Leading a life of quiet desperations

"Most men live lives of quiet desperation."

This is a quote from Henry David Thoreau - saw it at the end of a book I recently read called "Earn more, Stress less". And I find rather intriguing.

The meaning of 'quiet desperation' can be interpreted as bottling up the feelings of desperation and dissatisfaction. Someone also suggested that it could be describing people who just wanna follow the flow and fit into the society, they might be too polite to complain and too busy to think about it much. I am sure there are many of us out there who fits the bill, including myself.

How many of us dare to voice out our dissatisfactions to, for example, our superior or kin of seniority?

How many of us are brave enough to pursue our dreams without being handcuffed by reality?

How many of us are leading the kind of life we want and working to change it (if it isn't)?

How many of us are truly living life for ourselves?

Then I ponder the answers to this questions myself.

Indeed, I feel that right now I am living a life of quiet desperation. I have no clear life goals in mind, I am not doing what I am most passionate about, I am going with the flow on what others deemed as the 'right choice' and what I ought to do given my qualifications.

Amidst all these, life has been busy. I have been busy earning a living. As time goes by, it became a default that life should go on like this and I am 'happy' to stay status quo.

Maybe... just too afraid to take a leap of faith.

Slowly we just gave up trying to answer those questions and let them sit at the back of our mind. Life goes on. Quiet desperation, thus, became a fine phenomenon for those like myself.

Because staying in the same spot and not doing anything out of norm means nothing can possibly go wrong.

Right?

***

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