During our table talk section, we discussed about “Toastmasters and me”. Last month, decisively, the first time I stepped into this room with a invention from Bernice, my heart was beating like a motor engine, “They would have heard some noises”, I thought. Remembering the past old stories, it was hard for me to face such challenges. Through the ages, everything has changed.

Back to the year of 2016, waves of startups were raised, everyone was talking about “start a business”, “mobile internet”, or “online to offline”. When I finally graduated from the college, I pushed myself into the career life of being a software developer in a startup company, with no hesitation and regret.

Early days were exciting. As a fresh engineer with thin knowledge of programming, theories and skills were practiced in face of the growing business, experience accumulated by the proletarians struggling in the tiny office. “I raised a new business by my own hand” I thought, dreamed of becoming successful. “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty in their dreams.”, I repeated.

However, happy moments are short. Several months after I joint the company, the business ran into a big trouble. Our service can hardly be kept improved, customers tend not to trust us. Three times, I survived from downsizing of the business. Feeling everything seems to be meaningless, with deep nervous for the future.

But why? The business fell into trouble because it deserves, while I do not think I should be blamed. I had tried my best to work even harder, but it came out to be no use. Everything had changed, there was no one still discussing about “online to offline” nor “mobile internet”, they were talking about “winter is coming”.

Poverty gives rise to a desire for change, everything is changing, but leaving the “change” itself unchanged. Specialization and deeply dive into specific domain maximums the efficiency, it also becomes a chain which blocks us from surviving in the fast-changing world.

The reason is: The modern world is constructed from a set of widely believed consensus, and specialization is one of the critical part. Specialization gives great advantages to face the challenge of greatly increased complexity. However, the other side of a complexity is hardly can anyone have a full sense of the entire system based on what he is focusing on. Transferring from one specific vertical domain to another is difficult, “experts” must learn the knowledge and gain the skills required by the new business, the old experience can do little help for the new challenges, everything should be grown from the ground up.

Is there any way to help facing this difficulty? The answer is: yes.

In the fall of 2018, I tried to begin to read something. Things were not easy at first. Reading requires focusing on something steady, compared to those represented online via short messages or videos discussed by Zhulan. I read on my way to work, curled in the corner of subway truck, I read in the cafeteria during lunch time and dinner time. More than 60 books were read in the following three years, including mathematics, political ideologies, and even philosophy.

Reading and continued thinking changed my mind. It is true that everything is changing, but there is still something remains even firmer in the river of time. One example is, most of the mathematical tools we use today are invented hundreds of years ago, such as the modern Calculus was first introduced in the 17th century. Even some financial derivatives can be traced back to the Crusaders in the Middle Ages.

The method to face the change is to find out and to learn those not changing. For me, a programmer, the business is changing, from tools like CRM, to e-marketing and analysis. The core knowledge required such as algebra, and the thought of Rationalism are just improved or act in different shape to fit different situations.

Ultimately, what I learned from books is: a complex appearance may always be combined and/or transformed from one or several simple abstract basis. Those what behind the change is how they are combined and/or transformed. The basis itself can hardly be challenged. As the old saying shows: “While appearances may vary, the essence remains unchanged.”

Now I’m standing here, knowledge give me coverage me to face the changes and walk through the ages decisively in agile ways. We fight for the future, and the future belongs to those who believe in the beauty in their dreams.