Rest Before You Are Tired

At noon today, after finishing work, I went to my small vegetable plot to water the plants and picked some vegetables on the way back. Riding my bicycle home, I suddenly and for no reason fell into a deeply negative state. I felt life was meaningless, and my work and writing worthless. I even thought that whatever job my child took after graduating from his ideal university would be meaningless too—that reproducing generation after generation is nothing but repeating this meaningless life.

This negative mood stayed with me all the way and did not ease after I got home; even after lunch I remained glum. I thought to myself that perhaps this is simply the reality of middle age: all the bright hopes for life in youth have, by middle age, turned into dry reality, without a trace of vivid color.

After lunch I set everything aside and slept hard, not waking until past three in the afternoon. Once awake I stayed in bed, did no work, and dozed on until nearly four before I finally woke completely. After washing up, all my energy came back, and the gloom of the morning vanished without a trace.

These past few days I have seen several cancer patients I am helpless to treat, and two patients with depression. This year is unusual: medical-insurance funds are tight nationwide, and few drugs can be prescribed from the insurance fund. Some patients have very poor means; I want to help them but simply cannot—the treatment cost of each cancer patient is a bottomless pit, and before these countless bottomless pits I can only feel willing yet powerless.

Several more cancer patients have run into family troubles: the strain of paying for treatment, compounded by this year's unusual conditions, has left their spouses unable to cope and wanting a divorce. This saddens me too, because such psychological blows often shorten a patient's survival. My own son also had a small conflict with a classmate at school; piled up, these pressures weighed on me. So I, who almost never feel negative, turned negative myself.

Perhaps if I had slept deeply earlier, this negative mood would not have come. One must not overdraw one's mental and physical reserves; overdraw and you are in trouble, and long-term overdraft is serious trouble.

The son of a cancer patient I know lived under pressure for a long stretch. Recently, he was suddenly rushed to the emergency center by an ambulance after an arrhythmia. After he came out, he told me that as he boarded the ambulance he had already gestured his last instructions to his wife; now his feeling for his own health is profound. He is younger than I am, so after leaving the emergency center he has never again stayed up late working.

I too do not want to increase my workload beyond my control, especially mentally taxing intellectual work. One really must not exhaust oneself; once fatigue passes a certain point, it erodes one's enthusiasm for life. Without that enthusiasm, life grows as gray as without sunlight. I think many people slide into depression perhaps because of long-term overloaded study and work. So no matter what, we must learn to rest before we are tired.