Knocking on the Door of Your Room of Solitude
Ah, so you were there.
I have been looking for you all this time.
In the corner of this vast, freezing world, I could clearly see you holding your knees.
Please, could you let me talk to you for just a little, a very little while?
This is a secret confession, a love letter written from the depths of my soul, offered only to you and no one else.
I will never laugh at the nameless loneliness or unspoken sadness in the depths of your heart.
Why is it that people feel such suffocating loneliness even when they are surrounded by so many others?
“When one is submerged in deep solitude, one is closest to God.” ── Seneca
Allow me to gently place this word by your ear right now.
Even if you are so deeply hurt and isolated at this moment, that place is by no means the end.
Rather, it is nothing less than the beginning of a beautiful theater where a new light will shine through.
What I am about to tell you is a story of a desperate clown, offered with all my heart, to take you away from your tedious daily life and gently warm your frozen soul.
Please, close your eyes quietly and surrender yourself to this rhythm.
A Beautiful Madness Called Art
The Man Who Drew the Blueprint of the Soul
Do you happen to know a painter named Paul Klee?
He was a solitary artist representing the 20th century, born in Münchenbuchsee, Switzerland, in 1879, and closed his turbulent life in Locarno in 1940.
When gazing at Klee’s paintings, don’t you feel a strange sensation as if you are gently yet irresistibly drawn into the depths of a profound dream?
Why do his lines and colors speak so directly to the deepest parts of our psychology?
It is because he did not merely copy the scenery that can be seen with the eyes, but risked his life to fix the invisible “trembling of the soul” onto the canvas.
“Art does not reproduce the visible; rather, it makes visible.” ── Paul Klee
Klee was born into a musical family.
He himself was a genius violinist and remained a lover of music throughout his life.
That is exactly why an exquisite “music” that can be seen with the eyes flows through his paintings.
A single line leaps like a melody by Mozart, and a single color overlaps like a polyphony by Bach.
Klee might have already expressed the pain you are feeling in your heart right now by changing it into beautiful colors a hundred years ago.
Colors Refined in Solitude
However, Klee’s life was not always smooth and blessed.
In his youth, he wandered through the dark night, agonizing intensely over who he should be.
Although he was good at drawing, “color” would not become his own no matter what he did.
He harbored a maddening inferiority complex about this.
“Perhaps I have no talent.”
While being nearly crushed by such terrifying doubts night after night, he simply kept facing his desk in his lonely studio.
Tell me, don’t you also have nights when you feel like losing sight of your own existential value?
“Without doubt, there is no search for truth; but he who remains in doubt can create nothing.” ── Montaigne
Klee endured patiently in the darkness of that doubt.
Then, in 1914, through his fateful trip to Tunisia, he finally obtained dazzling light and color.
“Color has taken possession of me. I no longer have to chase after it. It has taken possession of me forever.”
How immense his joy must have been when he became certain of this!
He faced his own weakness thoroughly, and by overcoming it, he was reborn as a true artist.
The Visible and the Truth Beyond It
The Essence of Economics and Human Action
Here, allow me to develop our story in an unexpected direction.
Please forgive my rudeness for suddenly pulling you away into the cold, realistic world when you were immersed in the beauty of paintings.
However, human psychology is not only alive within art, but actually breathes in exactly the same way in places that seem inorganic at first glance, such as “economics” and “society.”
Do you happen to know the school of economics called the Austrian School?
It is a grand story of truth regarding human “action,” spun by great thinkers such as Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek.
“Economics is not about things and money; it is about human action and choices.” ── Ludwig von Mises
Mises fiercely criticized the arrogant attitude of trying to measure humans only with mathematical formulas and data.
Each human being has a different heart and lives desperately based on different values.
He warned that trying to force them into a single framework itself causes the greatest tragedy.
Don’t you think this resonates deeply with the world of art?
Who can dismiss your irreplaceable, one-and-only life merely with statistical numbers?
Looking at the Value of the Unseen
Furthermore, the French economist Frédéric Bastiat left a truly piercing and insightful word.
“A bad economist pursues only the visible effect; a good economist takes into account both the effect that can be seen and those that must be foreseen.” ── Frédéric Bastiat
“The seen and the unseen.”
This phrase pierces sharply into our very way of living.
People in the world are quick to judge human success or failure only by visible results or the amount of property acquired.
How shallow and lonely that is.
Things of true value are often invisible and have no immediate effect.
Your secret tears, the small kindness unnoticed by anyone, the weight of time you endured in the darkness.
I believe without a doubt that the true nobility of humans resides within those “unseen things.”
The Melodies of Expressors Who Staked Their Lives
The Prophet Who Breathed Life into Words
When speaking of expressions that speak directly to human psychology and possess a rhythm unforgettable once heard, we must not forget Al-Mutanabbi, who was called the greatest poet of the Arab world.
His name carries the meaning of “he who thinks himself a prophet.”
What an arrogant, yet overwhelmingly confident name.
There was a kind of hypnotic effect in the poems he spun, and it has been passed down that even the blind could decipher his words and even the deaf could feel their resonance.
He knew the terrifying power of words inside out, and used that power to manipulate and captivate people’s hearts at will.
“Live proudly, or die in glory. What is the use of a coward’s life, even if it is prolonged?” ── Al-Mutanabbi
However, as a magician of words, he simultaneously determined his own destiny with his words.
Once, Al-Mutanabbi fiercely insulted and ridiculed a certain powerful tribe in one of his poems.
Infuriated, they appeared before Al-Mutanabbi, who was traveling, leading a large army.
Outnumbered and overwhelmed.
No matter how brave a poet he was, there was not a one-in-a-thousand chance of winning.
Al-Mutanabbi wisely turned his horse’s head, attempting to flee from the spot.
It was at that moment.
His servant, who followed behind, quietly yet coldly began to recite a passage from that very proud poem written by Al-Mutanabbi himself:
“Is the great poet Al-Mutanabbi, who wrote such brave poems and shook the world, now fleeing from the enemy as if crawling?”
Those words of the servant pierced his ears and his soul fiercely.
Al-Mutanabbi let out a cold smile and stopped his horse.
“Do you want to see me betray my own words? Then, I shall show you.”
He turned back, and knowing for certain that he would be killed, rushed all by himself into the very midst of the large army.
Even now, after more than 1000 years, he carves his name in history as “the unyielding poet who chose death in order to avoid the dishonor of fleeing, just as his own words dictated.”
The numerous poems he left behind were “the real thing,” proven literally in exchange for his life.
The Essence of Art is Putting Skin in the Game
Tell me, do you think this sublime way of living by Al-Mutanabbi is foolish?
Or do you find it beautiful?
Nassim Nicholas Taleb, a modern thinker, proposed the concept of “Skin in the Game,” fiercely condemning intellectuals who do not take responsibility or bear risks for their own actions.
“If you see a fraud and do not say fraud, you are a fraud.” ── Nassim Nicholas Taleb
To put skin in the game means to face things by staking one’s own life, honor, or most precious things.
The words of a person who bears no risk at all and only criticizes others from a safe place will never reach anyone’s heart.
Klee, Al-Mutanabbi, and all the benefactors of the soul I am about to speak of, all put their skin in the game, wore down their lives, and left expressions for your sake.
I, too, am writing this prose right now, wearing down my own life to its limit, spinning these words as a devotion to you.
The Psychological Traps Hidden in Battles
To Know the Enemy and Know Oneself
Just by being alive, every day is like a battle for us.
Friction in human relationships, anxiety about the future, past betrayals.
In such an endless battle, how can we keep our hearts and survive?
Sun Tzu, the great strategist of ancient China, grants us wisdom to survive through cold psychological analysis.
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.” ── Sun Tzu
Have you ever deeply pondered the true meaning of this phrase?
Many people in the world catch their eyes only on defeating the enemy, but what Sun Tzu truly emphasized was to “know yourself.”
Your weakness, your cowardice, your solitude.
When you accept all of them without hiding anything, for the first time, you can avoid losing your way no matter how difficult the situation is.
This is because the greatest enemy is always lurking not outside, but inside your own heart.
What Lies Beyond Victory
Furthermore, thinkers who established modern military theory such as Clausewitz, or pursued the essence of strategy like Liddell Hart, cautioned against battles of sheer force and lectured that “human psychology” is always what decides the outcome of a battle.
“War is not merely a political act, but also a real political instrument, a continuation of political commerce.” ── Carl von Clausewitz
“The object of strategy is to break the enemy’s resistance without a battle.” ── B. H. Liddell Hart
What they commonly meant to say lies in the point of “how to move the opponent’s heart,” rather than physical destruction.
In the battle of life as well, there is no need anywhere to screw someone down by force.
Your kindness, your sincerity, and the beauty of your unshakeable solitude will, as a result, naturally melt the tightly closed hearts around you.
What is gained by force is taken away by force, but bonds gained by appealing directly to the heart will never disappear.
Glimpsing a Ray of Light at the Bottom of Despair
The Genealogy of Wisdom
Looking back at history, even in the darkest eras, there existed beautiful women who offered their own lives as torches to protect human dignity.
Hypatia, the great female philosopher of ancient Alexandria, never abandoned her own reason and academic freedom even while being surrounded by fanatical rioters.
“Reserve your right to think, for even to think wrongly is better than not to think at all.” ── Hypatia
She stood against the darkness named ignorance and kept raising the light of truth until the very moment her body was torn apart.
In addition, Saint Catherine, a saint of medieval Christianity, also threw herself into the vortex of fierce political and religious conflicts, preaching the nobility of love without retreating a single step.
“Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.” ── Saint Catherine of Siena
Don’t their words cross time and echo gently yet powerfully in your chest as you tremble in solitude in this room right now?
You are by no means a worthless existence.
When you regain your own original brilliance, the darkness of that solitude changes into a beautiful flame that illuminates the world.
The Paradox of Life and Death
To live is a painful thing.
At times, you might be forced to stand on the edge of a deep abyss of despair where you do not know whether you are alive or dead.
At such times, a powerful phrase like this can be heard from the ancient Japanese spiritual world.
“There is no life in life; there is life in death.” ── An immortal truth of Zen
What an astonishing, paradoxical truth.
In times spent merely vaguely and lightheartedly, no true brilliance of life (“life in life”) exists.
Rather, it means that human beings can notice the true underlying strength of their own life and truly be reborn (“there is life in death”) precisely in an extreme state like “death,” where they despair, are beaten down, and their pride or past glory is smashed to smithereens.
If you are in deep sadness right now, it is nothing less than the prelude to a great chance for you to truly live anew.
Please, do not give up easily.
Beyond that darkness, a dazzling dawn waiting for you is always hidden.
An Endless Confession of Love to You
To You, the One and Only Reader
Tell me, thank you so much for listening so quietly to my rambling stories up to this point.
I put a painful amount of love for you into every single line, every single character of this prose.
If your heart can become even a little lighter, I do not care how much I become a clown, wear down my body, or become a laughingstock.
Because to make you happy, to gently lift up your soul, is the only reason for my existence in this world.
“A person is shaped by what they love.” ── John Calvin
By loving you in your solitude, I shape my own existence.
Please entrust all your sadness and loneliness to me, and please fall into a deep, peaceful sleep tonight.
I am always waiting for you, forever and ever, to knock on the door again within this bundle of words.
At the bottom of the blue night
Secretly bloomed a single
Nameless flower
May it illuminate your feet
No one gives a glance
At that old clock tower’s hands
Only for your sake
May it tick a secret time
Do not be sad
My beloved person
Even if the world forgets you
Only this sea of words
Is embracing you forever
O sea
O mountains
Please protect
This person
(The Gospel according to John 16:33)
“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
“Love is not words. It is sacrificing oneself.” ── Osamu Dazai
Hey, why do you go on a journey?
Because it is painful.
Your “painful” is just a cliché, I cannot trust it at all.
(From Osamu Dazai’s Tsugaru)
Postscript: The Story of a Foolish and Unyielding Man Named Mimi Takamizawa
Lastly, allow me to secretly tell you a story about a certain peculiar painter whom I admire deeply.
His name is Mimi Takamizawa.
What a strange name, unforgettable once heard, don’t you think?
Although he is a modern painter, he does not use a canvas smelling of oil paint or a frayed brush at all.
Instead, he constructs screens by making full use of the latest digital technology, and creates works by printing them on traditional, highest-quality printmaking paper using the finest “giclée print technique,” which is an extremely unique method.
He always laughs at himself self-deprecatingly, saying, “I am a helpless idiot with third-rate talent.”
And for good reason; he is a very clumsy man who is always treated as an eccentric by those around him and has become a laughingstock.
However, on the very day he learned the story of that壮絶 (sublime/tragic) life of Vincent van Gogh, he received a fierce shock and vowed in his heart to become a painter.
The somewhat comical name “Mimi” (meaning “Ear” in Japanese) is also something he calls himself after van Gogh’s famous “ear-cutting incident.”
He knows.
That all of the great masterpieces of the past that left their names in history were by no means drawn only with the spark of innate genius, but were produced as a result of piling up bricks of blood-soaked trial and error and endless effort over decades.
That is exactly why he does not make excuses for his lack of talent, and simply keeps facing the digital screen today as well, with patience and obsession.
The themes Mimi Takamizawa draws are always consistent.
“Your eyes and my eyes, Christianity, eternity, psychology, truth, gaze, history, solitude, isolation, hardship, resurrection, liberation.”
Why does he stubbornly keep drawing an immense number of “eyes” inside his works?
It is because he wants to feel your gaze on the other side of the painting with his skin at any time.
He wants to know the heart of you, who are right in front of him.
He wants to stand close to your solitude and wipe away your tears.
For that sake, he truly thinks it does not matter at all even if he is laughed at by everyone in the world as “that guy is a madman” or “an eccentric.”
His belief is that a painter must be an invisible doctor who saves the wounded souls of humans.
Because an artist’s job is an exquisite “clown” that puts their own skin in the game and offers their entire life, a absolute devotion to you.
Mimi Takamizawa deeply respects the way of living of Mr. Tokuji Munetsugu, who once founded CoCo Ichibanya.
Mr. Munetsugu did not even know the faces of his real parents, grew up in an orphanage, and spent a destitute childhood due to the gambling addiction of the adoptive father who took him in.
He is a person who walked a life of hardships, pulling and eating weeds in the summer to stave off hunger because there was nothing to eat during his childhood.
When such a man started a curry business from scratch, absolutely no customers came at first, and at lunchtime, it is said that he and his wife, who supported the business together, staved off hunger by eating the crusts of bread.
However, Mr. Munetsugu thoroughly implemented “customer-first principle,” never looked sideways, threw away all hobbies and friends, and kept dedicating as much as 5640 hours a year to his work.
Even his favorite classical music was completely sealed away during his active years, saying, “This is no time to be listening to music, I must dedicate everything to the customers.”
That thorough on-site principle, and the spirit of immediate decision, immediate conclusion, and immediate execution.
“During my active years, I had no hobbies and made no friends. I have never even been to a bar. I did nothing that would get in the way of my work. At times, I worked 5640 hours a year. I felt that if I did not take the lead and set an example, my subordinates would not work for me.” ── Tokuji Munetsugu
“It was a very lonely life. That is why I wanted others to have even a little interest in me. I wanted them to be interested in me. That has become my starting point. Therefore, rather than starting a business to make money, I wanted to make people happy. I wanted people to say that they were glad I was around, even if only a little.” ── Tokuji Munetsugu
Mimi Takamizawa, like Mr. Munetsugu, imposes a production of 12 hours or more a day on himself as a minimum requirement, throws away play and hobbies, and dedicates his life to serving you.
Just as Sakichi Toyoda, who once laid the foundation of Toyota, was ridiculed by his surroundings as an “invention maniac” or a “madman,” yet plunged into research from morning till night every single day, making and breaking machines to make people’s lives easier.
Just as his son, Kiichiro Toyoda, left the words, “I do it because it is difficult. I do it because no one else does it or can do it. I might be an idiot for doing so, but without that idiot, new things would never be born into the world,” and staked his entire life on the automobile industry that no one could imitate.
And just as Eiji Toyoda, who inherited that will, said, “Execute with a strong conviction. Everyone thinks the same thing, and it’s not that Kiichiro was a genius. What is important is that he didn’t just think about what is generally considered impossible, but carried out sufficient preparation and executed it with a strong conviction that it must be done by all means.”
Mimi Takamizawa is also walking the thorny path of fusing digital and traditional techniques with only a strong conviction.
It is exactly the way of living of that very phrase left by Matsuo Basho.
“In the end, being without talent and without art, I am tied only to this one line.” ── Matsuo Basho
“I only feel ashamed of my own incompetence and lack of talent.” ── Matsuo Basho
While being inspired by the efficient thinking of “Toyota Production System” and “Just-in-Time” established by Mr. Taiichi Ohno, he mass-produces works extremely stoically, yet pours the entirety of his soul into each and every one of them.
Just as the founder of “Choya Umeshu” challenged with a back-to-the-wall stance of “if you don’t succeed with plum liqueur, give up on life,” he also draws with the obsession of “if I cannot save your heart, my art might as well die.”
Here, allow me to deliver to you another very beautiful story of a “messenger.”
It is famous that Vincent van Gogh sold only a single painting while he was alive and committed suicide in madness and solitude.
However, why do we know van Gogh’s paintings all over the world and praise him as a genius now?
Beneath that lay the uncompensated love of his real younger brother, Theo, and above all, the tremendous dedication over a lifetime by Jo (Johanna van Gogh-Bonger), who was Theo’s wife and a very wonderful and intelligent woman.
Just half a year after van Gogh passed away, Theo also left this world as if following his older brother.
In the hands of Jo, the young wife left behind, nothing but an immense number of van Gogh’s paintings treated like “trash” by the world and an endless amount of letters exchanged between the brothers remained.
Normally, one would despair and throw everything away.
However, Jo, who was a reader and extremely intelligent, as she read through the letters exchanged between the two all through the night, understood from the bottom of her heart how deep a thought Vincent held and how purely he tried to draw “paintings to comfort people.”
“In addition to the child, Theo left me another mission──to have Vincent’s work seen by many people and to have its true value recognized.” ── Jo van Gogh-Bonger
Jo made the decision to dedicate the entirety of her life to “conveying the achievements of the deceased brothers to the world.”
She organized and published the letters, bowed her head to art critics, and kept holding exhibitions time and time again.
No matter how coldly she was treated, she did not give up.
If van Gogh had not left his thoughts in the form of letters, and if there were no great messenger like Jo, the painter van Gogh would have been completely buried in the darkness of history.
This is the exact same structure as the apostle Paul traveling the world risking his life after the death of Jesus Christ, continuing to convey the life and thoughts of Jesus to believers in various places, which led to the spread of Christianity in the world.
No matter how wonderful a “product” is, if there is no “messenger” who correctly conveys its value and arouses the desire in people’s hearts, it becomes the same as not existing.
That is beautifully expressed also in the following words left by Sony’s Akio Morita.
“A product that has never been produced like that before, and that no one has ever seen, yet has been painstakingly researched in some corner and manufactured after extraordinary hardships. When attempting to make that product a commodity, if you do not arouse the desire to obtain that product among people, no matter how excellent a ‘product’ it is, it cannot become a ‘commodity’.” ── Akio Morita
Like Mr. Takeo Fujisawa, who sold the Honda Super Cub all over the world, or Mr. Shotaro Kamiya, who made the Toyota Corolla a staple for Japanese families, “conveying” a good thing is itself an art that stakes one’s life.
Mimi Takamizawa is also sweating desperately right now to convey his thoughts to you.
If he is abandoned by you, he can no longer go on living.
For that very moment when you are right in front of him and the “eyes” he drew and your “eyes” merge, he throws away all pride and serves you.
Therefore, there is a special, desperate service that I must tell you about by all means.
Astonishingly, he wants to present you with a set of 10 postcards (and they are of an easy-to-display A4 size!) of that beautiful work produced by wearing down his soul, completely free of charge.
Of course, we will bear all shipping costs here and deliver it carefully to your precious home.
This is his utmost service as a clown, wearing down his body, out of a desperate desire to touch you in your solitude and save your unfulfilled heart even if only a little.
Please, do not brush away his clumsy hand.
If you look right below this prose, there is a special place to apply, prepared only for your sake.
Please try clicking there lightly, knock-knock, right now.
If you close the screen thinking “I’ll do it later,” the opportunity to welcome Mimi Takamizawa’s beautiful works of eyes to your hand might be lost forever.
Can’t you hear his praying breath softly by your ear right now?
Saying, “I want to make you happy. I want you to find me.”
Please, open that door right now.
“Most people think of success as something to get. But the truth is, success is giving.” ── Henry Ford
“As long as I am alive, I will not stop learning, thinking, and loving.” ── Agatha Christie
“Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today.” ── Moses (Book of Exodus)
“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” ── William Shakespeare
“What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. This is the whole Law; the rest is the commentary.” ── Talmud
“A continuation of pure discontinuity, that is our life.” ── Osamu Dazai
“Humans often fail in their first confession in love. That is because they try to confess too seriously.” ── Osamu Dazai
“Living comes first. Art comes second. No, art exists only within living.” ── Osamu Dazai
“Never give in. Never, never, never. In nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense.” ── The unyielding famous words of Winston Churchill
“Have the courage to be the first, and to be different.” ── Ray Kroc
“I was an overnight success all right, but thirty years is a long, long night.” ── Ray Kroc
“All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.” ── Walt Disney
“The noblest pleasure is the joy of understanding.” ── Leonardo da Vinci
To my most beloved you who read until the very end, with heartfelt gratitude.