#mindl

The problem is that I am not what is called an observer: I’m very distracted, absorbed in my thoughts, incapable of focusing my attention on what I see. Before writing each chapter of this book, I found that I needed to perform a preliminary operation: I set myself to observe things I’d had before my eyes hundreds of times and record every tiny detail in order to imprint it on my memory, which I had never done; it’s an exercise that can be extremely difficult when, for example, it’s a matter of the starry sky of a summer night or blades of grass in a lawn. I therefore had to try to change myself somehow, to make myself similar to the presumed author of the book I wanted to write. Thus writing a book becomes an experience of initiation, involves a continuing education of oneself, and this should be the goal of every human action.