Life Without Spice is Not All That Interesting

I used to obsessively watch movies — in an attempt to find truth. Truth in man, truth in the essence of living — extracting honest recollections from previous generations. Since I don’t trust much of what I read written and broadcasted today, I immersed myself in antiquity for small morsels of universal laws. After all, without order and discipline, one cannot attain happiness and certainly not live freely with grace.

Graceless living is often accompanied by wanton degeneracy, deceitfulness, sloth, and grift. If your spirit is diminished from living a bad life — it’s next to impossible to feel good on a day to day basis and that spiraling effect manifests itself in bad deeds which compound over time — making you craven and wicked.

Truth can be found more in books than anything else — since the perversion of Hollywood has limited reach in literature, profound story telling from the greats — authors who will live the test of time and continue to speak to the souls of truth seekers and people interested in understanding the essence of living.

My personal journey started with finance and it’ll likely end there. Over the years I became immersed in one thing after the next — did things that looked foolish or odd to others — but made me happy. It’s like buying a new car, or applying a fresh coat of paint — when new, it’s fresh and brimming with aspiration and hope — promise for the future. That aspiration is rooted in the belief in happiness and equanimity — peacefulness. When that new item is proven to be a false hope — it’s quickly reviled, even hated, seen as an albatross more than anything else. It’s the passion that drives us to these extremes — the emotional investment wears thin and creates indifference and frustration.

All of these emotions and cycles repeat themselves over and over in every facet of your lives — careers, relationships, investments, hobbies etc. I haven’t found true peace yet and sometimes find myself falling back into old bad habits, exhibiting anger and frustration, or favoring comfort over industry.

Some people drink away their pain or mask their unhappiness with delusions — fantasies so strong that one cannot tell the difference between real or fake anymore. There is an unmistakable immaturity in brooding in melancholy — wasting time on things non-central to your lives — an opinion thrusted upon you by a careless malcontent, or a severely flawed family member. It took me a long time to realize this and truly accept it and not just say it — but the opinions of others are really not that important.

Take, for example, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Gatsby — a commercial failure upon its release — now considered a masterpiece with profound meaning and everlasting qualities.

I’m not an expert on living and cannot speak to you with authority on how you might find equanimity, but I do know that finding passion in something makes the days go quicker and the mind run vigorously. Break your routine and move outside of your comfort zones to experience new things — and maybe you’ll accidentally crash into something that changes your life for the better. You won’t know, lest you deviate from the norms.

Sigmund Fly