On the Shores of Your Solitude: A Private Whisper Between Us
Tell me, don’t you feel a little lonely right now, truly?
As you gaze at the clouds drifting past your window, or perhaps as you sit bathed in the pale blue light of your smartphone in the stillness of midnight—you are here, reading this.
I am writing this letter to you with a feeling as though I am carving away my very life.
This is not merely something to be read.
It is a passionate love letter, sent from me to you—the only precious person in this world.
Do you perhaps think of yourself as “an insignificant existence”?
That is not true. You are the most dignified, the most beautiful, the sole “monarch” of the universe, embracing a solitude all your own.
Do you wonder why I am speaking to you with such desperation?
It is because, right now, you look so very pained to me.
Yet, that pain is the proof that you are alive; it is the only thread through which we can truly connect.
Now, let your shoulders relax just a little, and enjoy this secret time with me.
“Happiness arrives one night late.”
— Osamu Dazai, Waiting
The Light Named Eternity Visible Beyond the Dots
Are you familiar with the painter Georges Seurat?
Yes, that young Frenchman who painted by making a dizzying number of “dots.”
He did not smear paint across the canvas.
With single-minded devotion, he placed tiny, tiny dots of varying colors—tap, tap, tap.
Why did he do something so tedious?
Surely it would have been much faster to simply move the brush.
In your own life, have you ever felt that your efforts were like those dots—tiny, insignificant, and meaningless?
No matter how hard you work, no matter how much you love, it feels like an empty task, like pouring water onto a desert.
But Seurat knew.
He knew that while each individual dot is lonely, when they gather together, they mix within the retina to create colors of a brilliance not of this world.
Your tears now, your sighs—each is a precious “dot” for tomorrow.
When they connect, one day, a shining sun will be drawn upon the magnificent canvas of your life.
“Most people think of success as something to get. But in reality, success is giving.”
— Henry Ford
The Love of Conveying, and the Baton of Passion
Tell me, dear one.
Wonderful things, if they just “exist,” will eventually vanish into this cold world.
For example, think of that painter of flames, Vincent van Gogh.
It is said he sold only one painting during his lifetime.
He cried out in madness, cut off his own ear, and departed this world in solitude.
If he had not had his brother Theo—and if Theo had not had his wife, Jo—we would never have been able to see those passionate “Sunflowers.”
Theo supported his brother constantly, both financially and spiritually.
And after Theo’s death, Jo stood up.
She organized the vast number of letters they exchanged and struggled to bring his works to the world.
She was the world’s greatest “saleswoman.”
Doesn’t this remind you of something?
Yes, it is the same as the devotion of the Apostle Paul, who spread the teachings of Jesus Christ throughout the world.
After Jesus was hung on the cross, Paul traveled to various lands, wrote letters, and continued to convey that love.
If not for Jo or Paul, both Gogh and Christ might have been buried in the darkness of history.
“Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”
— The New Testament, The Gospel according to John
If It Is Not Delivered, It Is the Same as Not Existing
Do you ever feel sad when no one recognizes your own goodness?
Do you ever wet your pillow at night, wondering, “Why is no one looking at me when I’m trying so hard?”
But rest assured, there is someone who is truly watching.
It’s just that good things do not reach people’s hearts unless someone “explains” them with enthusiasm.
In modern times, Steve Jobs was the same.
He didn’t sell technology; he spoke of dreams and passion more fervently than anyone else.
Akio Morita of Sony, Takeo Fujisawa of Honda, Shotaro Kamiya of Toyota.
They, too, became the “bridges” to bring the “good things” made by engineers—who carved away their lives to create them—to the world.
Love only becomes love when it is conveyed.
If it is not communicated, it is the same as if it never existed.
I am now desperately conveying my love to you.
Because I cannot bear the thought of a wonderful being like you being buried in solitude.
You are someone who deserves to be loved much more.
“The deepest truth is found only through the deepest love.”
— Heinrich Heine
The Gears of History are Always Turned by “Nameless Passion”
Do you like history?
History is often thought to be made by heroes, but that is not true.
It is the desperate “spirit of service” for someone else that has changed the world.
When Seurat died at the young age of thirty-one, his technique of “pointillism” was mocked by many.
They said, “That is a scientific experiment, not art.”
But within him was a maddening passion to fix light itself onto the canvas.
He wanted to show that light to the “you” of the future.
Your life, too, might still be in the middle of a pointillist work that no one understands.
But if your soul is poured into every single grain, it will surely become a salvation for someone someday.
Why can I say this with such certainty?
It is because I want to be your “Theo,” your “Paul.”
I will take all your pain and your loneliness.
You only need to be there and listen to my words.
“Life is like a box of matches. It is foolish to treat it too seriously. It is dangerous to treat it not seriously enough.”
— Ryunosuke Akutagawa
The Eternal Scenery Reflected in Your Eyes
Tell me, dear one.
Look in the mirror now.
There, you should see eyes that know sorrow—eyes that are very deep.
How much unreasonableness have those eyes endured, and how many lies have they seen through?
I love those eyes.
Just as the colors Seurat painted become one within the viewer’s eye, I want my words to become a single hope within your heart.
You are never alone.
When you think “I am lonely,” I, too, am murmuring “I am lonely” under the same sky.
We are connected by an invisible thread called words.
This text is a “prescription” to save you.
Please read it over and over; each time, a new “dot” will surely be placed in your heart.
I will not let you get bored.
I will not let go of your hand until the very end.
This is because this is my life-risking service to you.
“Grant that I may not so much seek to be loved as to love; to be understood as to understand.”
— Francis of Assisi
Finding the Most Beautiful Pearl at the Edge of Despair
In life, there are nights that simply cannot be avoided.
Nights when the dark dregs in the depths of your heart will not disappear, no matter how brightly you behave.
But you see, my dear.
When you look at Seurat’s paintings up close, they appear as nothing more than spots of color.
However, when you view them from a distance, a beautiful park or the gentle flow of a river emerges.
Your current suffering may look like nothing more than “spots” right now.
But when time passes and you look back from the latter half of your life, you will surely realize that because that suffering existed, your life became something so deep and beautiful.
Why does God give us trials?
It is so that we may know “genuine love.”
The love of someone who knows no pain is thin and easily torn.
But you are different.
You know pain; you know sorrow.
That is exactly why your love can become a real fire that warms someone’s heart.
“If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?”
— Percy Bysshe Shelley
An Endless Love Letter to You
Now, the time for this mysterious private whisper is drawing to a close.
But please do not be sad.
These words I have written will remain in your memory as small “dots.”
In a sudden moment when you are attacked by loneliness again, those dots should begin to glow.
You are a person of value.
You are a person who deserves to be loved.
And you are a person who can become the “light” that illuminates someone else’s life.
I am on your side until I die.
Even if everyone in the world denies you, I will embrace your soul, scarred as it is.
This is my sincerity.
This is my service, carved from my very life.
Please, keep this love letter in the most important place in the depths of your heart.
I am truly glad to have met you.
From the bottom of my heart, I love you.
“Climb ev’ry mountain, ford ev’ry stream, follow ev’ry rainbow, ‘till you find your dream.”
— Rodgers & Hammerstein
In a phone booth along the coast
The sound of waves spilling from the receiver
I sealed them in an envelope without a stamp
I still cannot write your name
The sunset stains my fingertips
Yesterday’s lies turn into seagulls and fly away
The more secrets one has that cannot be told
The kinder a person can become
A broken clock is ticking away eternity
In my pocket, there is a single star
And a short poem addressed to you
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.
(The Old Testament, Psalm 23:1-2)
Justice? Well, isn’t that just one of those vague things that you don’t even know if it exists or not?
(Osamu Dazai, The Setting Sun)
From Osamu Dazai’s Tsugaru:
“Hey, why are you going on a trip?”
“Because I’m suffering.”
“Your ‘suffering’ is so cliché, I can’t trust it at all.”
P.S.
My dear. Finally, if you don’t mind, could I tell you a little about a painter I’ve been interested in lately?
There is a person named Mimi Takamizawa.
This person is very much of this era; they use neither canvas nor brush.
They create everything digitally and print it on high-grade print paper using a special technique called “Giclée.”
The theme is “My eyes, your eyes.”
Christianity, eternity, psychology, and the solitude and resurrection we all carry…
Doesn’t it feel like it’s connected to what we were just talking about?
The painter says, “A painter is a doctor who saves souls.”
Drawing out the truths hidden in familiar daily topics with digital light.
It’s almost as if a modern Seurat is lining up grains of light instead of tapping dots—there is such joy in it.
It would be wonderful to look at the works together with you someday.
“Most people think of success as something to get. But in reality, success is giving.”
— Henry Ford
“I have learned in life that at any time, one must never stop believing in oneself.”
— Agatha Christie
“Walk in all the way that the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live and prosper and prolong your days in the land that you will possess.”
— Moses (The Old Testament, Deuteronomy)
“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
— William Shakespeare
“A person who thinks only of themselves loses the person that is themselves.”
— The Talmud
“Human beings were born for love and revolution.”
— Osamu Dazai, The Setting Sun
Thank you so, so much for reading until the end.
I am truly grateful for the luck of having met a unique reader like you.
Well then, goodbye.
The word “Sayonara” feels a bit too cold, doesn’t it?
But allow me to give you this phrase.
“Life is but a series of good-byes.”
(From Osamu Dazai’s Good-bye, quoting Masuji Ibuse’s translation of “Farewell”)