True and lasting happiness can only really be found inside ourselves. This is something I discovered decades ago but tend to suffer from temporary amnesia about from time-to-time. It seems like life is a constant cycle of straying from and then being gently ushered back on the right path again.

I relate to this so much. I had a tizz the other day having to cover a sport lesson and another colleague/friend reminded me that there's very little you can control in life, so just go with the flow and do your best. He then laughed and said he wished he could follow his own advice. It was advice I would have given someone else, but had forgotten in the moment. Wisdom is clearly a practice!

some drifting, rudderless ship. New projects begin in excitement but fizzle in the end as I lose interest and move on to something else. On a certain level I think to myself What's the point?

It's actually quite remarkable how we are both at this point - I'm 55 in in October, and I'm feeling exactly the same way. Sometimes I think our only job is to just breathe and live until we become worm food. Mind you, I've learnt to live with that and think it's really not a bad thing at all. Becoming one with the universe and transmuting to another form and all that. Simplicity at it's finest.

Yep, the dead internet. It's rather sad, given the twenty years or so where the internet has been full of creativity, connection, possibility. Now it's just AI or writers sounding like AI because all they've been reading is AI. Sigh.

'What gives your life meaning' is an amazing question. I think the answer doesn't need to be huge. You don't need to be an entrepeneur, a saver of lives, a ripple maker. That's sometimes for other people. Living small can also be a very big thing. I'll try to get round to watching those videos - I'm in class now supervising some literature students who don't need me, but watching videos would be taking the piss.

Keep being inspired and finding your peace, Eric. You have inspired more people than you think on Hive and I'm sure that is the case in your wider circles too.