One Hundred and Four

I strive to strip myself of all illusions, so that I may leave this world as naked as I entered it.

Most people cling to their illusions, mistaking them for a defense – not the best defense, but for people without money or power the only defense – against a cruel world. But the world is neither cruel nor kind. That is itself an illusion. The world only seems cruel or kind to those who imagine it exists in the same way we do, and loves or hates us in the same way we do it.

If we create illusions to protect ourselves from the world, and grow used to relying on them, it will be painful to lose them – as, sooner or later, we must. Better to live without them.

But striving to live without illusions is difficult when for most people illusions are what make life worth living.