In this blog post, I’d like to share how reading “The Death of Ivan Ilyich” led me to reflect on the path I’ve chosen in life and its meaning.
My Choice
“What do you want to be when you grow up?”
Questions about what our future will look like—one of the most common questions we hear as we grow up—didn’t mean much to me until high school. Since my career path was determined by studying according to the curriculum and the grades that resulted, there was no need to think deeply about it. Rather than envisioning my future, I was more interested in achieving the goal of coming in first in the competition of the present. I thought that as long as I achieved that goal, everything else would naturally fall into place.
However, when it came time for college admissions, I failed to achieve that goal. Feeling disappointed, I tried again but ultimately failed once more; not wanting to take any further risks, I eventually enrolled in a program based on the results I had received. And so, I continued to lead a passive life, simply completing the required coursework without any clear direction or goals.
It wasn’t until I had spent a year like that and began my military service that I truly started to envision my future. Through encounters with a diverse range of people I hadn’t met before, I gained indirect exposure to various experiences and sought to discover what I truly wanted. Furthermore, by comparing myself to them, I analyzed my own personality, assessed my aptitudes, and mapped out my career path. Even after completing my military service, I constantly questioned whether that choice was truly the right one, and it wasn’t until I gained my own sense of conviction that I was finally able to take my first step.
The path I chose was one of achieving social status and living a life of honor. As the saying goes, “A tiger leaves its skin when it dies, and a person leaves a name,” I wanted to leave my name somewhere, and I chose a career in public service as the means to achieve that goal.
Reflections on My Choice – “The Death of Ivan Ilyich”
The novel “The Death of Ivan Ilyich,” which begins with the perspectives of the protagonist’s colleagues and family as they watch him die, made me reflect once again on the future I had spent the past few years carefully planning and working toward. This is because the life Ivan Ilyich lived until his death from illness was not only regarded as honorable in the society of his time but also closely resembled the image I had envisioned for myself as a future public servant.
Throughout his life, Ivan Ilyich strove to live up to society’s expectations according to his own standards. He valued maintaining a joyful and dignified life and worked hard to live a life befitting the upper class. He faithfully carries out the duties assigned to him and maintains a respectable lifestyle to advance his career. He refrains from morally harmful behavior or the abuse of power. However, to those around him, he was merely a figure defined by self-interest. Even his own family viewed him as a means to maintain their social status. Then, he contracts an incurable disease and is overcome with despair upon realizing that he—who had believed himself to be a special being—is simply dying because of his illness. He even resents the people around him who are living healthy lives. It is only in the process of facing death that he finally reflects on his own life—especially his inner self—and, ultimately realizing that everything stemmed from his own mistakes, he passes away.
Can the desire for success and the reasonable level of economic need required to maintain a life befitting one’s social status truly be dismissed as merely his own excessive greed? Yet, there is no sense of vitality in Ivan Ilyich’s life. It is an elegant and neat life, yet as dull and arid as if he were stuffed. If that is the case, can the life I am pursuing truly be called the right path? Watching Ivan Ilyich, who, in the face of death, finds everything meaningless and reflects on the life he has lived, I began to wonder if I shouldn’t adjust the path I have chosen—or, more precisely, the career path I have only just begun to pursue.
Rethinking
In fact, I’ve had many concerns lately. The biggest one was how to form and maintain relationships with people in the professional world. In the past, most of my relationships were with school friends, so it was enough to maintain good relationships as classmates pursuing our studies together. I thought that, to alleviate loneliness and find peace of mind, all I needed were a few friends with whom I could share my innermost thoughts.
However, after passing the civil service exam, my relationships with my fellow successful candidates were not so simple. They were colleagues with whom I would work for a long time, but they could also become rivals with whom I would have to compete far more fiercely than I had ever experienced before. Furthermore, my relationships with seniors and juniors could not be viewed as mere friendships. Our interests might align, and these relationships held the potential to lead to deep professional networks. Consequently, I couldn’t easily reveal my true feelings and inner self; I had to put on a facade whenever I interacted with people. My persona and role varied at every gathering, and the process of forming new relationships—different from those of the past—gradually wore me down.
Yet even these struggles could only be explained within the framework of the life I was pursuing. This was because, like Ivan Ilyich, I, too, wanted to attain social status and be recognized as a person of moral integrity and dignity. I thought I was actively pursuing honor, but in the end, I had chosen a life lived with constant awareness of others’ gazes.
It seems clear that through Ivan Ilyich, Tolstoy is telling us—who live our lives looking only at our surroundings—to look within ourselves. Even as we live by forming various relationships with others, we must listen to the voice coming from within ourselves, rather than focusing on social status or the judgments of others.
However, if the life I choose after truly listening to that inner voice turns out to be similar to his, wouldn’t that still be a life worth pursuing? Since humans are social animals, we live by forming relationships with a variety of people. If that is the case, couldn’t the views of others also be an important factor in determining the direction of our lives? Wouldn’t it be a hasty judgment to conclude that my choice is wrong simply because Ivan Ilyich realized his life was a mistake only when faced with death?
At least for me right now, discovering a version of myself that is recognized within society seems likely to bring me happiness. Rather than changing the new direction I’ve found in life, I want to take one more step forward and experience it for myself. Rather than viewing all life as meaningless and falling into despair simply because everything may seem meaningless in the face of death, I believe that even if I end up regretting it after living and experiencing life firsthand, it won’t be too late by then.
