1. Sima Qian
Sima Guang has been studying hard and diligently since he was a child. He felt that his memory was not good enough and he was not as fast as others in memorizing new words in texts, so he said to himself: "Let me work hard." Come and enhance your memory!" So he tried to memorize the text more.
Others recite it twice or three times, but he has to recite it five or six times. In this case, time is not enough. After school, I have to find time to read. Especially in the evening, after playing for a while, he would read a book, and he read very late.
The next day, I have to get up early and do morning reading. Because he went to bed late at night, he often overslept and delayed his morning reading. "How can we solve this problem?" He wanted his mother to wake him up.
But his mother felt sorry for him and didn't want him to study so hard. One day, Sima Guang saw a log in the backyard and had an idea. He thought to himself: "There is a way!" Sima Guang wiped the log clean and put it on the bed as a pillow.
He was sleeping with his head on a log. When he turned over, the log rolled, waking him up. This way, he won't oversleep. One day, my mother found this log on the bed and was about to throw it away. Sima Guang said, "Mom, please don't throw it away. This is my warning pillow."
My mother listened to his explanation. He said movedly: "My child, it is a good thing to study hard, but don't tire your body out!" Sima Guang replied: "Don't worry, mother, my child is not a fool, and he will not tire out his body."
Sima Guang was a child who loved to play and sleep. For this reason, he was often punished by his teacher and ridiculed by his peers. Under his teacher's earnest instruction, he was determined to get rid of his bad habit of sleeping. In order to get up early, he drank some alcohol before going to bed. A belly full of water.
As a result, I was not woken up in the morning, but I wet the bed. So the clever Sima Guang made a warning pillow out of garden wood. When he turned over in the morning, his head fell on the bed and he woke up naturally. From then on, he got up early every day to study and persevered.
Finally became a great and knowledgeable writer. Due to his diligent study, Sima Guang had no books to read when he was 15 years old. When he grew up, he became a minister of the Song Dynasty and edited the famous chronicle "Zizhi Tongjian".
2. Li Shizhen
In the process of practicing medicine and reading classical medical books for decades, Li Shizhen discovered that there were many errors in ancient materia medica books, and was determined to re-compile a materia medica book. In the 31st year of Emperor Shizong's reign in the Ming Dynasty (1552), Li Shizhen began to compile the "Compendium of Materia Medica".
Based on "Zhenglei Materia Medica", more than 800 books were consulted. During this period, starting from the forty-fourth year of Jiajing (1565), he left home many times for inspections, traveling to Huguang, Jiangxi, Zhili visited many famous mountains and rivers and clarified many difficult problems.
In the process of compiling the "Compendium of Materia Medica", the biggest headache for Li Shizhen was that because of the mixed drug names, the shape and growth of the drugs were often unclear. Although the past herbal books have repeatedly explained it.
However, because some authors did not conduct in-depth actual investigation and research, but copied it from books, the more they explained, the more confused they became, and they were full of contradictions, making people confused. For example, the drug Polygala spp., Tao Hongjing, a famous medical scientist in the Southern and Northern Dynasties, said it was a small grass.
It resembles ephedra, but is green in color and has white flowers. However, Ma Zhi of the Song Dynasty thought it resembled Daqing and blamed Tao Hongjing for not knowing Polygala at all. Another example is the medicine Gouji. Some say it resembles wormwood, some say it resembles geobuckthorn, and some say it resembles guanzhong. The opinions are very inconsistent.
Inspired by his father, Li Shizhen realized that "reading thousands of books" is certainly necessary, but "traveling thousands of miles" is even more indispensable. Therefore, he not only "searched for Baishi" but also "interviewed all parties" to conduct in-depth actual investigations.
After 27 years of long-term efforts, the first draft of "Compendium of Materia Medica" was completed in the sixth year of Wanli Emperor Shenzong of the Ming Dynasty (1578), at the age of 61. Later, it was revised three times in 10 years, totaling 40 years.
3. Qi Baishi
Qi Baishi paints shrimps through a lifetime of observation, striving to deeply express the physical and spiritual characteristics of shrimps. Qi Baishi started painting shrimps when he was young. After the age of 40, he copied the shrimps painted by Ming and Qing painters such as Xu Wei and Li Futang.
At the age of 63, Qi Baishi's shrimp painting was very similar, but it was not "live" enough, so he raised a few long-armed shrimps in a bowl, placed them on the painting table, and observed them every day, and learned the method of painting shrimps. As a result, shrimp became one of Qi Baishi's representative artistic symbols.
4. Beethoven
Beethoven was a great German musician. He loved music since childhood, was open-minded and studious, and devoted himself to creation. He said: "My motto has always been: never stop writing; if I sometimes make the God of Art sleepy, it is just to make it more excited when it wakes up."
At the age of 30, he became deaf. Well, for musicians, this is a huge blow. But he never stopped writing. What the students are hearing now is a fragment of Beethoven's "Destiny" symphony, which expresses Beethoven's determination and courage to fight against his unfortunate fate to the end.
5. Wang Xizhi
Wang Xianzhi practiced calligraphy in 18 large pots. According to his father's request, Wang Xianzhi started with basic strokes and practiced hard for five years. Xianzhi's face was full of shame, and he felt that his writing skills were far behind.
He rushed into the study, studied ink every day, and studied hard. The smart Wang Xianzhi deeply realized that there is no shortcut in writing, only the word "diligence".