There is a path to humanity. To understanding what we really are. We are born with the potential to decipher the nature-given truths buried in us, with wonder, imagination and inspiration as the keys to reach them. But as we grow up and get thrown in the sea of daily worries and distractions, we become too busy to keep up the effort. We don’t spend enough time inquiring on the laws that govern our nature, so we slowly forget them. In some cultures, this discipline is spoon fed to everybody from a very early age, with the practice of religion, but it only goes skin-deep. Not nearly enough to be meaningful.

So we are never trained to lead active lives in communion with introspection. We slowly lose some of the shades that make life so brilliantly colorful. And we end up feeling shallow.

Existence is tough and full of preoccupations. The organized world we’re all participants in desires our full attention and energy. There is always the next bill to pay, the next email to send, the next family fight to resolve. We often feel like we should need two lifetimes, or days twice as long, in order to dedicate the necessary time to everything that’s important.

Some of us choose, as a response, to abandon mundanity altogether and devote their lives to the sole purpose of spiritual and intellectual pursuits. Religion, philosophy, art and childlike activities are usually what they opt for, as they are not only stimulating, but also the perfect ways to escape the mediocrity of modern adult life. It’s understandable.

The best of us, however, go beyond. They manage to blend the two lives together, pursuing creative disciplines while never abandoning the most boring responsibilities of civilized life. They turn their introspective journey into careers, ideas, inventions and answers that can help other people. Their purpose is to help themselves by making life a bit better for everyone else.

This is the kind of living we are all meant to aspire to. It takes courage, resilience and imagination to get to it, but if pain is the price to pay for a meaningful time spent on this earth, it’s honestly not a harsh price to pay after all.

The problem with separating the awesome from the mundane, on the other hand, arises when another kind of people starts to gain prominence.

Far from reaching a balance of inquisitive and active lives, and opposite to the complete devotion to spiritual endeavors, these figures lead an existence of purely material designs. They live to survive. And what’s worse, they spread their philosophy with the fervor of divining prophets.

These people are the hustlers, the grinders, the finance gurus, the health gurus, the self help charlatans. The merchants of smallness.

Exploiting the hunger for success and status that most of us have, they turn it into full-fledged belief systems, entire religions complete with rules, rituals, icons, penalties and heavenly rewards. They showcase their lifestyles as evidence of the effectiveness of their methods, and build congregations of followers ready to swallow pills of wisdom, to endure trials of fire, and to buy the products they are pitched.

Aided by the inhuman environment established by social media, the merchants of smallness gather vast numbers of people with simple quotes and videos. They infiltrate any culture or community, turning their essence into rulebooks for success and conversion funnels.

You’ve seen them. The social media gurus, the fitness gurus, the “wake up at 4am if you want to be rich” motherfuckers.

Venomous insects spreading a plague to blinded minds, seducing kids and adults alike. Always busy, always tired. The kind of people this philosophy produces is primed for manipulation. Distracted, unhappy, easy to control.

A shallow existence makes you uncertain, constantly unsatisfied. Far away from reaching the inner worth that sets you free. Status-hungry mole rats, blindly digging away. This is the kind of people that consumerism at its worst looks for.

The hustle scammers have blood on their hands. The next generation of mental heath victims is on their conscience. Their “prosperity gospel”, “rise and grind” hogwash is self obsessed and dangerous practice, with the same benefits as masturbating with knives.

Crush it. Don’t sleep. Don’t think. Grind yourself to the grave.

The doggedly pursuit of affirmation and a better life is sacred, it’s in part what makes us human. It’s the price of pain I was talking about earlier.

But the glorification of hard work for the sake of it, the shameless worshipping of honey drips of wisdom from the mouths of successful icons goes well beyond that, and it’s becoming scary.

Even when left without spirituality and philosophy, people still need iconographies to follow. They need rules, guides and hope because they need to believe they can escape their financial situation. Which becomes even more tragic when compared to the luxurious lifestyles of the online hustlers.

Every concept can be turned into a philosophy, and every philosophy can be distorted into a cult.

In the path to discovering our humanity, we have to leave this busy bullshit behind. Leave it to the preachers, and the speakers and the influencers with always something to sell you. Turn your eyes away from the hypnosis.

Be inspired. Be successful. Be productive. But please… never, ever be “busy”.