God.

But as I grew older I questioned a great many of the things that I knew very well my grandmother who had brought me up had taken for granted. And I think I might have been a quite difficult person to live with if it hadn’t been for the fact that my husband once said it didn’t do you any harm to learn those things, so why not let your children learn them? When they grow up they’ll think things out for themselves.

And that gave me a feeling that perhaps that’s what we all must do—think out for ourselves what we could believe and how we could live by it. And so I came to the conclusion that you had to use this life to develop the very best that you could develop.

I don’t know whether I believe in a future life. I believe that all that you go through here must have some value, therefore there must be some reason. And there must be some “going on”. How exactly that happens I’ve never been able to decide. There is a future—that I’m sure of. But how, that I don’t know. And I came to feel that it didn’t really matter very much because whatever the future held you’d have to face it when you came to it, just as whatever life holds you have to face it exactly the same way. And the important thing was that you never let down doing the best that you were able to do—it might be poor because you might not have very much within you to give, or to help other people with, or to live your life with. But as long as you did the very best that you were able to do, then that was what you were put here to do and that was what you were accomplishing by being here.

And So I have tried to follow that out—and not to worry about the future or what was going to happen. I think I am pretty much of a fatalist（宿命论者）. You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give.