The “You Can Be Anything!” Deception”

The very dangerous illusion and the Greek project

We live in a society that lies to us shamelessly, whispering a toxic mantra in our ear: “You can be whatever you want”. It seems like a promise of infinite freedom, but it's a very dangerous illusion that generates frustration. The truth, the uncomfortable one that no one puts on billboards, is that none of us can be "whatever we want." The Greeks, who understood the human psyche millennia before influencers, reversed the perspective: you don't have to be what you want, but you have to become what you are.

Pindar wrote it with disarming clarity: “Know thyself to become what you are”. It's not a limitation, it's an existential project. There's a chasm between the two: "being what you want" is a marketing whim that sells you masks; "becoming what you are" is a destiny to be carved by eliminating the superfluous.

Arborum Felix: Happiness is a harvest

There's an etymological passage that drives me crazy and that dismantles our modern idea of well-being. The Latins used the expression Arborum Felix, the happy tree. And how do you imagine a happy tree? It's not just green or full of ornamental flowers: it's a tree laden with fruit.

Happiness, in its ancient root, is intrinsically generative. Those who are happy create, produce, and above all, share what they have created with others. A happy person is, by definition, generous: they are not stingy with knowledge, they share their resources, and they help the community around them grow. It's a perfect virtuous circle, where personal fulfillment becomes nourishment for others.

Because the system prefers you euphoric

But there is a “bug” in this perfect system, at least for today's economy: when you are truly happy, you don't buy. If you are Arborum Felix, If you're full of fruits and real connections, you only buy what you really need. In a society based on the overproduction of the superfluous, you're sure the market wants you. own happy?

The answer is no. The system wants you. gassed, it wants you euphoric, it wants you under the influence of a metaphorical "Red Bull" that gives you wings for three minutes of omnipotence and then makes you crash. The implicit message is subtle: “Be happy, but with a frivolous happiness. And don't go too deep.”. Because depth brings awareness, and awareness is the enemy of compulsive consumption.

The revenge of slowness

Depth requires a time that the attention market hates. The social media mantra is: “The video has to be quick, fast, just a few seconds. I'm anxious.”. We've tried to compress, reduce, and pillize every concept, to the point that my social media manager friends threaten suicide every time I publish a post that takes more than 3 minutes to read.

Yet, something unexpected is happening: the great revenge of "radio." The explosion of long-form podcasts demonstrates our hunger for complexity. In that slowness, which seemed banished, you can finally set aside your thoughts and discover yourself. Everyone is looking for the "magic pill," the Comprehensive Guide to life, but haste is never the solution.

I loved you late

St. Augustine, a man who knew a thing or two about torment and inner searching, wrote one of the most beautiful phrases in history: “Late have I loved you, beauty so ancient and so new”. And he added the key to everything: “You were inside me, and I was outside. And there I looked for you.”.

We spend our lives seeking happiness "outside," in things, in objects, in external approval, while it sits peacefully within us, in the place we never look. It's funny how much happiness we waste seeking validation elsewhere.

And when someone asks you with contempt “But why do you settle?”, smile. Because to be satisfied – in the noble sense of to be happy of reality, like watching a child grow up or enjoying a real moment – is the only true rebellion possible.

Become who you are. Everything else is just background noise.