Yesterday

Perhaps you had to wait a long time for a train yesterday. Perhaps you were frustrated, cold and hungry, annoyed with the railway service and the government that didn't fund them enough. This was a mistake. You must arrive at the train station and hope that your train is delayed. You must look forward to waiting, because it is in waiting that we are defined. Standing on that cold platform, there is nothing you can do to make the train come quicker. You can ask the guard, press the help button, but the train will not arrive. You are entirely helpless. It is in this moment that you are defined. How do you react? The only possible, the only reasonable, way for you to react is with joy. It is in the gaps in life, in order, in time, that we understand ourselves. It is in such moments that we are alive, that we face head-on our helplessness. Look at the other people on the platform, don't wish you were somewhere else, don't get frustrated. There is no past (you cannot go back through the ticket barriers), and there is no future (the train is not there to take you away), there is only the present: you on the platform, waiting. Engage fully in the moment, in the time given to you, and hope the train never comes.

Tomorrow

Perhaps you took what I said yesterday as advice; perhaps I helped you. No, I cannot help you. I only said what you already knew. You know everything I will ever say. There is nothing I can do to change your mind about anything. What you will do you have already done. It is too late. It is always, and forever, too late.

Conversely, you interpret and misinterpret what I say. My language is transformed into yours. You hear me say exactly what you want me to say. No matter what I do you will have already decided what it is you want, or do not want, from me.

Today

I can't help you. Perhaps you want to lose weight, get fit, or quit smoking? Well, I can do nothing to help you. If you wanted to lose weight, you would have done so by now, wouldn't you? What it involves is a fundamental reconceptualisation of the self. There is no intermediate stage. You are either fat or you are thin. You cannot be dieting, or quitting. You are one or the other. There are no steps between being lazy and being fit. You cannot chart a development. There is no becoming. Never say 'I will diet for a month', or 'I will try this for a bit'. You will have already given up on your goal. You, and you alone, must fundamentally transform who you are. This blog will be brutal. See, I told you I couldn't help you.