Haruki Murakami is one of the most famous fiction writer in Japan. Also his work has been translated into more than forty languages. I am huge fun of the way of his thinking and the character he writes.
Murakami sometimes describes the man who (looks) does not care the things around him. He can enjoy being alone and himself. I can see myself on him. Murakami is also known as a good runner. He talks running. Here is what I learned from the book.
1. Team sports or not.
“The desire in me to be alone has not changed. Which is why the hour or so I spend running, maintaining my own silent, private time, is important to help me keep my mental well-being. When I’m running I don’t have to talk anybody and don’t have to listen to anybody.”
I have not though deeply. But I have similar thought with him. During running, especially for long and hard running, I talk to myself. That is important time. On that time, I usually talk to myself “can you do it?. Do you wanna stop?” I have to say “No. I won’t stop” Training discipline.
2. When is your peak?
Our time, our life is limited. And our body is getting older. The older we get, the more we are going to weak? Maybe. Even though, we may have physical peak, we train hard to fully fill the room of improvement.
3. First priority is work.
“This can’t be good for me, I decided. If I wanted to have long life as a novelist. I needed to find a way to keep fit and maintain a healthy weight.”
I have a similar idea with him. If I would like to enjoy living life, working, we need the energy and health. Without health, we can do anything. I wanted to stay health for work and family.
4. Know yourself.
“To what extent should I be confident in my abilities, and when should I start doubting myself “
If we train harder, we can know our limit. We can not run forever, we sometimes get injury, we need rest to run faster and safer. This is same in real life. knowing ourselves is important skill. Working too hard is not good, working too little is lazy. To perform best, we need appropriate amount of task. We need to be good manager of myself.
5. Totally unfair.
I could see his thinking on this book. He might believe that the world is made in totally unfair. I think I can agree.