12 Rules for Life (Full) ENGLISH

blind to everything else (and there’s a lot of everything else—so you’re very
blind). And it has to be that way, because there is much more of the world
than there is of you. You must shepherd your limited resources carefully.
Seeing is very difficult, so you must choose what to see, and let the rest go.
There’s a profound idea in the ancient Vedic texts (the oldest scriptures of
Hinduism, and part of the bedrock of Indian culture): the world, as perceived,
is maya—appearance or illusion. This means, in part, that people are blinded
by their desires (as well as merely incapable of seeing things as they truly
are). This is true, in a sense that transcends the metaphorical. Your eyes are
tools. They are there to help you get what you want. The price you pay for
that utility, that specific, focused direction, is blindness to everything else.
This doesn’t matter so much when things are going well, and we are getting
what we want (although it can be a problem, even then, because getting what
we currently want can make blind us to higher callings). But all that ignored
world presents a truly terrible problem when we’re in crisis, and nothing
whatsoever is turning out the way we want it to. Then, there can be far too
much to deal with. Happily, however, that problem contains within it the
seeds of its own solution. Since you’ve ignored so much, there is plenty of
possibility left where you have not yet looked.
Imagine that you’re unhappy. You’re not getting what you need.
Perversely, this may be because of what you want. You are blind, because of
what you desire. Perhaps what you really need is right in front of your eyes,
but you cannot see it because of what you are currently aiming for. And that
brings us to something else: the price that must be paid before you, or
anyone, can get what they want (or, better yet, what they need). Think about
it this way. You look at the world in your particular, idiosyncratic manner.
You use a set of tools to screen most things out and let some things in. You
have spent a lot of time building those tools. They’ve become habitual.
They’re not mere abstract thoughts. They’re built right into you. They orient
you in the world. They’re your deepest and often implicit and unconscious
values. They’ve become part of your biological structure. They’re alive. And
they don’t want to disappear, or transform, or die. But sometimes their time
has come, and new things need to be born. For this reason (although not only
for this reason) it is necessary to let things go during the journey uphill. If
things are not going well for you—well, that might be because, as the most
cynical of aphorisms has it, life sucks, and then you die. Before your crisis