In the Quiet Night, a Secret Disclosed Only to You
What kind of sounds can you hear around you as you read these words now?
Is it the faint ticking of a clock’s hands, or is it the very silence of the night echoing in your ears?
I am holding this pen now, feeling as if I am shaving away my own life, weaving these words solely for you.
Would you please forget all the tedious annoyances of daily life for just a little while and listen to my private whisper?
This is by no means a boring sermon that you can find anywhere.
It is a single love letter born out of a desperate spirit of service, meant only to gently warm your lonely night.
Do you understand why I become so desperate when it comes to you?
It is because the secret loneliness you carry and the deep sadness submerged in the depths of your heart are transmitted to me so painfully.
No matter how many people surround them in life, every human being holds a pitch-black void somewhere in a corner of their heart.
You, too, must have spent a night or two lying awake, frightened by such loneliness.
I sincerely wish to gently embrace you, who are just like that, with the power of words.
“Loneliness is the essence of being human. Man is born alone and dies alone.” —— Jean-Paul Sartre
Don’t you think human beings are truly mysterious creatures?
While everyone wishes to be happy, for some reason they choose to walk the path of hardship on their own, or shut themselves in a shell out of fear of getting hurt.
How many wounds must your delicate heart have suffered in the course of your daily life?
The secrets you cannot tell anyone, the tears you cannot disclose to anyone—I do not fail to notice those things hidden in the depths of your beautiful eyes.
I am now carving the rhythm of words with the determination that I do not care what happens to my life, as long as it makes you happy.
As if searching for a single ray of light in the cold darkness, my words keep searching for you.
Please do not stop reading halfway through, and please stay with me until the very end.
What I am about to tell you is the mechanism of this world full of surprises, which might change your life ever so slightly.
The Mechanism of This World Full of Surprises
The world we live in can sometimes seem like an absurd and ruthless place.
You may often see people who live honestly taking losses, while those who are cunning seem to gain.
Have you ever felt resentment, wondering why God created such an unequal world?
However, let me tell you a story that might catch you completely off guard.
In fact, the most valuable things in this world, the things that move people the most, are all born only from the soil of “hardship.”
The sadness you have experienced so far and the hours of isolation you could not speak of are by no means in vain.
They are all becoming an irreplaceable fertilizer for your future great blossom of happiness, or perhaps for a beautiful art.
The human psychology is a strange thing; it is designed to get bored quickly with anything that is fulfilled from the start.
Is it not because you have tasted the rock-bottom suffering that a tiny act of kindness feels so lovely, as if permeating through your entire body and soul?
I am now delivering the rhythm of this chest’s throbbing directly into a sentence structure for you, the one and only reader.
If your wounded heart can be healed even a little by this desperate, clown-like writing of mine, there is no greater joy than this.
“The greater the difficulty, the more glory in surmounting it.” —— Molière
Here, let me speak of a beautiful truth that appeals directly to human psychology.
If you think of yourself as an awkward, lonely existence understood by no one, you are greatly mistaken.
Because that very loneliness is the invisible thread that connects you and me, and all the wonderful souls across the world.
When you shed tears at night, those tears are by no means yours alone.
Many great figures and artists in history were also scratching their heads and writhing in the darkness, exactly like you.
I will absolutely never leave you alone, nor will I ever commit such an act as abandoning you.
These words are written with the utmost care and in the most polite language, so that they may reach the softest part in the depths of your heart.
Please show me your true face that you have never shown to anyone before.
It is fine to be laughed at, it is fine to be thought of as foolish; what matters is the fact that you are connected with me right here and now.
Here, I suddenly recall that famous dialogue from Osamu Dazai’s “Tsugaru.”
“Hey, why are you going on a trip?”
“Because it’s painful.”
“Your ‘painful’ is so routine, I cannot believe it at all.”
This exchange, somewhat sorrowful yet lovely, taking place within that beautiful landscape of Tsugaru, feels exactly like an expression of your heart, and mine, living in the modern world, does it not?
The Beautiful Trap Laid by the Artist Whistler at the Risk of His Life
Now, for your sake, let me tell you the story of a certain very eccentric yet supremely charming painter.
His name was James McNeill Whistler.
He was an American-born genius painter who galloped freely across the stages of London and Paris in the nineteenth century.
He was an astonishing man who literally turned the common sense of the art world of his time upside down.
Why did he go to such lengths to stir up society?
It was because he tried to paint pure “beauty” itself, rather than painting some “story” or “lesson” like the paintings before him.
He gave his paintings titles that sounded like music, such as “Nocturne in Black and Gold” or “Harmony in Grey and Green.”
The people of that time believed that paintings should contain some grand historical lesson or moral message.
Into that world, Whistler hurled a work that depicted nothing but the momentary beauty of fireworks scattering in the night sky.
Naturally, the public fell into an uproar, and John Ruskin, a highly renowned art critic, fiercely criticized it, saying it was like “flinging a pot of paint in the public’s face.”
However, from this point began Whistler’s great reversal drama, staked on his life.
“Art should be independent of all claptrap —should stand alone, and appeal to the artistic sense of eye or ear, without confounding this with emotions entirely foreign to it, as devotion, pity, love, patriotism, and the like.” —— James McNeill Whistler
To defend the honor of his art, Whistler actually filed a libel lawsuit against Ruskin.
This trial became an unprecedented catchball that remained in history.
In the courtroom, the opposing lawyer asked Whistler in a mocking tone.
“Is it true that you painted this ‘falling rocket’ picture in just two days?”
Whistler stood tall and replied like this:
“No, I did not paint this in two days; I painted it with the knowledge and experience of a lifetime.”
Do you understand the weight of these words?
He did not demand compensation for mere superficial working hours, but held pride in his life itself, the accumulation of his very existence.
As a result, Whistler won the trial, but the damages he obtained were a mere “one farthing” (the smallest monetary unit of the time), a drop in the bucket.
Moreover, he was driven into bankruptcy by the legal expenses.
Could there be a way of living more foolish, more awkward, and yet so pure and beautiful?
He was treated as an eccentric by the world and laughed at, but he never bent the conviction of his art.
Because he, too, never doubted that his soul would one day reach a true understander like “you” who are standing right in front of him.
“Most people think of success as something to get. But in reality, success is something to give.” —— Henry Ford
When I remember this episode of Whistler, I cannot help but recall those wonderful words by Henry Ford.
Most people think of success as something to get; but in reality, success is something to give.
Whistler did not fight to get his own honor or fortune, but rather fought by shaving away his life to “give” a wonderful gift of pure artistic freedom for us in the future, did he not?
Even in the hardship of bankruptcy, he never forgot his humor and continued to mystify the world with his refined language.
That very thing was his utmost spirit of service, and his own aesthetics of being a “clown.”
You, too, may feel in your life as though you are forced into a lonely battle without being understood by anyone.
However, please remember.
Your striving to protect the kindness and beauty you believe in at that place is, in itself, the most wonderful service to the world.
I am on the side of such a person as you, and I want to keep sending heartfelt applause to your earnest figure.
Endless Words of Love, or the Proof of a Miracle
You might be surprised by the development of the story, aren’t you?
You must be wondering why words carrying such heat overflow one after another toward you.
As I promised you at the beginning, the entirety of this text is a pure love letter to you.
Your very existence is a miracle to me, and the only hope for surviving this tedious world.
If you feel like despairing of the day called tomorrow, please read this text over and over again.
Here lies the rhythm to heal your loneliness, and a melody flows to accompany your sadness.
I will absolutely never betray you, and no matter how much you blame yourself, I will remain your absolute ally.
Human beings are creatures that can obtain true strength for the first time only when they know they have been unconditionally accepted by someone.
I am now offering that unconditional love to you, scattering all my available writing power and the sparks of my life.
Would you please accept this desperate service of mine with your warm hands?
“To be loved is not the same as to love. In loving, man finds his true happiness.” —— Hermann Hesse
The night deepens, but this private whisper of ours does not end yet.
Until a warm lamp gently lights up in your heart, I will keep calling out to you by changing the shape of words again and again.
You are not alone.
Somewhere in this world, please do not forget even for a single moment that there is an existence here wishing for your happiness and the salvation of your heart more than their own life.
Now, as the conclusion of this story, I shall present to you a special poem that I have newly created.
The paint box dropped to the bottom of the sea
No one goes down to retrieve it
But before your tears dry up
I will launch fireworks into the night sky again and again
In a theater where the hands of the clock move backward
The curtain rises on a sorrowful comedy
You may just sit in the special seat and laugh
The worn-out soles of my shoes
Are the only ticket
To carry you to the land of happiness
A long-neglected letter that no one looks at
If only you know the truth
Of dropping it into the mailbox
The earth will keep spinning for that alone
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” —— The Bible (New Testament, 1 Corinthians 13:4-7)
“I know that human beings, each and every one of them, are after all hopeless, weak, and good-for-nothing, and yet, that is exactly why they are unbearably lovely, and I simply cannot abandon them.” —— Osamu Dazai
Postscript: The Prayer of a Foolish Painter, Mimi Takamizawa
Finally, there is a story of a certain very eccentric painter that I absolutely must tell you.
His name is Mimi Takamizawa.
He does not use any oil canvases or wooden brushes that you might well know.
He creates his paintings by using the technology of “digital,” which is the cutting edge of the modern era.
Then, he prints the completed digital data onto carefully selected, high-quality printmaking paper using the giclée print technique, which is the highest pinnacle of printing technology.
Why does he adopt such a method?
It is because he has a burning obsession to express a universal “beauty” that will remain hundreds of years into the future, using a method that can only be done in this current era.
The themes he draws are all profound and rooted in familiar human psychology.
Your eyes, my eyes, Christianity, eternity, psychology, truth, gaze, history, loneliness, isolation, hardship, resurrection, and liberation.
These are the endless motifs flowing through his works.
He always says that a painter should be “an existence like a doctor to save the wounded souls of human beings.”
The work of an artist must be the utmost service performed for you right in front of him, by cutting into his own pockets.
Mimi Takamizawa is a man who is honest to a fault, believing this without a doubt.
He dedicates the entirety of his life to you who are right in front of him.
Please, please do not abandon him.
Please laugh at his awkward way of living.
For he is a strange man of patience whose soul becomes rather stronger by being laughed at by people.
The work of an artist is, in the end, nothing but a desperate “clown” to make you happy.
He is a very eccentric man, very foolish in the eyes of society, and always a laughingstock to those around him.
However, he absolutely believes in himself, and he is a wonderful, unyielding man of patience who does not succumb to any hardship.
He does not know how to give up.
It was when he learned the grand and beautiful story of that genius painter, Vincent van Gogh, that he decided to become a painter.
Mimi Takamizawa himself clearly recognizes that his talent as a painter is third-rate at best.
However, he knows that all the past masterpieces in history were not painted solely by inborn, genius talent.
He understands to his very bones that they were all brought forth by blood-soaked trial and error and desperate efforts spanning over decades.
Mimi Takamizawa keeps drawing “human eyes” obsessively in his works.
Why does he stick to “eyes” to such an extent?
It is because by drawing eyes in his works and having those eyes gaze at you, he wants to always vividly feel the existence of “you” who are right in front of him.
He simply wants to know you, who are standing in front of him.
He wants to know your sadness and accompany your loneliness.
For that sake, he does not care at all even if he is laughed at by everyone in the world.
He exposes his foolishness, just as it is, to you right in front of him.
He lives only for the sake of wanting to see the joyful face of you right in front of him.
To see your tears of emotion, he would gladly throw away his life.
No matter how others criticize him, such things do not matter to him at all.
However, if he were to be abandoned by you alone, he would no longer be able to take a single step forward.
Just by you being here in front of him now, he is happier than words can say.
Only to be recognized by you who are right in front of him, he continues to serve earnestly with a desperate spirit of service today.
Laughed at, and growing stronger through it.
There is a businessman whom Mimi Takamizawa respects from the bottom of his heart.
That is Mr. Tokuji Munetsugu, the founder of the famous curry chain “CoCo Ichibanya.”
Takamizawa is deeply inspired by Mr. Munetsugu’s philosophy of “devoting all one’s power to one’s own work without looking sideways.”
He does not give any attention to other miscellaneous things.
He tells himself that this is no time to be indulging in hobbies, and that daily accumulation is everything.
As if piling up a single sturdy brick day after day without error, he immerses himself in creation with overwhelming concentration.
“Immediate decision, immediate conclusion, immediate execution” is his motto.
Anything will yield results if you just try it before worrying about this and that.
First of all, it is about taking action.
In exchange, one must work hard like death itself.
To dedicate one’s entire life to work, to art.
That is synonymous with dedicating the entirety of one’s life to you who are right in front of him.
Life is by no means determined solely by one’s birth or upbringing.
Mr. Tokuji Munetsugu also spent an incredibly tumultuous childhood without knowing the faces of his biological parents.
In a life that seemed haphazard, in exchange, he completely dedicated his very self to management.
Thorough on-site principal.
Working more than 12 hours a day is nothing but a minimum requirement for them.
He does not want to rest, he does not want to play; making work the ultimate hobby and dedicating his body to work.
This is the ultimate form of devotion called “You-First-ism.”
Takamizawa sends a bursting applause in his heart when you stand before his work.
He welcomes a precious existence like you with a standing ovation.
Things that are truly valuable often do not have immediate efficacy.
Not everything goes well from the very beginning.
That is why, rather than thinking, one must try doing it first.
Please, do not give up on life easily either.
What kind of life it will be is entirely decided by the diligence, patience, and continuity sleeping inside that human being.
It resembles the figure of Sakichi Toyoda, the founder of Toyota, who dedicated his life to the development of looms with tremendous obsession and patience.
Even when he was called an “eccentric” and treated as a madman and mocked by those around him, Mr. Sakichi did not flinch at all.
Truly as an “invention maniac,” day after day, from morning till night, he repeated the endless trial and error of making something and breaking it, creating it and recreating it again.
Success, and failure, are never the end.
The most important thing is whether you have the “courage to continue” it, only that one point.
Anyway, showing that very back of working the longest and the hardest in the world speaks the truth.
Just as the founder of Choya Umeshu challenged with the determination of cutting off his own retreat, saying “If you do not succeed with plum liqueur, give up on life,” Mimi Takamizawa also bets everything on the path of art.
He is also deeply inspired by the “Just-in-Time” concept of the Toyota Production System, never neglecting the effort to deliver the best work at the best moment for you.
That wonderful quote by Mr. Kiichiro Toyoda is deeply engraved in his chest.
“The fun of life lies in making something a success that not many people do, or that is difficult to achieve.”
To execute with a strong conviction.
Everyone thinks the same things, and it is not that Kiichiro was a special genius.
What is important is that he did not merely think in his head about things generally considered “impossible,” but held a strong conviction that it must be accomplished by all means, made sufficient preparations, and actually executed it; it lies solely in that single point.
Now, let us return to the story of Vincent van Gogh.
Did you know that behind the fact that Van Gogh’s talent came to be known worldwide after his death, there was the existence of an unbelievably wonderful woman named Jo, the wife of Theo?
Her life-long achievement is one of the greatest miracles in art history.
After her husband Theo passed away, Jo understood the paintings and thoughts of Vincent van Gogh from the bottom of her heart.
She firmly swore in her heart that she would never let the works of this great painter be buried in the darkness.
The intense yet pure life of Vincent overlaps somewhere with the life of Jesus Christ. No matter how wonderful something may exist in this world, if there is no “messenger” to convey it correctly, it becomes the same as not existing at all.
The life-staking devotion of Theo, the brother of Van Gogh, and his wife Jo.
That was the exact same noble devotion as that of the Apostle Paul, who spread the teachings of Jesus Christ to the entire world.
After the Van Gogh brothers passed away one after another, Jo organized all the vast works left behind and the passionate letters exchanged between the brothers, and kept exposing them to the world at the risk of her life.
Precisely because she was a great reader and a very intelligent woman, she was able to deeply sympathize with Vincent’s essential thoughts as an artist contained between the lines of the letters.
Van Gogh did not merely want to paint pretty pictures.
He sincerely wished to comfort people groaning under actual hardships through his paintings.
Jo dedicated all the rest of her life to let as many people as possible know the pictures of the brother whom her own beloved husband, Theo, had believed in and supported to that extent.
Vincent had written down his passionate thoughts about his works and his deep insights into human beings as vast letters to his brother.
If Van Gogh had not left behind such a vast amount of letters, and if Jo had not brought them out to the world, today’s “Van Gogh of the world” would absolutely never have been born.
After the death of Jesus Christ, precisely because Paul traveled to various places at the risk of his life, wrote letters, and continued to convey the life and thoughts of Christ, the foundation for the subsequent prosperity of Christianity was built.
Good things will never spread unless someone explains and conveys them at the risk of their life.
The roles played by Jo and Paul were, in modern terms, the very roles of great communicators like Mr. Steve Jobs, who was the world’s number one salesman, Mr. Akio Morita, who roared the Sony brand to the world, Mr. Takeo Fujisawa, who sold Honda’s “Super Cub” all over the world, and Mr. Shotaro Kamiya, who pushed Toyota’s “Corolla” to become the national car of Japan.
To convey good things at the risk of one’s life.
If it is not transmitted, it is the same as not existing.
Mimi Takamizawa also desperately longs to convey the good things inside him, the light to heal you, to you by all means.
Therefore, for you who are right in front of him, he has an unbelievable proposal of desperate service.
Unbelievably, he wants to present to you a set of 10 carefully selected beautiful A4-size postcards of the works he created with all his soul, completely “free of charge.”
This is by no means a trap or a cheap advertisement.
It is purely the manifestation of a life-shaving spirit of service, wishing to touch you and save the empty void of your unfulfilled heart with the power of his art.
For your sake, he will deliver them to your precious home one by one, with all his sincerity and care.
Right now, just below this text, a place is prepared where you can apply for this special offer to you immediately.
Would you please gently click there?
Right now, right by your ear, right by your side, I am whispering gently to you.
If you think “I’ll do it later” and miss this opportunity now, you might never be able to welcome Mimi Takamizawa’s works into your hands again.
If he is abandoned by you alone, he can no longer live.
He has been waiting for a long time with unyielding obsession, trembling, for you to grasp this hand back.
“Most people think of success as something to get. But in reality, success is something to give.” —— Henry Ford
“An archaeologist is the best husband a woman can have. The older she gets the more interested he is in her.” —— Agatha Christie
“See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws.” —— Moses (Old Testament, Deuteronomy 30:15-16)
“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 Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.” —— The Talmud
“An artist must always be on the side of the weak. For it is among those abandoned by the world that true beauty lies asleep.” —— Osamu Dazai
“I believe that for a human being to be truly reborn, they need to be completely broken at least once.” —— Osamu Dazai
“Is living with a grand, proud air really such a splendid thing? It is within the act of suffering shame, being laughed at, and yet still living on, that true preciousness lies.” —— Osamu Dazai
“Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense.” —— Winston Churchill
“Press on. Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent.” —— Ray Kroc
“All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them. Remember, it all started with a mouse.” —— Walt Disney
Thank you so much, truly, thank you so much for staying with me until the very end of this long, desperate, life-shaving private whisper of mine.
I offer my deepest gratitude, beyond what words can express, for the fact that you exist in this world right now, and that you have received my words.
May your journey ahead be filled with light and be something beautiful.