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2009
Vol.12 Energy of a Company.
Vol.11 What is love? Part2.
Vol.10 What is love? Part1.
Vol.9 University Entrance
                       Examinations.
Vol.8 A Word on Privacy.
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Vol.10 What is love? Part1.
<“What is love?”- 47 years ago>

 It was 47 years ago that I entered university to study law. I joined a law related club in the spring of my freshman year, and a welcome party for new members was held in Hakone. In the evening, a professor who was supervising the club said to the new members, “I will give each of you a theme. Come to me with your answers by graduation in 4 years time.”

 We were all flabbergasted when we received our themes. In my case, it was “What is love?”
 

<4 years of struggle>
 That’s where the trouble started. With a theme that may be said to be difficult to tackle even for the top philosophers, it was initially a continuing process of trial and error, which was not even funny. 

 Nevertheless, after about a year, I had a somewhat clearer image of my theme, and realized that I would not get anything like an answer unless I started from the question, “What is man?”

 As for my lifestyle, what with classes and a lot of my time also spent on club activities as well as some part-time work and hobbies such as fishing, I was constantly in top gear and was rarely at home on weekends.

 But as I worked my way through my given theme, I naturally got into the habit of searching for answers through questioning everything I encountered, asking why.

 Come to think of it now, I think the professor gave us themes and told us to work on them for 4 years in order to teach us the importance of asking “why”.

<My answer 4 years later>

 The report on “What is love?” that I submitted to the professor before graduating consisted only of a diagram like the one below on a B5 sheet of paper, and I gave a verbal explanation.



 The red circle in the center is energy that everybody possesses, and love is merely realized as a pattern depending on where this energy is directed toward. “Love is the energy itself that human beings possess” was my answer, and I told the professor, “I could only get this far.”

 After looking at the diagram for a while, the professor said, “What you studied in the last 4 years will be useful in 10 years time after graduation.” At that time, I did not know what the “10 years” meant, but later there was many a time when I felt that it all seemed to make sense.

 I realized that by combining the life experience gained after graduation with the knowledge accumulated by academic work and reading while at university, you gradually acquire a sense of judgement and balance, and after around 10 years, your future direction and color are more or less defined.
End.
Masaru Sugaya

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