Photo by Simon Wilkes on Unsplash
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18 November 2021
It’s curious how people think they mustn’t earn alone a life worth living.
Everybody giving the same trite advice: provide a solution. Readers come here to find answers. Publications ask for “actionable advice.” Everybody is in love with the action, while reflection is an outdated practice of the old-fashioned people like I am.
One of marketing’s golden rules says, now I should tell you why I am the right person to advise you on this topic. Third paragraph: why you? All things considered, I can. But sorry, it’ll be the fourth.
I’m a suitable writer to tell you not to search for easy solutions because all my life, I have written speculative fiction. Yeah, those vast tomes leading nowhere. What I love to do is to reflect, and I can tell you no one ever taught me how to live my life better than the right question.
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Answers are overrated.
“Give me the right question, and I won’t care of a thousand wrong answers” — Andrea D’Angelo
At the risk of sounding unpleasant, I must say that I read countless articles providing shallow advice. Sometimes it is something that a seven-year-old child like my daughter already knows. Occasionally, we are sent to make a fool of ourselves in many different ways for the sake of actionable.
Get up at 5 a.m., after 8 hours sharp of sleep - yes, you need to go to bed at nine, 30 minutes before reading the goodnight tale to your daughter, ubiquity permitting. Drink an icy glass of water, meditate 20 minutes, then take a 4 minutes cold shower, then turn it to hot for 40 seconds; fine, last but not least, one final shot of almost frozen water (damn, is it pouring down that thing?). Be sure to hit your entire body, please; yes, especially the backside. You’re almost there! Dress up a go for a walk of 27 minutes. Awesome! You’re ready to start your day relaxed and in perfect shape.
There’s no doubt that after such an awakening, I’m in perfect shape: to shout at you. Anyway, you missed one detail: how can I relax while doing one million things in my first 40 minutes? I’m already stressed only reading it. It’s unbreathable!
All right, that was to have some fun.
Look, it must be me. I cannot understand this perspective on our lives. Everything needs to be planned, optimized, and perfectly packed for the best performance as if we were in endless competition with ourselves.
My question is: who’ll win?
And if someone wins, who is the loser?
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Our culture heightens whatever touches. Especially in the First World, we live in a society made of extremes and idiosyncrasies. We aim for money, success, and fame because we feel invisible in the middle of our metropolis. We feel the need to reach out for nature, but we cannot stand the “silence,” and we turn on our radios when we are on the riverside - messing up with those poor birds and fishes.
What’s gone wrong?
We trusted the wicked. We let the powerful manipulate us and push us to desire what only a few can have when we already had everything. We worship God, listen to wise words every week, but then we walk into the streets and turn our heads the other way round when we see someone begging.
Yes, someone. The beggar isn’t a dummy. He could be me; he could be you. Idiosyncrasies. Contradictions. So we walk away drawing a deep breath with our guilty conscience, but we never reflected enough on the concept of “guilt.”
What is guilt? That’s one of the right questions to ask yourself. Unfortunately, I said it, I have no solutions for you, hence neither answers.
What I know is that whatever makes you feel miserable is wrong.
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Back to the top, as writing gurus teach us. Your conclusion must link to the beginning. Tiresome. But again, I can.
This advice flood that runs over you would be good if you could manage it and obtain fruitful, juicy results. But it’s so much and so confusing that no one can keep up the pace unless he dismisses most of it.
I prefer to ask myself the right question, go for a walk in the wood, smell the trees and let them interpenetrating me, thanks to my highly developed connectedness. Back home, the answer I obtained is all I need, no matter how blurred.
No answer or partial answer? I don’t care. I have my novels to write. My drive for a living has always been to reflect and reach deeper truths: the ones that matter. And they couldn’t be found in a five minutes article, whenever it suits you.
My life was some software I’d need actionable advice.
Instead, I beg you for pardon, but I’m a living being and my guru’s nature.