Our apparent incapacity of loving life exactly as it is, no matter what, is both essential and torturous.
Essential because, well, because it’s there, which needs no further reasoning.
And if you want one: it’s also essential because it seems to be an amazingly powerful fuel for us to go out and attain things and careers and situations and Rolexes and sexy sex partners.
Of course it’s also torturous because it makes everything way more complicated and painful than it could be, theoretically.
The constant search for relief that leads us to acquire things and go after stuff and want achievements, almost always leads to disappointment.
I was just reflecting on goals and dreams and other things we reflect on and turn into future possessions, and I realized that whatever situational or physical goal I’ve had in life, there’s always an ‘after the fact’.
You’ve worked for it, maybe for many years, it’s finally there, it feels good…. until it doesn’t.
‘I’ve done it, I got it, yeah!! But…. now what?”
And the whole thing begins all over again.
This is of course part of the agonizing beauty and wonder of life.
There’s so much potential drama and excitement in lack and desire.
There’s so much (at least apparent) power in wanting to leave a certain situation behind and ‘make something out of life’.
So we obviously need all of it.
But at the same time we all know, deep inside, that no matter what it is, no matter what title, job, house, relationship, body, or amount of books we publish as an author, there’ll always be the moment after the achievement.
The next phase.
The new search.
The fresh lack and the blossoming desire.
And that’s exactly why ‘just being happy’ or ‘living a fulfilled life’ is so deliciously meta, and so incredibly valuable.
It makes all the goals and dreams in the world optional.
You can still become a multi-billionaire and buy an island to have sex with sexy sex partners all day long, or you keep sweeping the modest terrace of your tiny cottage in the countryside.
You can write 20 books that become bestsellers, or you can write poems that are appreciated by 3 people.
You can own the biggest airline in the world, or you can have an old canary.
Because if you start from happiness and ease, if you’re able to appreciate life because you’re living it and feeling it and part of it, all those things are no longer seen as the way to achieve peace of mind or sustainable joy.
Of course I know that it’s easy to write about this, and that attaining that basically simple state of happiness always turns out to be a challenge.
Our preferences get in the way, and our ideas about what life should be like compared to how it actually is, are always ready to fuck up the current moment.
I’m not saying something new.
This is SO obvious that most of us find it really boring and uninspiring.
But that doesn’t keep me from rubbing it in your face.
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(Photo by @rruprrup, for Unsplash)