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" Yama ari tani ari ~ There are mountains and there are valleys "

Ancient proverbs are so annoyingly true. Right? Each time they reach us at the moment when we are most vulnerable. I came across this proverb in Nick Bradley's book, which was given to me by a dear friend. I found myself in the words of the protagonists Kyo and Flo. Kyo is a boy who lives in a world of his own. Society, his mother wants to convince him that to become someone in life you have to follow a conventional path. The return to the village of her childhood and the figure of her grandmother will be the keys to taking the reins of her life. Flo is a brilliant translator, unlucky in love. His life needs a strong change of course, which makes him rediscover his passion.

The thing that I deeply have in common with them is the fear of not making it, of feeling lost. Passion is the only thing that can save us. Find our ikigai.

*注釈, chūshaku : The word "ikigai" "生き甲斐" deserves some more explanation. Ikigai is a complex concept, intrinsically linked to personal experience and therefore difficult to understand without having experienced it firsthand.

· 生き (iki): This kanji literally translates as "to live." It indicates existence, life itself.

· 甲斐 (gai): This kanji has multiple meanings, including "value," "merit," "purpose," or "reason." In the context of ikigai, it refers to the value we place on our lives, why life is worth living.

By putting the two kanji together, we get "ikigai" which we can translate as "reason for living", "purpose of existence" or "that which gives value to life".

Simply put, it is that feeling you get in your body when you live your mission or are in harmony with your purpose in life. Although the term originates from Japan, ikigai has been compared to eudaimonic well-being, or the state of functioning and living well, in other cultures as well.

How can we find our ikigai ? Great 質問 shitsumon/question !

When researchers try to measure ikigai, they analyze the following dimensions:

1. positive and optimistic emotions towards life;

2. an active and positive attitude towards the future;

3. the awareness of the meaning of one's existence;

There is no magic formula to achieve this level of happiness and fulfillment. Our travel companion helps us in this: the book, the protagonist of this article. We are often too busy with other things, we are unable to pursue our dreams. Dreams in the drawer often represent our deepest desires and aspirations that we keep in our hearts. It is those projects, those passions, those ideas that fascinate us and that we would like to realize.

Ikigai, on the other hand, is the reason we get up in the morning, our reason for existing. It's that meeting point between what we love, what we're good at, what the world needs, and what we can get paid for. I imagine the furious look of Ayako, Kyo's grandmother, if only I had left my dreams locked in a drawer. Living also means taking risks, doing something different. You'll say, "Well, easy talk." I answer you with the words of Ayako-Sensei: "There will be days when you will pick up the pen and feel like a hero. You will feel that nothing can stop you and you will accomplish everything you want, maybe even exceed your expectations. […] And there will be days when the pen will seem like a foreign body to you. It will seem to you that nothing is right, the lights will be too light, the shadows too dark. Every line you draw with a brush or pen will seem ugly or wrong. But that's life, Kyo. Sometimes you go up and sometimes you go down. Yama ari tani ari".

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