This book explicitly analyzes the Chinese nationality to reach the seemingly outrageous conclusion that most Chinese today have the mental status of an infant. Though psychoanalysis isn't often taken seriously as science these days, I still found the book quite insightful and meaningful. To most Chinese readers, the study on Chinese nationalities/characteristics has long been stuck in the perceptions made by Bo Yang almost over a decade ago and since then no new publications had come out in a substantial way. This book is likely to challenge that situation with its newly coined term Giant Baby, especially given the increasing hostilities in the Chinese society due to class solidification and the morbid interpersonal relationships arising as the result of that. Moreover, although the many conclusions Mr.Wu put in the book weren't necessarily based on scientific experiments, they were, however, based on insightful social observations. Which is why I'd say that even though psychoanalysis itself is usually confused with groundless intuitive thinking, this book deserves its recognition. Overall, a discerning and thought-provoking read that doesn't take up too much time (but does requires a lot of time to ponder over).
P.S. I'm looking forward to its English translated version.
Understanding "Giant Babies": A Personal Exploration
Because the feeling of being controlled and oppressed is so obvious in work, whether it's about time or overall feelings, people feel like tools. So, I really wanted to find relevant books to read and understand. I accidentally came across this one. It really cleared up the fog and revealed many secrets.
But the theme of this 500-page book is really broad and scattered. It's not easy to organize it into a coherent framework. To save trouble, I can only focus on my reading notes and impressions, selecting some to elaborate on.
The Author's Standpoint The author's overall sentiment is that contemporary Chinese people are mostly not mature adults but merely infants. This notion of infants can be seen as a metaphor or defined using the stages of psychoanalysis the author employs in the text (page 8). But in any case, the fact that Chinese people are infants is what the author firmly believes.
What is a "Giant Baby"? The main characteristic of an infant is incompetence.
It manifests in two ways. First, they need to be taken care of completely, like a deity. Indeed, in this aspect, an infant is like a "deity." On the other hand, when an infant doesn't receive care, they cry, scream, or even make destructive noises. In this aspect, an infant resembles a "demon."
Contemporary adults embody both characteristics of infants, hence the term "giant baby."
The "Deity" Giant Baby and Its Subjects When an adult occupies the position of a "deity," they receive care everywhere. For example, at home, they are treated like a "father" by their spouse and children. In a company (or government) or any collective, if they hold power, they become the "father." At its extreme, this is the emperor, controlling everything.
In such collectives, in the presence of such "deities," others cannot resist. To resist means losing one's livelihood, job opportunities, or even facing death. What can one do? They can only compromise, abandon their spontaneity, autonomy, self-feelings, needs, and desires, becoming "good people," model citizens, obedient tools.
Under the absolute power of the "deity," one after another "good person" forms a collective devoid of individuality. All these collectives, big and small, merge into Chinese culture, spirit, and destiny.
Our culture always advocates collectivism. At the same time, it praises those who "serve the cause of Heaven and extinguish their own desires." By giving up oneself, giving up one's aggressiveness, denying one's needs and desires, one gains resources, help, recognition, and approval. Thus, almost everyone has undergone self-castration and become quiet, gentle, meek, obedient "good people." Some even actively cultivate how to become more benevolent.
Under the absolute power of the "deity," within a large or small group, what opposes it is actually individual human feelings. Is it important? It's crucial; it's what makes us human. But in the collectivism of the "deity," it's not important at all; it's even dangerous. You must give it up, shut up and obey, to obtain what you need in life, to be safe and secure.
Can you not give it up?
It's difficult. Really difficult.
At the same time, in the process of giving up individual feelings, you also give up your aggressiveness.
The "Demon" Within the Giant Baby and Vitality What is aggressiveness?
In infants, this aggressiveness is actually a destructive force, a tendency to destroy everything, a demonic force. As an adult giant baby, one can certainly feel this force.
I often feel my almost destructive aggressiveness.
People often praise me, saying I'm a good person. Blah blah. I can only smile.
In reality, I know, the demon in my heart is bloodthirsty, wanting to kill, very cruel. But to hide this cruelty, I suppress my aggressiveness. At the same time, I suppress its vitality, creativity, and life force.
Why does this destructive force also encompass vitality and life force? Because human impulses, the most primitive forces, reside within it; they are the primal forces of life.
So, for the sake of material gains and to avoid the destructive force of my "demon," I become a good person. I start seeking peace. I retreat. I bend over. My smile becomes gentle.
But only we ourselves know that this image of "good person" is a disguise, a result of suppressing our true feelings, needs, and desires. This suppression consumes a lot of energy and mental effort.
It becomes self-depletion.
This good person can only lock themselves in their room and start to recover.
This is also why, after work, even if not much is done, one feels very tired.
At the same time, this good person will sever most of their social connections because they are all elaborate performances. What's the point? I start actively pursuing mental tranquility.
Buddhist scriptures, religion, yoga music, here we go.
The Formation Process of the Giant Baby and Life Guide What exactly are these "deity" and "demon"? How did they come about? What should we do?
The "deity" and "demon" are actually ourselves, our superego, our ego. They are the parts that discipline us in our minds, while also providing energy, youth, and aggression for our lives.
The reason why the giant baby presents them as absolute forces in opposition, without any intermediate stages, is because, firstly, they themselves haven't had the experience of accepting, understanding, and comforting dark energy. Whenever dark energy emerges or erupts, it startles others, or they feel ashamed, regretful, or simply ignored and unnoticed, thus imprisoning the energy of the "demon" and seeking absolute control of the "deity." In the realm of absolute control, they can exert their desires, demands, and ensure others take care of them and pay attention to them.
Secondly, the reason they set them in absolute opposition is that there is no more "psychological space" in their minds. Without spaciousness, other possibilities beyond the "deity" and "demon" cannot be accommodated in terms of time and space. These two big things cannot turn around in our minds.
What should we do then? The author's suggestion is love. Devote yourself to loving someone (mutual love), or devote yourself to doing something. Through this process, establish your core beliefs, affirm your self-worth, respect every choice you make, love every aspect of yourself, and embrace the demons and deities in your heart.
At the same time, go out and participate in social life. Let energy flow and circulate in social and interpersonal relationships. Let your dark energy be seen and touched. Stop the criticism and judgment in your mind, let the energy flow and circulate in interpersonal relationships. Have awareness of and stop the delusions in your mind, create psychological capacity, and expand your heart.
To be carefree and unrestrained is to let energy flow through your heart. It's to make everything and everyone come alive. And for yourself, it's to feel people, things, and events with your senses and have the capacity in your heart. Like the vast sky and grasslands, with winds blowing back and forth.
Epilogue I've been reading this book for four or five days; it's really fascinating. I've stayed up late reading it. It also discusses personal energy, observing inner demons, family relationships, traditional Chinese culture, and more. It's really good.
It's a pity it's not available anymore.
Why?
I'm not sure.
This book has helped me a lot. I didn't understand before (in 2018), I was always obsessed with approval. And before (early 2023), I focused mainly on meditation, often spending time alone, drinking tea and such.
Oh well. Life's like that.
Now, my direction for self-development is vitality. Respect for my feelings and needs (and clearly affirming and expressing myself), establishing core self-worth (absolute trust in spontaneity), and letting energy flow in social relationships.
I was expecting a lot from such a controversial title and theory. This book left me quite disappointed. 'Proof' of his theories were simply random analogies or news stories. It wasn't academic as I expected. I also found this book to simply be far too long at 500 pages. It was repetitive at times and also didn't go into some interesting social issues like 富二代 in the kind of detail I expected. I gave up after around a hundred pages.
The concept of "Giant Baby" is only a summary instead of an explanation of the characters of Chinese. Therefore, this book mainly enumerates many specific examples of "giant baby psychology" in a disorganized way but doesn't introduce a systematic theoretical explanatory framework (in the sense of social science) of the characters of the Chinese. That is to say, many popular characters of contemporary Chinese people like filial piety, collectivism, symbiosis, comparison with others, interference in other's personal affairs, etc are all analogous to some characteristics of the 6-month-old babies. But "being psychologically a giant baby" is not why these national characters exist. The true fundamental reasons lie in China's culture, social structure, and political system. However, the author didn't delve into it, except only mentioning a little bit about the cultural reasons (Confucianism, Legalism, etc) at the end of the book. The author also didn't give solutions to the "giant baby psychology" on the level of the nation.
Nevertheless, the book does well from the standpoint of psychological counseling. The author gave helpful suggestions on the level of individuals for psychological problems caused by the bad characters of contemporary Chinese people, such as the way to comfort the failed students in the College Entrance Examination. This can benefit the readers who are suffering from these psychological problems. Besides, from the distinct perspective of psychology, the author provided uncliched insights into some trending social issues--for example, the reason why the senior citizens wrongly accused the passers-by (who lifted them when they fell on the road spontaneously) of knocking them down is that they wanted to attribute their turmoils to some external factors to eliminate their psychological unease (instead of simply the commonly believed moral unscrupulousness). However, some of the psychoanalytical reasonings and treatments described in the book, like attributing psychological problems to childhood trauma or "dialogue with the ghost in your sight", seem to be absurd. This is because the author is a psychoanalysis-oriented psychological counselor. But psychoanalysis, despite being effective in treating many psychological disorders, is generally believed to be non-scientific mainly because it is not falsifiable and hence has been abandoned by modern developments of psychology.
I treat it as a CBT book for myself and it’s the best one I’ve read so far. It’s an insightful and enjoyable read, probably because we share the same cultural background. Sound logic with examples, even though some examples are not completely solid as evidence.
I do think the author’s perspective is limited by their own identity, given that the approach is, very often, based on their own experience.
Interestingly I start to write comments in response to the text which feels like having a conversation with my counsellor. That’s probably the charisma from someone who’s have 10k+ hours counselling sessions.
最后我的take away就是,人生需要热情,需要爱,需要全情投入,从而重新塑造一个内心完整,强大,自由的自我。NO Role model I am here right now. I am devoting my entire life to become the role model for everyone I love , and also for myself.
Anecdotal without providing any frameworks. The best part is its compelling title. The book involves Freudian theory, which is outdated in my view (although I am not majored in psychology). A lot of the issues presented in the book can be contributed to the agricultural civilization and a lack of modern scientific psychological knowledge in China.
Very well-written. It explains many things I've experienced before but never summarized, which helps in understanding many bewildering and peculiar phenomena influenced by Chinese cultural upbringing.
Perhaps too much about the author's personal journey. Provides some framework and tools to think about certain issues common amongst CN families, but there are quite a few sweeping generalisations that read more like conjecture.