First of all, we have to analyze from the characteristics of human beings. Apart from the similarity of eating colors, a significant difference between humans and ordinary animals is that people have subjective initiative, and people can pursue what they want purposefully according to their own needs, and beauty is one of them. Animals feel things from a single angle, mostly based on physiological instinct; Moreover, people feel that the perspective of seeing things is diversified, selective and associative. "The scenery changes and the fun is endless." Facing the same grassland, perhaps in the eyes of the sheep, this is a rich thing, which triggered Niu Xiji's beautiful thought of "remembering the blue silk skirt and pitying the grass everywhere". Enjoying the same spring scenery may be a comfortable climate suitable for animals to live in, but it is as spring as Li Bai's "spring beckons me to smoke, and I write a lot of fake things". Ordinary images in the material world arouse people's subjective literary creation, make people engage in literary activities and show its aesthetic value. This literary activity triggered by real things is produced by people's subjective and dynamic thinking, poetic emotional association and personalized expression. It not only has perceptual form, but also accumulates rational content, which is the deep aesthetic implication of the interweaving of rationality and perceptual character. Zhu Guangqian said in "Talking about Beauty" that "in the activity of doing one thing, people are slaves to the needs of the environment. In the activity of inaction, man is the master of his own mind, and literary activity, an ideological aesthetic spiritual activity, is a kind of inaction, so Zhu Guangqian's point of view also affirms the bearing value of literary activity as a better life.
In addition, compared with the limited life, the eternity of literature also makes people's value travel through time and space in another form and continue endlessly. Therefore, many people with lofty ideals pin their ideals and hopes on their own creation in order to transcend life and re-create their own value. As Sima Qian said in the humiliating Historical Records, "When learning from heaven and man, learn from the changes of ancient and modern times and become a family statement", it can be seen that the charm handed down from generation to generation of literature is an inexhaustible spiritual motivation to support Sima Qian's constant pursuit after experiencing a major turning point in his life. As a reader, an individual can not only act as an author in literary activities and exert the "essential power" of creation, but also explore beauty and value in the literary world. The process of people joining literary activities through reading is also the process of aesthetic and value generation. On the intuitive level, people are examining the object and conscious subject expressed in their works, but in fact they are indirectly examining themselves through the object.
As Lacan's famous mirror image theory describes: "People will constantly identify with an object imaginatively in the process of growing up, and self is gradually established in this process." Correspondingly, we can explain why literary works can arouse people's enthusiasm, inspire people's character and let readers find their own value. When we feel confused and lonely in the face of the vast world, we may find similar objects in the world of literature and construct a fictional and unified self-consciousness to comfort our hearts. From these two aspects, we can understand the process and reasons why literature contributes to a better life. Therefore, for us in the real world, understanding and mastering the relationship between literature and life and treating literature as a catalyst for a better life will be an important way for us to show our essential strength and realize our own existence value.
Perhaps when we open our hearts to discover the beauty in literary activities, we will also appreciate the charm of Shakespeare's works: "When a rose is called, no matter what its name is, it is so fragrant"; I will also happily watch Sleepless Begonia by Yasunari Kawabata at four o'clock in the morning; I will also enjoy the innocence of Zhou's "cooking beans and sprinkling salt" in the cool days; It will also be at the intersection of poetic feelings, where words are like springs and feelings are beautiful.