There is ecstasy in paying attention. You can get into a kind of Wordsworthian openness to the world, where you see in everything the essence of holiness, a sign that God is implicit in all of creation. Or maybe you are not predisposed to see the world sacramentally, to see everything as an outward and visible sign of inward, invisible grace. This does not mean that you are worthless Philistine scum. Anyone who wants to can be surprised by the beauty or pain of the natural world, of the human mind and heart, and can try to capture just that— the details, the nuance, what is. If you start to look around, you will start to see. When what we see catches us off guard, and when we write it as realistically and openly as possible, it offers hope.

You may be blind to the very thing that will make your life feel worth living. You may be repressing the very source of your deepest satisfaction. You may be gullible, taking in the world’s insidious lessons in superficial satisfaction. Therefore, you have to dig deeper. Discover who you are and who you want to be. Don’t be dissuaded from that objective by the illusory promises of commercial life. Instead, be yourself.

You can trust them [emotions and fantasies], not to arrange life the way you want it, but to arrange the elements of your soul in a way that will offer rich life in the future.

Over time, you may tell it more effectively, and its sheer beauty will help you and connect you to the people in your life. You will find unexpected pleasure in the aesthetics of your thoughts and words, and that, too, will keep you going deeper, looking for further insights and language.

You only have to understand this basic point: Beauty nurtures the soul. Expose yourself to the beautiful, and let it do its work. It will accomplish what you could never dream of. All you have to do is trust it and be open to it.