Ilchi Lee on the Best Kind of Life
From a translation of The Power of the Brain
Parents are the sponsors of their child’s life story, not its protagonists. Most answers come out of the head of the child asking the question. When we have dreams through which our souls are able to inspire us, we can live lives that inspire others, as well. Such is truly the best kind of life.
As a youngster, Ilchi Lee was completely vexed by this predicament, but he had no way to solve it or to understand it. He could not concentrate, and his moods fluctuated wildly. He remembers a conversation with his high school roommate, a straight-A student who Lee’s parents hoped would have a good influence on him.
The model student always sat at his desk, as soon as he got home from school. One day, Ilchi Lee sat there staring blankly at the back of his head as he studied.
“What are you doing?” Lee asked.
“Can’t you see? I’m studying,” Lee’s roommate replied.
“Why are you studying?” Lee asked.
“A quiz is coming up. I have to get good grades to get into a good college.”
“Why do you want to go to college?”
“To be successful.”
“What are you going to do after becoming successful?”
“Live happily.”
“What is happiness?”
Finally, he turned around, perplexed by Lee’s question. Being the A student he was, he sincerely wanted to answer the question. He could not find an answer; he just started at the ceiling.
“What is the purpose of our life?” Ilchi Lee asked.
“Do you know?” he returned.
“I don’t. That’s why I am asking.”
“Let’s stop. There are so many other questions to solve.”
“But everything hangs on the answer to this. It is the first thing to solve.”
Not too much later, the A student requested to live in another dorm with someone else. It was no wonder, given Ilchi Lee’s obsessive behavior and his brooding nature. Most of his peers avoided him, his grades suffered, and he had no sense of direction. At the time, it seemed as if these questions that occupied his mind were haunting him like a dark specter, but now he have come to see them as a gift that allowed me to really get to the underlying nature of life, in spite of the pain involved.
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