Readers are doubtful types of people. Writers even more so.
What can we do when we are doubtful whether we should continue our search for more meaning and knowledge when the majority of the world seems to be doing fine with their food and drink?
What can we do when we are stifled by the thoughts that tell us that the words we type with passion, expressing hours of hard-thought wisdom might actually end up being read by no one apart from you and your computer?
I think I have found a solution:
Fill the working room with book smell!
Old book smell, new book smell, all sorts of book smell. Paper smell. Books. Books. Books. Book Smells.
On one hand they will remind us that the meaning, knowledge and wisdom we crave are real things with real presence and not random abstract stuff inside our heads to be suppressed by food and drink.
One might tell you that the thoughts you have and talk are nothing, but what when you hand them a bulky physical thing? Are they still nothing?
And on the other hand, they will remind us that we are not alone in the thing that we are doing. If the smell is a mixture of old and new books, it will perfectly remind us of the permanence of meaning, knowledge and wisdom in human affairs. While old book smell will remind us of a glorious human past where knowledge not only freed but also evolved humans, new book smell will remind us that such search still matters and exists.
It may matter to fewer people, but it still does. And who knows your writing can be the flame that ignites half of the world with a desire to know and be profound?!
You might question the need for written texts and books to ignite half the world.
‘I can do it with my podcast and YouTube videos,’ you might smirk. ‘I can fill my room with microphone smells.’
But, if birds could fly without wings, we would see birds flying without wings!
Even if all the books are about cookery and wine, they will still help to show us that fundamental things such as foods and drinks can be thought about deeply to be stored in books. Even those things can be dealt with wisely.
This should allow us to continue our search for more meaning and knowledge.
This should allow us to write words with passion, expressing hours of hard-thought wisdom.
