“I am very happy alone,” he said,”I don’t know how to explain it otherwise, than that there’s a certain chemical balance in my brain, which sustains it self and lies close to what is normally known as happiness.”
“But you certainly would need a woman or sexual intercourse of some sort at least?”
“Honestly, making love to a woman provides me with utter bliss, but it is superficial and can hardly give me lasting peace like being alone can. I would even argue that I react very badly to social interaction in general, but that sex – as a form of submission of the other to serve one’s selfish plearsures – is the only exception to it. But it requires a lot of working toward. The sexual affair itself is like a mountain summit, but the climb to reach it is either too long and steep or the mountain itself not worth conquering. But there are moments, of course, where I make an effort and anjoy the moment of accomplishment.”
“You sound so cold and distant when you say so. I wonder if you ever allowed yourself to experience the simple enjoyment of the aesthetics of a discussion, where the unpredictable turn of every course of words that the other sets out on is an enriching contribution to one self. And …”
“Well, you see, history is a chain of many men, and these many men, to our enjoyment, wrote many things, things they thought over, things they debated endlessly, and the ultimate result of these eternal deliberations, they entrusted to history to resolve. Now, why do you think that the single man, certainly less educated and less versed, less traveled and less experienced, and certainly with less insight in thoughts far from us, and the coincidental or random encounter with this single man will offer you greater pleasure than the library of thoughts and discussions that mankind, the historic man has collected for the public?”
“Well, cause it’s different, it’s the living soul of man, who holds a mirror to your face, instead of you drawing a picture from your own memory and interpretation, you won’t be able to see yourself as removed as the other person can.”
“Well, yes, but this remoteness to oneself makes us men unhappy.”
“Unhappy perhaps, but insightfull.”
“Insightfull perhaps, in a matter that concerns no one, our selves. Instead, we are better off gaining insight in the thoughts and selves of others, through what they thought over and phrased so well in their books and scriptures, their works of art and paintings, than concern with the trifle dialogues of fellow men.”
“But the other makes us not happy, you said so yourself. Is insight in ourselves not worth more than every glimpse upon another?”
“Oh certainly, but happiness is not what we should strive after unless you are a simple soul. Happiness is easy to obtain it lies within us, it is the other who disturbs it.”
“But are we not to seek this disturbance perhaps?”
“Oh certainly, this disturbance is essential to our thought. Man would stop thinking all together without it.”
“But happiness, happiness is more pleasant without a doubt, how can you resist?”
“It will resist itself, my friend, because happiness is easy to deceive, and it does not recognize itself even if it stumbles over itself. This is the simplicity of happiness and we must strive to avoid it.”