I found myself saying Hy-Brasail

I found myself saying yes. Reading that trope of personal surprise I found myself saying Libet what have you done. Are our responses to be considered according to the rubric of a bygone age which went: I’m the sort of guy who etc.. Here was a suggestion of someone who was helpless before their fate which was an adamantine source of response that could not be altered by much. Amor fati is then a sort of self love. You are your own fate. Become who you are said philohippic Friedrich which has a kind of 'vast imprecision’. The American love for such logoi is readily discernible if you google both it and its near idiot cousin ‘become what you are’. It is sealed with the seal of Oprah.

A contrary view of the core of personality is that it is malleable. Wisdom traditions all have their own specific recipes from penny plain to tuppence coloured. How are we to choose? Go by the slogan from the Irish Tourist Board - Ireland: The road you’re on will take you there.

HY-BRASAIL--THE ISLE OF THE BLEST
by Gerald Griffin


On the ocean that hollows the rocks where ye dwell,
A shadowy land has appeared, as they tell;
Men thought it a region of sunshine and rest,
And they called it Hy-Brasail, the isle of the blest.
From year unto year on the ocean's blue rim,
The beautiful spectre showed lovely and dim;
The golden clouds curtained the deep where it lay,
And it looked like an Eden, away, far away!

A peasant who heard of the wonderful tale,
In the breeze of the Orient loosened his sail;
From Ara, the holy, he turned to the west,
For though Ara was holy, Hy-Brasail was blest.
He heard not the voices that called from the shore--
He heard not the rising wind's menacing roar;
Home, kindred, and safety, he left on that day,
And he sped to Hy-Brasail, away, far away!

Morn rose on the deep, and that shadowy isle,
O'er the faint rim of distance, reflected its smile;
Noon burned on the wave, and that shadowy shore
Seemed loveilly distant, and faint as before;
Lone evening came down on the wanderer's track,
And to Ara again he looked timidly back;
Oh! far on the verge of the ocean it lay,
Yet the isle of the blest was away, far away!

Rash dreamer, return! O, ye winds of the main,
Bear him back to his own peaceful Ara again.
Rash fool! for a vision of fanciful bliss,
To barter thy calm life of labour and peace.
The warning of reason was spoken in vain;
He never revisited Ara again!
Night fell on the deep, amidst tempest and spray,
And he died on the waters, away, far away!