How Do You Live?

by Genzaburo Yoshino

Miyazaki makes films for whole people and makes films about consequences.

Copper had an odd feeling. The watching self, the self being watched, and furthermore the self becoming conscious of all this, the self observing itself by itself, from afar, all those various selves overlapped in his heart, and suddenly he began to feel dizzy.

human beings have a natural tendency to look at and think of things as if they were always at the center.

there may be nothing more deep-rooted and stubborn than the human tendency to look at and think of things with themselves at the center.

“No matter what anyone says, I don’t like it.”

To appreciate art, you must use your inner eyes and ears. You must open your heart.

The things that you feel most deeply, from the very bottom of your heart, will never deceive you in the slightest. And so at all times, in all things, whatever feelings you may have, consider these carefully.

To put it a slightly more difficult way, you must make a habit of thinking honestly, with your own experience as a foundation, and—Copper, this is very important!—if someone fakes this part, no matter what kind of great-sounding things they think or say, they are all lies in the end.

The most important thing—more than what other people think, more than anything—is that you should first know for yourself, truly and deeply, where human greatness lies.

There are lots of people in the world who act just for appearance’s sake—in order to seem great in the eyes of others. That type of person worries first about how they are reflected in other people’s eyes, and they inadvertently end up neglecting their true selves, as they really are. I hope you don’t become that sort of person. And that is why you absolutely must attend to the things you feel in your own heart, the things that move you deeply. That is what is most important, now and always. Do not forget this, and think carefully about what it means.

Wow

When you think about a thing as if it were self-evident and follow it wherever it may lead, soon enough you run into a thing that you can no longer call self- evident.

I feel that human particles are all connected like strings in a net, with countless other people that they haven’t met or even seen, and without even knowing it. That’s why I decided to call this the Net Rule of Human Particle Relations.

even to be able to make the climb—you must not lose the spirit that woke you in the middle of the night, to follow your own questions wherever they lead!

There is nothing more beautiful than people nurturing goodwill toward their fellow beings. And those are the human relations that humans truly deserve. Copper,

Copper, as you make your way toward adulthood, you will eventually come to understand that to lead a life of poverty is often to go about one’s life feeling inferior to others.

Someone who feels inferior because they are poor can never be much of a human being.

Because a human being who doesn’t understand the essentials of being human, in other words, is a pitiful fool.

As for why this is so—please remember this well—it’s because in the world today, the vast majority of people are poor. So the vast majority of the people in this world are unable to live their lives in a way that is really human—this is the problem of our time, greater than any other.

If you rely on your own labor to live, then not to be able to work is to face starvation, is it not?

Despite that, the sad truth is that in today’s world, the people who will be in the most trouble if they get hurt are the people who are in the greatest danger of getting hurt.

We are grateful for good fortune specifically because we feel that it rarely happens. Thus, the word arigatai has come to refer to something special or rare enough to be thankful for. So when we say arigatou, or thank you, in Japanese, it becomes an expression of gratitude.

You take many things from the world, but I wonder what you will give back in return?

there is something else, a big thing that you produce day after day. What could that be?

The greater the suffering, the greater the joy in overcoming it. So you don’t fear death anymore! I think that’s what a heroic spirit is all about.

Being extraordinary means that they all have something about them to make us bow down. But more than humbling ourselves to these people, we must be bold enough to ask questions. Such as “What did they accomplish using these extraordinary abilities?”

First, you might notice that the great people and heroes that loomed so large in your eyes until now were, ultimately, no more than drops of water drifting in that great stream.

Among those we call heroic and great, the only people we can truly respect are those who have helped to advance the human race.

The world is full of people who are not bad, but weak, people who bring unnecessary misfortune upon themselves and others for no reason but weakness. A heroic spirit that’s not devoted to human progress may be empty and meaningless, but goodness that is lacking in the spirit of heroism is often empty as well.

They probably still felt bad about what had happened, but along with those bad feelings, they had the happiness of having friends whom they knew they could believe in.

To convey to your friends how deeply sorry you are feeling and to do it honestly, without excuses. What happens after that is not for you to think about now.

“The older we get, the bigger the things are, the harder they are to take back, and the more we feel this way, compared to when we were children.

But that also means that pain alone tells us little about what it means to be truly human. We learn true humanity from a pain that only humans feel, even in the midst of experiencing all the same pain as other living things. So then, what sort of thing is this unique pain so special to humanity?

when you have made a mistake, to recognize it bravely and to suffer for it is something that in all of heaven and earth, only humans can do.

It’s hard to admit our mistakes. But in the pain of our mistakes there is also human greatness.

“Error has the same relationship to truth as sleeping does to waking. I have seen that when one wakes from error, one turns to truth again as if revived.”

We have the power to decide on our own who we will be. Therefore, we will make mistakes. However— We have the power to decide on our own who we will be. Therefore, we can also recover from mistakes.