True progress is not about finding work to do, but about upgrading the way we survive in the present. Therefore, progress has nothing to do with effort, only with upgrading the effort to improve. The prerequisite for progress is whether one can observe their true self. To judge whether a person has a trend of progress, emotions and actions are more truthful and reliable than words, because emotions do not lie; emotions are the reasoning behind your current life. Getting angry equals out-of-control expectations, flaunting wealth equals unstable gains, abusing power equals short-term authority, bullying equals force beyond control, vanity equals appearance surpassing intelligence, anxiety equals vision exceeding thinking ability, depression equals goals beyond capacity, compulsiveness equals responsibilities exceeding control. Reading facts from emotions is simpler than reading facts from words.

Whether human or animal, all pressure fundamentally comes down to two things. The first is survival, which is essentially survival anxiety. The second is reproduction, which is achieved through displaying luxury and wastefulness; fundamentally, it is expressing having surplus resources. Moving towards functional value equals emotional value, which also equals reproductive advantage. Buying functions is survival; buying waste is reproduction; both are instinctive responses. Women achieve reproduction through attraction, so they care more about evaluation; negative evaluations are subconsciously understood as insufficient reproductive value, leading to de-sexualization tendencies. Men achieve reproduction through pursuit, so they care more about achievement; low achievement is equivalent to losing mating rights.

When people feel unsafe, their instinct is to avoid evaluation rather than face difficulties. Being evaluated means being abandoned, so external expectations become the main source of pressure. Individuals will label external expectations as personal meaning, thus forming a small boundary connected to society. Different boundary structures lead to different life and emotional experiences. When the boundary is overly fused with society, individuals are more easily swept up by social emotions. Family and education often accelerate this fusion, causing children to bear expectations prematurely. The truly healthy state is to retain a self-doubting system. In later stages of social development, education will shift towards encouraging individuality and weakening involution; this is the era’s self-healing process. The difficulty is not in cognition, but in adults finding it hard to change their own habits.