I love this piece by Katsumi. You can see more of her work here, and the Zen Pencils feature here. Reading about her journey was such an inspiration for me. Most of her work are in Portuguese, but she has a good number of pieces translated to English as well. There is something special about this piece that reminds me of where I stand in life.
There was a two-year period during my mid-20s when I rented and lived inside a garage. As a self-identified minimalist, living in a garage was the perfect way to stay consistent with my core values. Naturally due to space limitations, accumulating stuff was not an option. I lived a very simple life, as my daily routine consisted of the following, and not much more:
-Simple meals
-Teaching
-Music
-Sleep
I don’t live in a garage anymore, but I maintain a very simple lifestyle to this day. Other than my musical instruments, I do not have much possessions. Because I love music so much, I doubt that any material possession will make me as happy as simply having the time to play music.
It is ironic that society ingrains in us the idea that we need to make more money and buy more things, while psychological research reveals the exact opposite truth; the more materialistic the person, the less happy they are.
The holiday season is a good time to reflect on the values by which we live. While the media tells us to go hit up those mega sales in stores everywhere, I can’t help but wonder how much of our values are tragically shaped by this consumer society driven by profit-seeking corporations. Keep in mind that these advertisements were specifically designed for the sole purpose of putting more money in the pockets of the corporations and their investors, with absolutely no regard to the well-being of the consumer. It angers me because they do it so cleverly, showing people who appear so happy consuming the products that they don’t actually need. Why should anyone expect to be better off by following their advice?
Whether we like it or not, life is short; it’s a mere instance of time in the scheme of the universe. Pretty soon, we will all approach the end of it. When that day comes, would we have any regrets, and if so, about what? I doubt that any of us will regret that we did not buy enough nice things. We might, however, regret that we did not spend enough time with our loved ones, nor express often enough just how important they are to us. Or maybe we’ll regret that we did not follow our dreams to make a positive impact in this world beyond ourselves, because after all, isn’t that the sole purpose of life? We didn’t come into this world simply to exist, pay bills, and die.
If you woke up this morning happy about what you are about to do today, chances are that your life is well-aligned to your values. If not, you’re not alone. We’ve all experienced those periods in our lives. Life certainly isn’t always great, and everybody struggles through the tough times during which we grapple with the idea of reevaluating and readjusting our course.
Change is actually not as scary as it seems. Rather, it is exciting. The country’s founding forefathers thought that it’d be important for us to have the right to the “pursuit of happiness”, but life is actually about the “happiness of pursuit”. When we stop pursuing and growing, we start to lose track of the meaning behind everything that we do.
May your 2016 be filled with growth,
Shin
