image by author.

time out.

“That I never managed to completely alienate myself from the people around me. That emotions — albeit to a negligible extent — always played a part of my life, my thinking. I craved complete solitude, no interference from others, no noise from feelings. I might have become a fully accomplished philosopher, had it not been for all that horrible distraction.”

Feng Ling Wu, noted scholar of the Shang Dynasty, when asked on his death bed, in 1601 B.C., about his greatest regret in life.