I’m sure many of you may already have seen Taika Waititi’s brilliant film Jojo Rabbit. For those of you that haven’t, I highly recommend you put a pin in this blog, and press play on this film. It is brilliant, moving, witty, achingly beautiful- and yet, not what this blog is primarily about.
While Jojo Rabbit left me with an abundance of intense emotions, what really stayed with me was actually the final shot of the film, the lasting image of a quote by the German language poet and writer Rainer Maria Rilke. I’m talking about this one right here:
The moment I read this quote- I was a goner. Just as I was rising to leave the theatre, I had to sit back in my seat and compose myself because the tears just wouldn’t stop coming. I’m not entirely sure why, but these words had seeped into me more than anything else had in a very long time. And as the months kept rolling on, I found myself coming back to this quote. Over and over again. Of course, I soon saw that I wasn’t alone in this fixation. Soon, this quote had captured everyone’s imagination.
And there’s only one reason why-
2020 came, and times got harder. Much harder. Without going into the violence, general terror and pandemic of it all- across the world, humans were going through a shared experience of loss, fear and a sense that everything truly was incomprehensible. Granted, this of course happened at vastly varying intensities for different people- but it started to seem that the entire world went from mundane to random in an instant. Something about our basic understanding of how things are, just shifted. Our sanctuaries have become our confinement chambers, our privilege is the certainty of the next meal, our luxury is the knowledge that we and those that we love are safe from imminent danger and our great stroke of luck- is that in a weird twist of fate, we’re all in this together.
“Let everything happen to you”, Rilke said.
And today, for the first time in a long time, we have no choice but to really, really let it.
For my part, this brought me to a unique curiosity about the very prescient writer of this quote. Of course, human history is one of hard times- there is no dearth of tragic, fearsome experiences when we start to look back on the past. The early 20th Century, when Rilke wrote- was witness to the incredible tumult of World War I- and besides just that, Rilke’s own life was well…quite a doozy.
Now, scholars, literary critics and researchers (or the single Wikipedia search you will inevitably resort to) will be the best authorities on what framed Rilke’s writing, and will give you far more accurate accounts of his life and experiences. I’ve only tried to absorb these accounts to be able to write my own interpretation of them. Here’s what I learned-
Rainer Maria Rilke had 99 problems, and was very prepared for the next one.
Now, as I make this statement- I do not mean that his writing will often discourage and depress you. In fact, it does the very opposite.
He had a childhood coloured by division and non-acceptance, which eventually led to a disillusioned, almost nomadic youth; by all accounts, he wasn’t a stellar parent or family man, he could not succeed at a fixed career- military or otherwise, and even faced serious heartbreak and disease, eventually succumbing to Leukaemia at the age of 51.
But through it all, Rilke never stopped learning. He never stopped being committed to what he was. He was always true to his essence, he was a writer through and through. And since his essence was the strongest thing about him- he became a communicator of the soul.
He may not have lived it, but he had an unflinching faith and conviction in what a life worth living was all about. He began to meditate on human nature, on love, on death, on connecting with oneself, nature and the earth. He traversed cultures and countries, he absorbed literature and ideas- he was what he always wanted to be. And that self awareness, his deep reflections and a quiet, almost stoic zest for life made its way into his verse, and the now famous anthology of letters he exchanged with a soldier, Mr. Kappus, who was his young poet protégé.
As I read through his works, and especially these letters- I became arrested with not only the beauty and elegance of his writing, but the intention behind it. How a broken man could ward off brokenness by understanding it, and then, knowing that pain and pure joy are always the closest of neighbours- healing himself through the act of creation.
(At this present moment, I hereby stan Rilke as an icon. He truly is 100% that bitch even when he’s crying crazy.)
Today, we’re on the cusp of a world that looks completely different by all accounts. What we earn and how we earn it, what we learn and where we use it, how we love and whom we bestow it on- is not going to look the same for a while to come. And yet, what stays the same is our humanity. Our ability to feel, think, adapt and just- be. Rilke knew that. He was a student of that intrinsic quality that makes us who we are, and a lover of it too.
And so, in a world that often seems broken, sad and different from all our imaginations, a lot of his advice holds up. And in the past few months, from that one quote at the end of a movie, to him bringing me out of a creative dry spell that has plagued me for over a year- I believe that Rilke is capable of bringing new facets of wisdom, and new reasons to take heart en masse.
So without further ado, and before we bid adieu- here’s the part you directly scrolled to in the first place. Here are 5 certain lessons from Rilke to help you navigate an uncertain world:
1. LEAN INTO MORE ALONE TIME
“But your solitude will be a support and a home for you, even in the midst of very unfamiliar circumstances, and from it you will find all your paths.”
Clearly, Rilke had a rich inner life. He took great care to nourish this at every step- and born from his own experience, was his deep seated belief that every single person has the same capacity to go within themselves, and unearth an infinite storehouse of creativity, power, beauty and love. However- the only way to access your inner life, in his opinion- was to embrace your solitude.
When his disciple, Kappus seeks his guidance on what it will take for him to find himself as a great writer, Rilke firmly tells him to stop looking for reasons outside of him- fame, fortune, respect, or the admiration of people he looks up to. He advises the young soldier to find that inner voice that screams “you must”- the one that compels you, beyond all else- to undertake every action solely because you cannot imagine your life without it.
And that takes solitude.
Rilke knows that this is a hard ask- he admits that the idea of isolating yourself, from the opinion of others, from the activities of the outside world will be met with great resistance. Conventions and norms will pull you back into feeling like the only option you have, is to heed to the motions of the world around you, and suppress the one inside you. This tendency to defer to the mundane is what Rilke calls- “the easiest side of the easy”. And everything that’s worth it in life, he says- is a little bit difficult. The key is not to be afraid of it, and remembering what it’s all for.
In the case of Kappus- he wants to be a writer, and find his own original voice. For us, it may be the career we’ve always wanted, the invention that’s almost in our grasp, the skill we can’t wait to learn or the dream we yearn to fulfil. No matter what it is- it’s good for us to give ourselves to the task. Spend time with your inner voice, and get comfortable with everything it has to say.
Honestly, isn’t it worth it to be as familiar with our own thoughts and needs as we are with our best friend’s, or our parents’? Switching off and tuning in as a discipline, as opposed to a relaxation exercise- might be the key to unlocking something entirely fresh and interesting.
Isolation doesn’t have to be the norm, nor do we have to cancel our friendship subscriptions for life- but there is great merit in Rilke’s unwavering belief that we’re all originals in our own way, and what keeps us from cherishing our uniqueness are the constant demands of society, and keeping up appearances. Maybe, as we self isolate on threat of a virus, we can ponder what it means to infuse a lite version of this exercise into our lives for good?
2. THE ANSWER IS IN THE QUESTIONS
“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them.”
More often than not, we can get bogged down by the questions that make their way into our self commentary at every step.
I’m not just talking about the ‘big’ questions- like, “why is the sky blue?” or “are we even real?” or “when will Adele come out with her new album?”
I’m talking about the daily questions that are an immediate side effect of well, every event in our lives-
“Why did I say that? I must sound like the stupidest person on Earth.”
“Am I even qualified to do this? I haven’t done a single worthwhile thing all day. They’re going to find out how spectacularly crap I am at my job and fire me once and for all.”
“Why am I trying so hard to look good? I know everyone at the party will only see how my friend looks anyway. She’s the real stunner.”
These questions- endless, annoying prompts that pervade our senses and keep us from boldly going for what we want in life- may seem impossible to love. In fact, we hate that we think like this. And yet we can never stop ourselves.
Rilke knew our dilemma, when he was advising his young disciple to make friends with his cloying questions. For him, all of these questions have a deeper reason. Our fear of looking stupid comes from our fragile self esteem, our fear of losing out on what’s good makes us hyper-vigilant and insecure- and yet, as we go on adding question marks to the finer points of our life, we never come to the root of why we feel the way we do.
Imagine this. The next time your mind raises a question or a doubt- throw down the reverse card. Look your question in the eye, welcome it, and tell it it can stay there a while, but only if it intends on making its intention known. Don’t run from the question. Don’t dismiss it as silly, or accept it as a sign to be less than who you are. Be aware of it. Sit with it a while. Envision what you want as one end of the stick, and the question that’s holding you back as the other. Then feel your way into what’s most important to you, and choose which end of the stick you want to drop.
Rilke said that whenever doubt wants to spoil something for you, you have to test it. He believed doubt can be trained to bring you benefit, instead of you bending to the will of doubt. Every time you switch it up and start addressing your doubts instead of your decisions- you’ll find how silly and trivial they always were. And then, you’re free.
3. DON’T FALL IN LOVE, LEARN IT
“Love consists of this: two solitudes that meet, protect and greet each other.”
Honestly, this is my favourite Rilke quote. On reading this, I was convinced that I’d be loyal to this Bohemian’s rhapsody forevermore.
Moving on from that disastrous joke, let’s dive into what makes this lesson such a deeply important one for our swipe-happy, fast paced generation.
Rilke wrote this in response to his heartbroken young friend, who like all of us, was utterly and completely confounded by love, and yet mesmerised by a deep need for it. Love is the elusive question that keeps even the greatest of minds up at night. And yet, it is the most natural, human thing we do. Its raw, almost pristine nature is what made Rilke such a proponent of loving as an endeavour- except he didn’t think it was for everybody. And he certainly didn’t appreciate how love was slotted into conventions of meeting, courtship, marriage and all the accompanying rules that go into it. Like everything else, Rilke knew love was for the souls.
He didn’t think that two people could ever merge into a unit. Humans aren’t built that way. The freedom of our individuality is a beautiful thing, and he believes we have to find, nurture and grow that before we even think of attaching ourselves to someone else.
I know this may sound spectacularly long and boring, especially when there are thirty possible definitions of love waiting for you on Tinder as we speak- but bear with me, or Rilke rather- he makes a good point.
He knew that young people, who are unformed in their thinking and have not yet fully grown into their own selves, often try to short-cut the process of becoming who they are, by finding someone else to focus on. This he thinks is an exercise in futility- there’s no union when both the parties involved aren’t even fully developed as entities. Eventually, a once consuming love will dissolve into tiredness, distance or worst of all- regret. And that’s how we end up hurting the people we once thought we loved.
But if we walk sometime on our own, if we give time to ourselves and like he always advocates- give time to our solitude- we will become it. We will be a free functioning unit, aware of what we want from another, aware of who we are to ourselves- and begin to search for people who are at that same level as well.
From it, develops a relationship where two people are honest with each other- who interact (meet) as independent beings going through lives with their own goals and desires, who respect each other’s space and individuality as sacred (protect) and continue to grow together, understanding the changes and opportunities that will come up in the course of life and going through them step by step (greet).
Of course, while we work our way into that awesome solitude- we can enjoy the comfort (and let’s be honest, hilarity) of dating around- as long as we don’t pin any wrongful hopes of love on them.
4. WHEN THE GOING GETS TOUGH, THE TOUGH THANK IT PROFUSELY
“The more still, more patient and more open we are when we are sad, so much the deeper and so much the more unswervingly does the new go into us, so much the better do we make it ours…”
As I mentioned before, Rilke was a proud, card carrying member of the Sad Squad, and for good reason. Having delved into the many hardships of his own life, and coming out the other end with a literary work that could spark awe and inspiration in all those who read it, for generations to come; Rilke knew that sadness held a definitively transformative potential within it.
He says that what we feel as sadness, is really an “alien thing” that seizes us, because it catches us by surprise and derails our perception of the way things are. It leaves us standing in the middle of a sort of transitional phase, from which we have to move on, because it isn’t sustainable or natural to stay there. Here again, he reiterates how important it is to commit oneself to sticking through the hard parts of life, not just in a “keep holding on” sense, but really diving into the deep end of what ails you.
Once you are with your sadness, knowing it, recognising every inch of your experience with it- Rilke says it’s no longer that shocking event, but rather a lesson that seeps into your bloodstream. You no longer need to learn from it, or work to decipher it- you know it. It’s part of you, and you have matured because of it.
5. LET IT HAPPEN; THE FLOW WILL LET YOU KNOW
“Let life happen to you. Believe me: life is in the right, always.”
For the final lesson, we’re throwing it back to what kicked this article off- the quote from Jojo Rabbit.
Rilke believed in the infinite power of life as the greatest teacher of humankind. He didn’t believe in pushing the brakes on anything- feel every feeling, live every moment- there’s no other way to be. We waste so many precious moments trying to steer circumstances that are clearly out of our control in our direction, putting ourselves through insane amounts of discomfort and strife- waiting to discover what we already know deep down- life just sorta, happens. There’s no way to stop it, and while it can bring us down sometimes, the best way to thrive when everything seems like it’s falling apart- is to just stay there.
Wait a while. Breathe in the moment. The pain, the pleasure, the laughter, the tears- they’re all there only for that moment. There is no past that can bind us, nor a future that can enchant us- the only reality we can claim is of the moment. So, Rilke recommends- it’s best not to struggle against it. Rather, ease off the pressure on yourself, and look the moment straight in the eye. Be with it, know what you want from it, and know that whatever happens- you will grow. You will change. No feeling is final.
And in that lies your greatest freedom- the freedom to just be.
