Because this is a carefully designed society, if you want to quickly accumulate your first million in life, or even your first ten million, you must learn a skill called plundering the bottom layer.
This society is very cruel, and for a person to make money, there are only two paths: one is called upward connection, and the other is called downward harvesting. When you are penniless and have never seen the world, you cannot walk the path of upward connection. Unless you are naturally intelligent, lucky enough to become a plaything of the upper class, or you possess special skills or talents, such as being a specialized talent with unique skills in a certain industry, you may be accepted by high society and have the possibility of upward connection and making money.
However, 99% of people will exhaust their lives without being able to step into the so-called upper class. Many people think that having luxury cars and famous watches will allow them to squeeze into high society, only to find that these things are merely toys for rich kids.
Sometimes, if you are not born into this circle, you won't even have the opportunity to be anyone's dog. Therefore, plundering the bottom layer has become a skill that everyone who wants to rise must learn. So how can one plunder downward? For example, if you want to harvest women from the bottom layer, you only need to give worthless things form and value; for instance, diamonds can be sold at sky-high prices in the name of love, while houses can be tied to a sense of security, allowing you to empty a man's wallet.
If you want to harvest men, that is even simpler because men from the bottom layer are naturally fearful of authority. They fear isolation and being abandoned by society, so they hope to present their value. Therefore, you only need to package yourself as a big shot, tell them that if they follow you, they will have a chance to succeed. Just look online; this is the routine. Renting a Maybach or a Rolls Royce can make countless men devote their youth, passion, time, and even life to you, let alone their money.
Harvesting children is also very easy. The children of the powerful learn music, chess, calligraphy, and painting, becoming cultured rich second-generation individuals. In contrast, children from the bottom layer who learn these skills are likely just fodder for training institutions. In the future, they will become 996 workers who can play the piano, copywriters who can play chess, graphic designers or salespeople, and office workers who can draw. Those training classes love to paint dreams for parents, as if learning these skills will lead to a different outcome, but they won’t tell parents that these noble courses are fundamentally built on material foundations. The biggest difference between the poor and the rich is that, many times, money is the means for the rich and the bait for the poor. They have a self-consistent theory to validate that everything they do is right, but if they are right, why are their pockets still empty?
The biggest cognitive flaw of the poor lies in the fact that due to long-term poverty, their brains can only operate on a formal logic system. They focus only on the present and never believe in the future; they do not like grand theories, only small joys. They are unwilling to exchange 'the plight of the present' for 'poetry and distant places.' In short: they prefer to live a life of 'drunken revelry today.' Therefore, you must persuade them in a way they can understand.
You must let them see 'instant returns'; you must make them feel that life is like playing an online game, where results are immediate. Furthermore, China is actually a society based on blood ties; behind most competition is the struggle of family power. Therefore, most poor people fundamentally lack the capital and opportunity to make mistakes, simply because their family power is too weak. Without such support, it is impossible to stand firm at the top of the ivory tower.
Some people refuse to accept that making money is that difficult. Isn't it just a matter of seizing the opportunity? You must understand that 'wanting' and 'being able to' are two different concepts. E-commerce, short videos, selling goods, virtual currency—what have you caught? If you wait for the right opportunity, it is safer than waiting for your house to be demolished. A strong wind only blows at the top of the industry; even a tornado cannot lift the struggling workers on the edge. Do you see how heart-wrenching that is?
Personal success is not just about how wealthy someone is now; more importantly, it is about how much breakthrough they have made based on their original family background.
Success is actually a relative concept. For children from ordinary backgrounds, the biggest problem is that their parents often teach them incorrectly because their parents are usually at a disadvantage in social competition and naturally do not understand the rules of social operation. The hardest part is not only starting from scratch but also overcoming the incorrect ideas subtly instilled by their parents. The people willing to have substantial contact with you are mostly from the same class; even those who are doing well are often unreachable. Even if you do reach them, they won't tell you the truth because their instincts only allow them to share everything with you if you can bring them benefits.
At any time, the lower and middle layers are always the most crowded, and the resources at this level are pitifully scarce. The path to success is not crowded; it is just that the layer you are in is too crowded.
The biggest difference between humans and animals is that human desires are infinite. Animals can hunt when they are hungry, but humans must work hard to create a 'ladder' to climb up.