How to Cultivate Public-Spiritedness

Civilization is only thirty meters away—literally, the distance from your front door. Beyond that threshold, many feel free to look away.

This isn’t hypocrisy. It’s human nature—shared by nearly everyone.

Yet a more livable society depends on more people cultivating public-spiritedness. The most practical lever? Redefining the boundary of “I.”

When we shrink “I” to just our skin—or even just our wallet—we shrink civilization with it.

For example: if you see your spouse as part of “I,” shared finances feel natural. But if you keep meticulous accounts—“your money,” “my money”—you’ve drawn the line outside them. They remain deeply close, yes—but not you.

Wu Jun once recounted a story from his father’s life: in the 1970s, the elder Wu was a grassroots cadre. Every Sunday night—the only quiet evening he had at home—colleagues and neighbors would flood in, mostly to file complaints: 80% about marital spats (e.g., one spouse sent home ¥7, the other ¥10; both teachers earning ¥50–60/month), and 20% about neighbors’ coal stoves protruding half a meter into a shared corridor in a tongzi lou (communal apartment building). Today, it sounds absurd—yet these were highly educated professionals, locked in earnest, exhausting disputes over inches and pennies.

Much of that friction stemmed from narrow definitions of “I.” When both partners expand their sense of self—to include each other’s parents, siblings, even friends—the family gains resilience, grace, and quiet strength.

So raising societal civility isn’t about suppressing instinct or performing virtue. It’s about widening the circle of care: when “I” includes the sidewalk, the park bench, the neighbor’s child, or the shared air—you’ll naturally treat them as you’d treat your own things. No moralizing required. Just redefinition.

That widening is urgent—it reduces friction, conserves energy, prevents needless conflict.

But two guardrails matter: boundary awareness and self-awareness. Expanding “I” shouldn’t erase personal limits—or dissolve your core identity. These three—expansion, boundaries, selfhood—are not contradictory. They’re complementary.

Entering via a Niche Market

To avoid head-on battles with giants, target a niche you truly understand.

A niche market serves a specific, well-defined customer segment with specialized products or services. Though small (annual TAM: ¥10M–¥300M), it offers high loyalty, low substitution, and strong margins—because needs are precise and competition is thin.

A friend, Yang Xiang, formerly a PM at a major internet firm, shared how his ex-company killed a project forecasted to earn ¥100–200M/year—deemed “too small.” For them, yes. For a lean team? That scale is ideal. Especially now: with AI tools, a team under 10 can often execute such projects profitably.

Three reliable ways to spot a solid niche:

Clone & improve successful indie-developer products.
Clone & improve proven offerings from small companies.
Combine big-tech product frameworks with deep domain expertise.

Options 1 and 2 work best for tiny teams. Small firms lack resources—so they’re vulnerable. Outperform them just slightly on UX, or fix their top 2–3 pain points several times better, and you capture share fast. Option 3 demands stronger synthesis skills—but yields defensible advantage.

Good Questions and Aesthetic Judgment

AI has made answers cheap. Good questions are now rare—and vital.

A sharp question reveals unique perspective, exposes hidden assumptions, and uncovers real opportunities. Often, asking the right question matters more than solving it. Why?

Repetitive cognitive labor is being automated.
Accessing answers is near-instantaneous.

So personal growth means cultivating question-asking—it’s mental weightlifting. In education, prioritize helping children formulate rich questions—not grading answer accuracy. The AI-era shift: from valuing answers to valuing questions, from accumulating knowledge to building thinking habits.

Also critical: the ability to judge answer quality. That’s aesthetic judgment—professional taste in your field, or everyday discernment in life.

Which view of this landscape is most compelling? From what angle does light fall most meaningfully? That’s aesthetic work.

Why do humans seek beauty? Because we instinctively recognize—and long for—optimal states. In modern life, aesthetics isn’t just about prettiness; it’s about perceiving meaning.

How to build it? Start early—or start now. At its core, aesthetic development means actively connecting with the highest expressions of beauty in your domain.

Two steps:

Build intuitive sensitivity: Immerse yourself in top-tier examples—e.g., watch landmark architecture documentaries, then visit masterworks in person. Let excellence imprint itself.
Add structured understanding: Study history, theory, or principles after intuition takes root. Then feeling becomes insight—and growth accelerates.

Key: initiative. Not passive consumption—but deliberate, hungry engagement with the finest.

Evening Exercise, Together

Dropping my daughter at kindergarten, she said: “Let’s exercise together tonight!”

I was moved. I remembered last night—her counting reps as I lifted dumbbells. Simple. Warm. A quiet way to weave movement, health, and bodily awareness into her five-year-old world—potentially shaping her relationship with her body for decades.

It struck me: we should record those unplanned, tender lines kids drop—“I want to see what I’ll look like at 18… and at 90”—or “I just talked to AI Dad for ages!” (“Is he nice?” “Yes! He keeps me company.” “Okay—I won’t bother you. Work well!”)

Human memory fades fast—especially the beautiful moments.

I flipped back through old notes. Too few.

Why People “Act Out”

Why do kids—and many adults—disrupt, provoke, or defy?

Because core human needs—achievement, belonging, recognition, control—are universal. As social beings, we need attention. We need to feel seen.

“Acting out” is a low-effort, high-return tactic: minimal cost, immediate reaction. That feedback loop reinforces the behavior—fast.

So the pattern forms:
Need (recognition/agency) → Low-cost action (disruption) → Instant attention → Behavior reinforced → Cycle deepens.

From an ROI lens, it’s brutally efficient. And because the need is primal, adults replicate it too—hence the rise of “contrarianism,” reflexive negation, online trolling.

Punishment rarely breaks the cycle. It often amplifies the very attention the person craves.

Better solutions work upstream:

Amplify positive behavior immediately—praise effort, help, focus—while calmly ignoring minor disruptions. Shift the expectation: this is how you get noticed.
Cultivate higher-yield sources of fulfillment: early aesthetic exposure, consistent routines, delayed gratification practice. The pride of finishing a run, mastering a chord, or completing a project delivers deeper, longer-lasting satisfaction than any tantrum ever could. Once tasted, it becomes addictive—in the best way.

The Four Archetypes Most Likely to Succeed Early

In startups, these four profiles have above-average odds of achieving product-market fit:

Product/Technical Experts: Build breakthrough tools or solve real industry pain points—engineers, scientists, elite PMs.
Sales/Marketing Experts: Uncover latent needs, validate demand, or engineer zero-cost acquisition—growth hackers, channel strategists, sales operators.
Leverage Amplifiers: Turn modest profits into outsized valuations—e.g., turning ¥300K net income into a ¥100M company valuation and securing ¥30M in funding. Often: well-connected founders, former investors, or recognized thought leaders.
Unifiers: Recruit and align Types 1–3. Requires exceptional charisma, trust, and vision—think Sun Quan or Liu Bei.

Ideal? Type 4. Rare? Extremely. Most succeed first by excelling in one of the first three—then gradually grow into unifying capacity.

10× Growth Is Easier Than 2×

Counterintuitive—but true: scaling 10× is often less painful than 2×.

Why? 2× growth tempts linear thinking: “Double budget, double headcount, double hours.” But linear effort rarely yields linear returns—especially beyond initial traction.

10× forces nonlinear reinvention: new models, new assumptions, new constraints. It demands ruthless prioritization—not expansion.

How?

Set an audacious goal (Sun Tzu: “Aim high—even if you land mid-range”).
Identify one pivotal lever—the single point where extreme focus creates disproportionate impact.
Allocate 3× resources to that lever—not across ten fronts. Leverage and scale effects mean output rarely scales linearly with input.

Doing “a little of everything” guarantees mediocrity—and slow growth.

21st-Century Positioning Principles

20th-Century Principles (Ries & Trout):

Mindset—not markets—is the battlefield.
Target gaps in perception.
Focus—not extension—builds strength.
Different—not better—wins.
Your brand name is your position.
Compete—not please—customers.
Binary choices dominate (e.g., Coke vs. Pepsi).

21st-Century Updates:

Global—not domestic—is the default arena.
The internet is a new category—not just a channel.
Category ownership beats brand fame (e.g., “Zoom” owns video calls; “Slack” owns async work).
Visual hammer: A strong, ownable visual cue (e.g., TikTok’s “For You” icon).
Memorable slogan: Short, sticky, repeatable—even without context.
PR—not ads—drives legitimacy in an ad-saturated world.
Multi-brand strategy: One company, multiple distinct brands for distinct audiences or use cases.