Heavenletters

Has not your life been like an emergency ward? Or a crucible. Has not the hammer of time pounded you?
 
When you know the illusion of the world you live in, you can eclipse it and love the world of illusion more just because you take it more lightly.
 
And think of it. All the people in the world are also illusions. They are all as if, as if they had emotions, as if they had time lines, as if they lived in a house, as if they had fences, as if they were anything the world they could playact, any drama, any comedy, when all the while they are yourself dressed up in other clothes. What then would you take so seriously?

 
 
Oh, how I love these passages that simply turn inside out everything I have tried so hard to believe. I remember my daughter when she was quite little, how she squealed with delight when I deliberately misnamed things, asking her, for instance, to fetch the butter from the trashcan. Why is that? Secretly, I believe, we have always known that all the descriptions we were handed are sham. We played along because taking things seriously seemd to matter to others. And one day we started taking things seriously ourselves. And why not? Taking the world more lightly is probably much more fun after you have been very serious about taking it seriously.
 
["as if they were anything the world they could playact" – is it "in the world"?]