sam's internet house

the sheer joy of being alive

Good afternoon friends,

For the last few months I’ve been making my way through Too Much of Life, a collection of Crônicas by Clarice Lispector. Many of you dear readers may not know what a Crônica is. As the back of the 750-page book details, it is “a literary genre peculiar to Latin American newspapers [that] allows writers to address a wide readership on any theme they like.”

Lispector wrote crônicas for a variety of newspapers in Brazil from 1967 onward. They often blur the lines between reality and fiction. Some of these stories are a sentence long, others are up to ten pages. I find my soul connects so deeply to Lispector’s work, and it is a true luxury to witness such a gifted author who was given a platform to write freely, on any topic she wanted, for many years. I am privileged to be reading her work translated into English, in this case by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Patterson. I feel a complete obligation to continue learning Portuguese in 2025 so as to finally understand Lispector’s work in her own words, her own voice.

Making my way through so much of Lispector’s writing in the past year has meant that I have thought about her nearly every day of 2024. As I flip through Too Much of Life to try and write this blog post, there are sticky notes on every other page, varieties of coloured highlighting and many notes written in pen. It felt only right to anchor my final reflections on the year in this great tome of a book, filled with love, politics, writing, travel, health, grief, despair, illness, youth, and age. Lispector is voracious. Her taste for life is reflected in each word of her writing. I can only hope to enter the new year with the same appetite - for something new. Something daring.

YES (1967)
I said to a friend:
”Life has always demanded too much of me.”
She said:
”Don’t forget that you have always demanded too much of life.”
Yes.

We must create our own favourable circumstances to be truly happy. There is no random wizard who will come barrelling through your door one morning to offer you a quest to find your true self and to save mankind. It is your responsibility to be creative, to create your own path forward, to CHOOSE life. This past year has hammered this lesson into my head. At the end of 2023, I found myself for the first time without a true sense of direction. I had finished my bachelor’s degree. I had done some travelling and not encountered any life-changing opportunities abroad. I was rotting away in my bedroom at my parents’ house not understanding why all my past decisions had lead to me being unemployed and stuck in my least favourite city in the world. For the first few months of the year, my entire self worth was tied to my ability to make money. It felt impossible to creatively address the problem. I felt that I had no resources to achieve my goals.

There is something to be said for the base layer of stability that is required for me to be creative about my life decisions. I am grateful that by March I had found a job, where a friend of mine had put in a good word for me. I am infinitely lucky that the timing worked out, and that I could finally work in the political sphere - something I had wanted for over a decade.

The opportunities that did come up for me this year allowed me to progress career-wise, and taught me what I need out of a long-term job. I am grateful that they allowed me to spend more time with my family, with old friends, with new friends. I am grateful the opportunities showed me how to reconcile with my hometown, and heal whatever was making me such a big hater. At the end of 2024, I find myself doing well. But of course, I demand more from life.

EVOLUTION (1970)
With time, she was growing more accustomed, as if she were gradually becoming accustomed to the Earth, the Moon, the Sun, and, strangely and especially, Mars. It was a kind of platform from which, for a microsecond, she seemed to see the superreality of what is really real. More real than reality.

The year that lies ahead feels like a venture into the unknown. I feel like I am toeing the line between multiple worlds. More than ever, I have an infinite number of choices and I now have built up the stability and knowledge to act on my dreams. How can I take my next steps while still staying true to who I am? There is so much temptation in the world. I am learning to try and see through the layers of society that cause me anxiety, that make me feel like there is no room for error. I want to be perfect. I want to live a perfect life. But the true essence of living does not lie in perfection. If I want to maintain some semblance of sanity I must remember what is truly reality. The soul - the connection to the world. As long as I am fulfilling the spirit of humanity within myself, I am succeeding. I must not be distracted in order to see the world for what it is. I am constantly thinking of how to move forward in a way that is productive for myself but also for humanity. As long as I am working hard in the service of myself AND of others, I can be fulfilled in my life.

From THE FUTURE HAS ALREADY BEGUN (1970)
Not that the year 2000 in which we are already living is a year of despair. Or is it? Despair at the eternal existence of Time, which, like the Universe, has always existed. I am now fearlessly thinking about the year 8000. Hoping it will come as soon as 2000. Time is not the length of a life. The time that happened before us is as eternal as the time ahead of us. In the year 8000, if there are still people around, a new religion will have arrived - one that allows the immaterial to materialize, one that is not afraid of death, since that is a purely personal problem.

In 2024, things around the world feel on edge. Everyone is trying to divide each other. Polarization won’t get us anywhere. I am aiming to work towards a world where we forget about the fear - I want to look you in the face and feel love for you. I want to look you in the face and tell you that the only way through the terror of living is to embrace the reality that we are not any different from the next person. How would we live if we thought about how our actions would stretch beyond our lifetimes?

So if I get rid of the fear (my personal problem), what does this next year of life look like for me? How am I choosing to build WITH time and not against it? Here are some of my goals:

There are many more things in my resolutions list, these are just the ones you are likely to see or hear about. If you have any urge to help with these resolutions, collaboration is the essence of my life!! Let’s discuss. I am no longer afraid of time. I am no longer afraid of inaction. I am the wizard, giving myself a quest.

I wish all you readers a marvellous new year. May you find stability, peace, action, adventure, good health, or anything you may be looking for as we transition out of the first quarter of the century. I can’t wait to see many of you again in person.

I leave you with Lispector’s closing sentence of her crônica, published on New Year’s Eve 1968:

I say again, out of the sheer joy of being alive: salvation comes through risk - without that, life is not worth living! Happy New Year.

love and hugs,

sam

Thank you for reading. Leave a comment if you like, it's nice to hear from people I know irl as well as internet strangers. Hit the like arrow thing. Sign up for email alerts when I post. See you in the new year.

Email signup: