"The One Spinoza Rule For Life I Try to Live By"
by Thomas Oppong
"I’ll save you the suspense: You’re trying too hard. Many self-help books and productivity gurus argue a good life is a math problem: input effort, output glory. But that equation doesn’t work for everyone. The blasphemy no one tells you is that the grind is not noble. It drains your soul. The more you hustle your way through existence, the less you live.
17th-century philosopher Baruch Spinoza notes, “The more you struggle to live, the less you live. Give up the notion that you must be sure of what you are doing. Instead, surrender to what is real within you, for that alone is sure….you are above everything distressing.” People have been gaslit into believing they need a 5-year plan. They don’t.
Spinoza could not be more right: “Give up the notion that you must be sure of what you are doing.” Want to pivot careers at 45? Do it. Want to start something new without a one-year plan? Go ahead. Use what goes wrong as wisdom for your next action. Certainty is where dreams go to die. Even if you get it, it’s temporary. A job you thought was “it” suddenly isn’t. A relationship changes over. You evolve. People change. You’ll never be sure of anything.
When you’re always pursuing certainty, the perfect career plan, the 5-year roadmap, the “this-is-my-purpose” epiphany, you miss what’s right in front of you. You’re so busy building the life you think you’re supposed to have that you forget to actually live the one you’ve got. You don’t need to know how chapter ten ends before you write chapter one. Certainty is a comfort blanket for the scared parts of your brain. I’ve micromanaged plans until they died in my notebook. I won’t go to that life anymore. I stopped trying to prove I knew exactly what I was doing.
The uncertainty won’t kill you. But the endless need for certainty? That just might waste your life. Stumbling is the path. The only thing you must be sure of is that you’re listening to your soul. The one that says yes or no without a PowerPoint deck. Your need for control is the very thing stealing your joy. You keep waiting for a sign, a guarantee, a cosmic permission.
Clarity doesn’t precede action. Action precedes clarity. The most alive people you know are not the ones with the bulletproof plans. They’re the ones who said “screw it” and stepped into the fog. Hesitation is not wisdom. The artist who waits for inspiration dies with a blank canvas. The lover who needs proof they won’t get hurt ends up alone with a spreadsheet of pros and cons. “You are above everything distressing.”The moment you stop resisting the uncertainty of being human, you realise the weight was never yours to carry.
Surrender to your own self. Your chief task in life isn’t to wrestle life into submission. Your job is to stop arguing with what’s true for you. Hate your corporate job but terrified to freelance? That dread is real. Ignoring it is what’s fake. “Surrender to what is real within you, for that alone is sure,” notes Spinoza. Your gut isn’t just smarter than your brain. It’s faster. Stop asking for permission from the wrong people. And stop negotiating with yourself. When you stop holding onto outcomes, you’re no longer a hostage to hope. You’re free.
You are the antidote to your own misery. The minute you stop treating life like an opponent, it stops fighting back. Distress isn’t fate, it’s friction. You’ll be “above everything distressing” when you stop confusing pain with purpose. Remember the last time you felt truly alive. I bet it wasn’t when you were “hustling.” It was when you forgot to measure, judge, or optimize. When you were just in it. For the experience. That’s the secret. Stop trying to live “correctly.” Start letting life happen through you.
The minute you “arrive” is the minute you start dying inside. Remember that one vacation where you planned every minute? Color-coded itinerary, timed breaks from experiences? Yeah. By day two, you were cranky and Googling “fun things to do near me” like you hadn’t spent three weeks researching. Life works like that. The more you try to control it, the less time to have to actually live it.
“The more clearly you understand yourself and your emotions, the more you become a lover of what is.” ― Spinoza
Every time you start spiraling over a decision, get back to these questions. Am I forcing this, or flowing with it? Is this fear… or freedom in disguise? Then, do the wisest thing possible, first: Nothing. Let the answer rise like heat off pavement. Because the truth isn’t out there. It’s in the parts of you that already know how to live, if you’d just get out of the way.
Life is weirdly beautiful when you stop forcing answers and just let it flow. Spinoza’s genius wasn’t in his logic; it was in his freedom. He proved what you already sense but refuse to accept. The struggle isn’t inevitable. It’s optional. Cancel your imaginary deadlines. The universe doesn’t care about your 5-year plan. Follow the unreasonable joy. What makes you grin for no reason? Do it badly.
Trust your gut. It already knows the way. What should I be doing with my life? It’s the wrong question. “What feels true right now?” Live from that. The rest, distress, uncertainty, and other people’s expectations, will still be there. You’ll just be above it. And when you finally stop wrestling the river, you realize it’s been carrying you the whole damn time. Stop trying to “win” at life. You don’t need to have it all figured out. You never will. “Surrender to what is real within you, for that alone is sure….you are above everything distressing.”
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