Last night I wrote about the worst feeling in the world. Today, let me write about the best one.
The best feeling in the world is overwork. The ideal amount of overwork one requires in order to reach ecstasy is an idea which is easily understandable by relating to the ideal amount of alcohol one requires in order to become happily tipsy.
The ecstasy comes when the work absorbs the worker in his entirety, inundates him and dissolves away his worldly worries, his self-awareness and his doubts. It is when every fibre of muscle and every neuron in the body are fired up, are turned on, are gathered in a concerted effort, each one not for itself, but for a purpose greater than itself. It is in this coherent display of power that one feels the most alive; the same exertion that in the same person may be interpreted as suffering.
Pure suffering, pure joy, in the same exertion.
The best feeling in the world is to lose oneself, to forget about the fact that one exists in this world or any other; to lose all concern about oneself, because there is no self.
