In high school, our principal gave a short talk every Monday after the flag-raising. One week he talked about shendu (慎独).
I didn’t really get it. And I didn’t do it either. When there were no adults home, I’d turn on the TV and leave the homework for later.
The word stuck, though.
What it actually says
It comes from the Doctrine of the Mean: “莫见乎隐，莫显乎微，故君子慎其独也。” Roughly: nothing shows more than what you hide, nothing gives you away like the small stuff, so a decent person is most careful when alone.
Why I didn’t do it
Looking back, other people set the standard then. Teachers checked the homework. There were proctors during exams, and someone else did the grading.
So when somebody was watching, I did the work, and when nobody was, the TV went on. I think what I really cared about was whether I’d get caught.
Now
These days I answer to myself. I set my own bar and work hard to meet it, without anyone telling me to. That bar is already higher than anything anyone else asks of me, so that’s the one I focus on.
Some nights I’ll keep working until 3 or 4 a.m. because I want to finish something I set out to do. There’s nobody watching then either, but it matters a lot less now that I’m setting the standard.
It took me years to get what my principal was talking about that Monday. Some of it, anyway.
That’s it for now.
高中的时候，每周一升完旗，校长都要在国旗下讲几句。有一回，他讲的是“慎独”。
那时候我没太听懂，也没做到。家里没大人的时候，我就开电视，作业先放一边。
不过这个词，我倒是记住了。
它到底在说什么
慎独出自《礼记·中庸》，原话是：“莫见乎隐，莫显乎微，故君子慎其独也。”
用大白话说，差不多是：越是藏着的东西，越容易露出来；越是小事，越能看出一个人。所以一个人待着的时候，反而要更小心。
那时候为什么没做到
回头看，那时候的标准是别人定的。作业有老师查，考试有人监考，分数也是别人给的。
有人看着，我就好好做；没人看着，电视就开了。我那会儿在意的，其实是会不会被查到吧。
现在呢
现在得对自己负责了。我给自己定了个 bar，要求自己一定做到，也不用谁催。这个 bar 已经比别人对我的要求都高了，我就照着自己定的来。
有时候我会一直干到凌晨三四点，就为了把自己定的目标做完。这时候也没人看着。不过标准是自己定的，有没有人看，好像也就没那么要紧了。
校长那天讲的话，隔了这么多年，我才懂了一点。
先写到这儿。
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