Hope of the Young

Have you ever asked a young person what they want to be when they grow up?  They have many dreams of greatness and happiness in the hopes for their future.

There is no youth that does not have hope. 

Mostly, when you ask what people hope for the future, they will have the ambition to succeed in the subject to which they attend college.  Then someone may challenge and ask, "Is that your real objective in life?"

In search of an answer, not many people are confident in their dreams.

When one is able to achieve their ambitions, then they must start over after realizing that this is not his true ambition.  Yet, not many people in life can feel that they have achieved their dreams and are truly happy and content.

Those who are able to achieve in a certain area, they will then see they want to go beyond that goal.  It is natural that we do not want to end in the reality we live, but we constantly want to go beyond that reality no matter how much we achieve.


Then what really is youth's hope or ambition?

It is a fact that no matter how hard we try, at least in the past, we have never been able to say, or heard anybody say, after reaching the goal of his own ambition, "I am happy, for I have accomplished it". No matter how big a person becomes in the world, he still has to achieve something more, look for something farther.  Always striving to be bigger.

The true ambition of every young person is to achieve his personal dreams.  No matter how accomplished one becomes, if it does not touch them in a soulful way, he will be unhappy. The gravest goal that we must consider is how do we maintain our own sense of happiness once we have established our goal.

Any youth you speak to still has the ambition to go beyond his own national boundary. 

Even though this young person is on this level of understanding, there is no true ideal.  The ideal begins from a certain central point within ourselves.  There, the basic hope and ambition of the youth then can go toward the world.  When we meet opposition, we become indignant toward others in an effort to protect ourselves and this ambition.

In other words, man is unconsciously working on the basis of perfecting himself. When someone attacks him, he will defend himself. Each person will suddenly realize he would like to be perfect.

A woman's sense of accomplishments centered on herself will be different from a man's sense of accomplishments.  Also, from the viewpoint of different countries, there are different ideas and attitudes.


What is true perfection, and what is the center of our hope?

If a person found his center well established, then he would be absolutely happy in the past, present and the future.  Such a person would be accepted consistently throughout history.  Everyone would want to devote himself to this person.

They would think they were the most dependable and beautiful person in the world.

How does one become such a person?  When we think of the ideal youth, it would be the same to us and everybody and consistent with this person.

The ideal youth represents the world, including every country, and the one who can represent the past, present, and future.

If such a youth exists on the earth, he would be considered a treasure of the world.  Treasure is regarded to have an eternal quality.  He would reflect the total.  All youth should want to have such an image; there should not be many exceptions.

When we think of the ideal youth, we must think about man that is both external and internal.  We also see the man striving to do the ideal, and the man as a physical being.

Then what is the ideal?

The ideal subject represent everybody; it excludes nobody; it represents every individual past, present and future.  The ideal person will deploy himself toward the world eternally, not momentarily.


The "Ideal," in Chinese characters, is comprised of a left side ("king") and a right side ("village"); in other words, king's village. -- One side symbolizes the whole, and the other side represents the center. When the whole focuses on one center, then that is ideal. A single man will never achieve that; only with the entirety surrounding the original center will the ideal exist.

It may be hard for Westerners to understand the significance of these characters, but each has a deeper meaning and represents one thought.  When people first started using these characters, they unknowingly included the concept of happiness and the ideal.

And on this basis alone, on this combination of outer environment and developing our own environment for this one purpose, the ideal can come to exist.

Thus, the ideal is not achieved by one person.  There needs to be a perfect object from which the subject has give and take with, then, the ideal exists.  The ideal does not come about from one man, but through a reciprocal relationship.  Just the same, the ideal youth can never be ideal in himself.  He will have the knowledge from both sides so he can represent everything.


Every individual is different from another. Some people have special points in outer things, and some in inner things. Some people are very weak, and some are very strong. Some people are noble, and some are lowly. The ideal person will be someone who can embrace both ends and stand at the center.


The ideal youth will encompass everything and stand strong in the center.  He will not only be concerned with his own life, but he will be concerned for his own village, family or country.  Also, he will not only live for the present reality, but be interested in the past, future and the world.

When a person tries to maintain a relationship with God, then he will become the ideal youth.  We may envision that God is a being that is the center of the whole.  Then this means that God represents the past, present and future.

From the four directions, we have to center on God.  Thus, God is the center of the whole universe.


Return for Tomorrow's Post: Youth Sacrifice for World Peace

This post was rewritten and derived from the speech Hope of the Youth.