Nankurunaisa

By Toshi Yoshida

Have you ever had dreams that feel like they’re never going to come true?

Life keeps moving, yet the things you long for most still seem so far away. That’s how I’ve been feeling lately… hopeless.

I guess we all have days like that, right? We can’t always be surrounded by positivity or good things. I know life needs balance, but… it’s exhausting. Constantly carrying this desire to finally make it, to build the life I’ve been dreaming of.

The things I ask for have never been extravagant. They’ve always been simple: a place I can truly call home, somewhere I genuinely feel I belong. Because, if I’m honest, I’ve never really felt “at home.” Before I die, I hope I get to experience that feeling.

I also dream of having financial stability. But those are things most of us want, aren’t they?

Pain and anguish have walked hand in hand with me since I was very young. Not because I was born sad, far from it. I have always been a cheerful and outgoing person. But the family and social environment I grew up in forced me to face things that no child should ever have to witness. Even so, I was born with an open smile and found reasons to laugh at almost anything.

In many ways, that is still who I am today, only now with a few scars and wounds that will never fully fade, no matter how deeply they are washed away.

Carrying all of this into adulthood has not been easy, but over time I have learned to deal with it on my own. It has been a long process. I do not resent pain, because it serves as a reminder that I am alive, and through it I continue to learn something new every day.

Funny how in life everything can change at any moment. Suddenly, we can end up back in the same place we left and swore we’d never return to, and this isn’t about physical places. Life has these mysterious twists: we can deeply desire something and just as quickly reject it. We can love something, then grow tired of it.

But I believe everything has a purpose, and I also believe that every choice carries both a consequence and a blessing. We don’t make choices for no reason; I believe it was already written that we would choose a certain path. The twists and turns of life are sometimes necessary to bring us back exactly to where we’re meant to be.

I often catch myself trying to learn the art of feeling: of simply allowing myself to feel. To feel anguish, to feel joy, to feel anxiety, to feel nostalgia, to feel peace… to let my body absorb the energy of each emotion, and then let it pass. Not holding on to it, but accepting it, observing it, and allowing it to go.

Don’t think you have everything figured out, you don’t.

Life is so complex, and everything can change at any moment. That goal you once had in mind can suddenly turn into something completely different, demanded by life itself, because something happens in the opposite way it should and forces us to change the ship’s course. But with faith and resilience, you won’t lose your way. Everything happens for a reason, even when everything seems tangled and confusing. The secret is to trust our intuition and keep moving forward. I’ll try to stay positive and always fight so this isn’t a misstep. With focus and persistence, I’ll get there.

I’ve been amazed by how the Universe never fails to surprise me and teach me life’s most important lessons.

Lately, things haven’t been easy, and when everything fell apart, I was angry, thinking, “Why now? Why me? Why this? Like this?” At the time, all I could see was injustice and anguish, but later, everything became clear.

How do you manage feelings? How do you live clearly and peacefully without always expecting the best or the worst?

I just wish I could get along with “nothing.” The feeling of “nothing” is liberating, because there’s no happiness without sadness, and no sadness without happiness. So I don’t want to be happy or sad, I want to reach nothing.