 This is the latest essay I published in my project Me, Looking for Meaning. It’s called The Lure of Special, and it reflects on what happened after I returned home from a month-long trip through Europe. At first, I thought I was just dealing with jet lag—but the deeper discomfort I felt led me to explore something more personal and universal: our craving for novelty, for heightened meaning, and for the feeling of “specialness.” In this piece, I write about emotional stimulation, the highs and lows of travel, and what it means to come back to the quiet rhythm of daily life. I also reflect on how Buddhist ideas and intentional presence have shaped the way I experience the world—especially the familiar. What happens when that quiet joy of everyday noticing no longer feels like enough? And what can we trust when the glow of “special” fades? Here is an excerpt from the essay: That’s when I began to realize just how powerful the lure of special can be. Not just because the places were beautiful, but because I expected them to be. Because I had already assigned meaning to the names—London, Paris, Strasbourg, and so on—and because every new scene gave me a new excuse to feel something heightened. Specialness, in this sense, wasn’t just about beauty or interest. It was about emotional stimulation. And once I’d tasted that intensity, coming back to stillness felt like a kind of loss. Keep reading here!
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