It was a surprise for me when I went looking that the source of inspiration for this post had only been used once. I had expected it to be more as it is a rich source of things – wise things – that people have written over the years. It does make it into my Trough of places that inspire me in one way or another. However only in A Thought Provoking Essay have I actually mentioned it before.
The Marginalian – Maria Popova – finds me through email – a couple each week. Each explores what writers have opined through their lives on a particular topic. I should say that I am somewhat in awe of anyone who has such a vast knowledge to draw on in composing the mails. Not every one speaks directly to me, but many do.
A couple of weeks ago there were two in succession that (for me at least) sort of explored the same sort of question about life. I shall quote some of what was said here – but bear in mind that these are excerpts which particularly spoke to me and they are, of course, excerpts that were in turn pulled into the published mail. That being said, in order to get the “whole story” it would be required to go further than just accepting what I have written here.
The midweek mail draw my attention straight away as Søren Kierkegaard was mentioned in the subject line and that attraction was strengthened by the mention of his book Either/Or which is something I was already interested in. It is slightly apt that I should post this immediately after a post which brings to mind the fact that wrong decisions simply do not exist – rather being an outcome of some missing knowledge, Here this is approached in a slightly different way – where your life path has reached some bifurcation point (simplistically, as in reality there are often more than two choices) and you are forced into an Either/Or decision.
So true – it is suggested furthermore that this is never more true than in the way in which our closest relationships – family and friends – where it is necessary to see that “any relationship on the level of the soul has elements of lover, parent, child, and friend, and suffers when subjected to either/or” as Maria says in her commentary.
The next mail from The Marginalian introduced another writer – Robert Louis Stevenson – to the narrative.
I would certainly suggest that these writings are likely to be worthwhile to many. Although, of course there will be lots of people who would simply get nothing from them – that is fine because we are individuals. The fact that we can find lots of mind expanding thoughts published – recently and hundreds of years ago – is marvellous and I am always very mindful that there is much more to learn and here we have gone full circle to my previous post about our level of knowledge.