Twilight at the Door.
Kafka’s Parable in a World Watching.
Franz Kafka tells the story of a man who comes from afar and stands before an open door, guarded by a doorkeeper. The man asks for admittance, but the doorkeeper cannot grant it. It is possible, but just not right now.
Impatient, the man tries to see beyond the door as it is wide open, and the doorkeeper responds, “If you are so drawn to it, just try to go in. But take note: I am powerful. And I am only the least of the doorkeepers. From hall to hall, there is one doorkeeper after another, each more powerful than the last. The third doorkeeper is already so terrible that even I cannot bear to look at him.”
Surprised, the man was not expecting this. As he takes a closer look, the doorkeeper is a grand warrior with a fur coat, big sharp nose and long thin, black tartar beard. In his critical moment, the man decides it is better to wait until he gets permission to enter. The doorkeeper gives him a stool and lets him sit down at one side of the door.
They occasionally chat, and the doorkeeper asks him questions about his home and many other things. This goes on and on as the man gets older. Years pass by, and he forgets what’s behind the door, focusing only on the doorkeeper who seems to be the only obstacle preventing him. Worn down by the importunity, at first the man cursed his bad luck loudly, and as he grew older, he only grumbled to himself.
His world fades in time, and now he’s lying there on the floor, but he continues to be aware of the radiance that flares from the open door. And as the guard bends down to listen to him, the man asks, “How does it happen that for all these many years no one but myself has ever begged for admittance?” And the guard says to the dying man, “No one else could ever be admitted here, since this gate was made only for you I am going to shut it.”
The reality is that we are often not ready for most things that life throws at us. Because of that, we spend most of our time pondering two choices: To have the courage to finally enter the open doors that life offers us, or to live in the waiting game and prudence that is most certain to us.
Yes, certainty is safe, preparation is safe, stillness is safe. But being safe can also mean losing an opportunity that will never, never come back. Staying safe was never so dangerous.
Waiting for the right time can become a prison. No, not the one you imagine with four close walls and no windows, but actually one in the open air that we spend most of our lives walking by, thinking about the things we wanted to do but didn’t, or the things we are doing but don’t want to do anymore. Either because we feel we are not ready for it, or because fear determines what is or isn’t possible. Most of our trouble comes from the second.
Morgan Housel said it well by pointing out that fifteen billion people were born in the 19th and 20th centuries but we can imagine a whole different world and society if just seven of them never existed: Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, Gavrilo Princip, Thomas Edison, Bill Gates, Martin Luther King. Everything from borders to technology to social norms would be different if these people didn’t dare in the right or wrong way.
Even Hitler, in his sick, violent lunatic thinking, was surrounded by German officers who opposed him but were afraid to stand against him during his craziest moments. They were just nudging, just saying what Hitler wanted to hear, or worse, just staying silent and complicit. Fear became their doorkeeper. Most were with him for every hour for 2,791 bloody days, or six years and one day. It was estimated that over 70 million people from all sides died during the Second World War, or 32 thousand people per day.
Imagine how many they could have saved by his military circle simply acting, or even just trying? It was their door, unique for them to take. And how many millions of others, or just a handful, need us to get our shit together to act, right now?
On the other hand, when the full force of the Blitz threatened England, Winston Churchill faced the worst fears of all British families and the fate of the nation. He was over 65 years old at the time, an age when many of us could pledge a time for resting, and he was placed in this unique spot in history. Did he silo in stillness, containing his army? No. Did he bring himself to try reaching an agreement with the Germans? Absolutely not. “Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never-in nothing, great or small, large or petty”, he said standing in front of young men at Harrow School as another winter was approaching, reverberating “never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”
We remember acts of courage for how scarce they are. Isn’t that a sign of where our most valuable actions could be?
We are not Churchill, thankfully, we don’t need to be. But we are all facing our unique door to chase, what is yours? Maybe it’s a hard conversation to recover a meaningful relationship, or maybe to change from an abusive one. Maybe is doing more or something different for your community. Maybe it’s a promotion or a new job, or simply ending the one making you miserable. Maybe it’s an idea that you want to materialize. Maybe it’s achieving your childhood dream. We stay gripped in the status quo. The irony of spending time avoiding. Thinking the same thoughts and admiring those who do differently. What we lack is what we see.
By waiting, “I was too cowardly to do what I knew to be right,” Charles Dickens once wrote, “as I had been too cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be wrong.” Living in the in-between, we become obsessed with the things meant for us that we don’t do. How crazy is that?
There is so much beauty in facing hard things. Whenever we find complexity in our challenges, we also find ourselves. “Self-discovery happens when man measures himself against an obstacle,” said the aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, who later went missing in a flying accident, also against the Germans during the Second World War, but not before writing The Little Prince, a fable about love and brave acts.
Franz Kafka shows us that to lead a full and aware life, you should head towards possibility, towards mystery and movements, towards change. Hard things are good things.
Yes, I know, circumstances are different for everyone. Maybe you are going through a forced time with limited options. Maybe the setup is out of fear or impatience rather than a balanced perspective. Prudence can be granted as one of the greatest virtues as you build up your readiness. However, it is crucial to distinguish between active preparation and losing ourselves for certainty. Nothing is wrong with waiting until you stop remembering who you are.
What if you pass the door and you enter a maze? What if you get broke, lose time, break the glass? What if the other side is just difficult? What if you want to stop? You can, sure. But remember how miserable you were by living in the “what if?” waiting as your life passes. Or worse, what if you forget the “what if?” I’d rather try to discover the exit of a maze than never leave it in the first place.
And if the doorkeeper beats you down? Yes, you will need time to recover. Yes, it can be emotionally devastating. Yes, the door might close afterwards. But remember that when one door closes, another one opens. It’s the law of nature.
The door before you is only made for you. Stagnation is slow-motion failure. And failure means not trying.
To never let the other side take what’s yours to take.
To always find the learnings from the paths you have tried.
To step in and find the light in the darkest time.
Sources
[1] Before the Law - Franz Kafka
[2] Courage is Calling - Ryan Holiday
[3] Psychology of Money - Morgan Housel
[4] Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
[5] The 33 Strategies of War - Robert Greene
[6] Wind, Sand and Stars - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
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