The Path to Enjoying Life’s Fragrance – Cultural Elevation

If there’s one word unique to humans, it’s culture. Animals don’t have culture. For them, everything is simply civilization, and the flowing laws of nature are their culture. But only we humans possess the word culture and create it. We live cultural lives within our created culture. So what should we create from now on? Cultural living. It’s through cultural living that we can guide sentient beings.

When you first come here, you arrive looking gloomy, like a refugee. But you shouldn’t leave looking the same way. When you go out, you must surpass others culturally. People desire culture. They dream of richer cultural lives and envy those who appear cultured. People demand something because they lack it. That’s when they come looking gloomy, like debt collectors. When you come here demanding something, you look just like someone collecting a debt. When you seek refuge here, fleeing from society’s hardships, you look like a refugee. It’s pitiful. People will never envy that. From now on, you must become fertilizer yourself and raise a vision of cultural life. That’s the path to enjoying your own life, and through that enjoyment, you can transmit a vision of vitality to others. This is what we must do.

When I first moved to Yeongdong, many people became instant millionaires due to rising land prices. Our neighbor was one such person. First, they built a new house with premium bricks and marble. Seeing others driving cars, they bought one purely for show – a black Royal Record, kept in the garage. Without a clear occupation, they had no need to commute. Few friends to visit in the city. They spent days idly at home with children, rarely needing the car. Unable to drive themselves, they just kept it clean and pristine. Despite neighbors’ requests to borrow it, they kept it preciously locked away. A year later, someone warned that unused cars deteriorate. When they finally started it, the engine and parts had completely rusted – it went straight to the junkyard, never used once. They also bought many antiques – white and celadon porcelain – hearing they’d be valuable, but all proved fake. After various scams and thefts, they were driven out to Maljukgeori and now live in a shanty in Seongnam, just as before.

You might think wealth equals good living. But money isn’t crucial. Without elevated discernment and cultural sophistication, you can’t truly enjoy wealth. We must raise these levels. We must advance. To advance requires dedication. Becoming fertilizer. If asked why we must advance, there’s no answer. No reason. Nothing that exists has a reason. We simply must advance. That’s the only certainty. If pressed for explanation, we can provide one.

Traditionally, Eastern enlightenment and Dao discussions included poverty (清貧) as a virtue. This was partly necessary for teachings about sacrifice and renunciation. In agricultural societies, wealth often meant exploitation – with limited farmland and labor, fixed production meant one’s wealth came from exploiting tenant farmers.

But times have changed. Now anyone can create wealth through creativity, wealth that can spread to others. People’s mindset has shifted – wealth, not poverty, is virtuous. In today’s world, you can’t lead people while poor. Only wealth can guide them. That’s the reason, if one’s needed.

You must advance. No path opens while sitting in poverty, living meagerly. You’ll grow frustrated with the world, others will look down on you, and society won’t recognize you. When you advance through sacrifice, when you can reuse all your experiences as fertilizer, your cumbersome world of self-knowledge will become fragrance and sweet fruit, enriching and illuminating us all.