The Razor’s Edge
I named this little blog after a line from the Katha Upanishad, the one Somerset Maugham used for The Razor’s Edge:
“The sharp edge of a razor is difficult to pass over; thus the wise say the path to salvation is hard.”
I always liked that image; walking a blade between chaos and clarity.
Somerset Maugham’s book was about a man named Larry Darrell, a pilot shattered by the First World War, who abandons wealth, society, and love to search for truth. He drifts through Paris, India, and the Himalayas, looking not for success but for inner peace and meaning in life.
Distraction used to be natural: hunger, comfort, desire.
Now it is industrial. Every scroll, every ping, every algorithm is built to pull you away from yourself. Distraction isn’t just a bug anymore; it’s the main feature.
It used to take discipline to resist distraction. Now it takes awareness just to realize you’re distracted.
Even self-improvement has become part of the machine.
The self-help industry sells formulas for freedom.
Career and lifestyle coaches promise purpose, one auto-renewed subscription at a time.
The fitness world sells enlightenment by lightening your body.
But it is the same old game.
You will not be free. You just polish your cage.
The ancients warned of maya, illusion.
We live inside one, not woven from dreams but from data.
Illusion is no longer an accident; it is a business model.
Every screen sells illusion. Every notification wants your attention.
Attention is the new gold, mined straight from your nervous system.
The hardest thing now is not to believe, or to suffer, or even to act.
It is to see, to hold a clear line of thought without it being colonized by marketing, politics, or performance.
Spiritual or existential awakening once meant leaving the village for the forest.
Now it means finding peace in a room full of screaming screens.
The razor’s edge was always dangerous, but today it cuts from both sides:
one edge of overstimulation, the other of sedation.
The hardest thing today is not to act or believe, but to see things as they are—not as they are sold to us.
Roughly where philosophy meets the road.
The good old place where you lose the world's approval and get your soul back.