The Introverted Thinker Newsletter #023
Sneak peak into an unreleased article, a book discussion on the toughness of history's greatest explorers, and some thoughts about war and double standards.
Hello everyone,
How are you all doing? After a sporadic two and a half weeks of travel, I’m back home in London, settling back into routine and getting the creative gears going again.
This week I have included a section of an article that is yet to be published, but I enjoyed writing it so much that I have to share it with someone. It’s about the struggles you have to be ready to endure if you want to pursue your passion.
There are also a few other segments like a short discussion on a book I read, and an important thought I had to voice. Enjoy.
A Life of Fulfillment Requires a Hike Through Mud & Shit
Stop idealizing perfection, there are two sides to every coin.
Pungent, sour, putrid, musty, warm, sloshy. Just a few words to describe the texture and smell of feces and mud to help you picture a few things.
Bit of a strange start no? Well, I’m here to tell you that at one point or another in your life, you’re going to have to hike through it for as long as it is necessary. Sometimes it may even get knee-deep… *shivers in disgust*
I can already hear you batting your head and asking “why?!”
The degree to which the soul of a person feels fulfilled in life is dependent on what they occupy their time with. The individuals working towards their passions non-stop, pursuing their life purpose, will feel fulfilled. It’s undeniable that this yields fulfillment and happiness, especially when it is successful.
But there is a tradeoff to be made here… One that I don’t know if you are ready to accept. So if you choose happiness and fulfillment over materialism, read on.
With Passion Comes Pain
When you have a passion for something and find what you want to dedicate your life to, it’s truly exhilarating. It’s like electricity running through your soul.
But people forget that this path of pursuing your passion can be much harder than a conventional path of a stable job that gives you the same paycheck year after year.
You’re secure in that job, you get paid no matter what (provided you show up) you have all sorts of guarantees like a retirement fund, healthcare, and more. It is comfortable as fuck, no stress.
Well, it’s a different story with passion. You are free-floating in a realm where people more often than not lose battles. They go insane, end up broke, homeless, or worst of all… go back to the corporate world.
It’s a risk for sure. But you have to ask yourself, are you willing to take that risk? Because after you’ve sprinted up the hill comprised of mud and shit, it’s blissful. Because you’ve followed your own path, and you made it work. It was guided by passion. And I think that's beautiful.
The Most Famous Case Study
I’m sure we all know who the author and poet, Charles Bukowski, was. He once said
“Find out what you love and let it kill you.” — Charles Bukowski
Bukowski was a drunk, a womanizer to the most questionable degree, and a general failure in the eyes of conventional society. He labeled himself a fuck up. But his self admitted darkness is what drew everyone to him. He laid it as it was, giving you the harsh truths of life others were too scared to even think about, let alone say. He was truly talented and introspective despite this.
For the majority of his life, he was broke, drunk, and could barely hold down a job. He did end up semi-settling down in a post office. He wrote eagerly all his life, with zero glimpses of success. It took him 30 years to get a first book deal which was less than satisfactory.
He accepted it, writing “I have one of two choices — stay in the post office and go crazy … or stay out here and play at writer and starve. I have decided to starve.”
To me, this sums up what it means to go after what you love. You will probably have to accept a significant pay cut for a certain portion of time, keeping faith that your skills will be rewarded one day…
Enjoyed this? The rest of this article will be published on Medium in the coming days. Keep up with me by following my page or becoming a member through my referral link to read all my articles and thousands of other talented writers.
A Book I Read Last Week:
Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing
In August of 1914, the famed explorer Ernest Shackleton and his crew of 27 men set sail in attempt to reach the south pole. A few months after the ship departed, it became trapped in ice. The ice slowly started to crush the ship with its insurmountable pressure and the crew were forced to abandon ship.
Stranded on a moving pack of ice in Antarctica, for 17 months these men endured literal hell in the most brutal conditions the earth has to offer, constantly on the edge of disaster with starvation, disease, and extreme weather bringing them to deaths door.
This book was mind blowing to me. This is a true story, a real life failed voyage. The detailed account of this shocking event by the author read like a thriller. I still cant quite wrap my head around the extremities that these men endured.
They literally camped on floating blocks of ice for over a year, with no food apart from the seals to hunt, they were constantly soaking wet from the freezing water of the ocean, their feet rotted from the constant exposure to salt water combined with frostbite. I will refrain on further details.
This book taught me a huge lesson. I think we’ve become too soft in this current day and age. Here we have this group of men who did the unthinkable, “the greatest adventure of all time” and we complain when the supermarkets run out of our favorite cereal. Or when our hot water runs out.
Reading this opened my eyes to the amount of suffering our not so distant ancestors went through, and just how tough they were. And it also made me concerned at the current state of how we are living, comfort is a killer as I always say.
4.5/5 stars for this book. History fans must read, and anyone who feels like they need a kick up the ass. Cause that’s what it gave me.
Tweet of the Week: War and Double Standards
I really don’t like to involve myself into politics in a public manner, but this quote above is a quote I live by. It’s part of a list of quotes that form who I am as a person. My father, being a war refugee who escaped ethnic cleansing and genocide from Bosnia and Herzegovina in the mid 90’s, instilled this quote into me.
It’s a very personal quote to me and my family history.
And with the current war going in Ukraine, this applies. How can we sit in the comfort of our own safe homes, drinking warm drinks, sleeping in a warm bed, feeling all safe and pampered, whilst people are getting their homes bombed not far from us?
Children are losing their childhood. Cancer patients and sick people are having to flee the hospitals that are holding their lives together by a thread. Family homes are being turned into rubble.
It doesn’t sit right with me that we are privileged enough to feel this comfort we are currently in whilst people are suffering so gravely.
But what I also want to point out is the current double standards of the West. It’s not just Ukraine that is suffering, people in Palestine have been suffering for years, people in Yemen are starving to death and being bombed. But just because these countries are part of the Muslim world, the West doesn’t raise attention to them.
Now that war may very well be on our doorstep, every single person starts to voice their support for Ukraine. Don’t forget that the Muslim world has been struggling for decades and countries like Syria, Yemen, Palestine are being - and have been - torn to the ground.
It is your duty as a human to speak out against evil in the world, all evil. Not just evil that poses a threat to you directly. If you don’t, your as guilty as the perpetrators.
Thanks for reading everyone.
I wanted to voice a few important thoughts, I hope you can understand the message behind that last quote I included and what I was trying to say.
Feel free to voice some of your thoughts aswell, you can hit reply to this email or leave a comment, I love to communicate with people who read my stuff.
I’ll see you next week. Until then, dedicate your week to being a force of positivity amidst all the negative chaos around us.
Julian.
5 ¶ And when a person commits sin, because they were called to testify under oath, and he was a witness that has seen or known of it, if he does not declare it, then he shall bear his iniquity. (Leviticus 5:1 ;Jubilee Bible 2000)