Do you feel like Siddharta sometimes? I mean, as in Herman Hesse’s Siddharta. Like the world is at both times, a great adventure and something so exhausting. Like there is dullness and in its corners lie bliss. I feel like Siddharta sometimes.
One of my favorite places in the world wide web is Twitter with its short, erratic, sometimes surprising and pleasant messages, people babbling, screaming and pushing through over the void, into my subconscious. Into yours. Like little ants working us all towards a future we think we can imagine but which we of course cannot. The hive listens to the noise over the Internet, from murkier places, and then channels it like the wave after a deep sea earthquake. Soon, those messages come crashing over us all and we never saw it coming. We say we were too uneducated, too unaware, but in truth this is just how complex systems work. In hindsight, it’s easy to be wise.
Of course, now you think I’m thinking about trolls and such, about the great political rifts of our time. But I’m not. Mostly, I follow finance bros on Twitter. It’s an interesting subculture. But they have crawled into my subconscious. All of their books and podcasts and workouts and quotes upon quotes upon quotes, like they are live performing Charlie Munger. I love learning but Jesus, how much can you learn? (Understand, I’m making a joke here). All of their lists on how to live and be! All the prudent tweets: if you are not prepared to do x, then you should not do y. Dunning Kruger of life advise channeled through financial advice, by a 27 year old dude. And then I realize our whole social culture is littered with this, advise givning. Am I giving advise? God have mercy.
So, like Siddharta I’m growing tired. Of late I have been dreaming of moving to a cottage, leaving life behind. Perhaps not like Siddharta who left a child behind, I would bring my dog. But all this information is making me so serious, and I have already too much of that. Too many lists and too much routine. This little life is passing by while I improve, is it not so?
Instead, I’m giving myself some advise. To seriously consider what brings joy and do more of that. To stop caring about all the great action plans out there. To assert my right to lie down and do nothing. To allow for the corners to become walls. To live a little, in the real world.
Henceforth, joy.