When Rich Strike surged to victory from behind to win the 148th Kentucky Derby in 2022, no one anticipated that a horse entering the race at the last moment would accomplish such a feat. Yet he did, and by doing so created one of the biggest upsets in horse-racing history.
On the ice, master skaters possess what others do not: presence of mind. When Ilia Malinin executed the quad axel, he could not know it would succeed until it had. When he performed the backflip, he set the crowd alight.
A master is not one who merely knows more. It is one whose judgment has been shaped by irreversible commitments. Mastery is costly, for it demands exclusions that cannot be reversed when conditions shift.
The most consequential work often appears unimpressive at the moment of release. It does not flatter. It does not excite. It does not promise advantage. It names what has long operated in silence.
“My writing is poor, and I will never become a great writer” is hardly the most auspicious beginning to an essay. Yet it is recognisable. From such a confession, analysis may proceed. Articulation is not the defeat of some grand adversary; it is the natural—almost unconscious—consequence of knowing one’s subject intimately.
As first a student, and later a doctor, of translation, I observed that many failed not from incapacity but from obsessive imitation. Good translation requires the ability to write well. The same holds for writing itself. Imitation will not suffice. If one strives simply to write well, a distinctive style inevitably emerges—one that cannot be imitated. Murakami did not set out to become Murakami; he wrote, and continued writing, until the voice was unmistakably his own. There is little use in attempting to be Murakami. Become instead the person you are capable of becoming, and what is yours will arrive of its own accord.
Write what is singular to you. In doing so, you will discover that it belongs, unexpectedly, to many. The only style worth possessing is the one that cannot be avoided, no matter how much you try to dodge it.
This is especially true of strangeness. A frog remains a frog. It does not aspire to become otherwise, and in this fidelity lies its beauty. Out of such fidelity, Porsches are born.
Nurture the strangeness that already resides in you. This is precisely where society attempts to bend those who have set out on the path to greatness. One never knows what lies beyond greatness until one has crossed to it. Do not bend. Find the intolerable. Do better.
Without risk, there is no reward. Theories require experiment, often in the most unconventional places. The greatest are unafraid to venture into harsh terrain. Diamonds in the rough outlast the synthetic.
To make people recognise their lives in what is written is an act of grace. Beginners stress the persona; masters attend to the person. Your persona is your person; that person is yourself. Begin with yourself. Do better for yourself. It matters little whether others agree; be true to yourself alone, for fidelity precedes approval.
To explain, justify, contextualise, and translate one’s work for immediate comprehension is a reflex born of systemic insecurity. A system that cannot tolerate silence fills it with commentary. A system that cannot trust time demands immediacy.
Visibility obeys algorithms. Authority obeys time. The former expands through repetition; the latter through compression. A visible idea spreads because it is quickly understood. An authoritative idea spreads because it becomes necessary. It is often ignored at first. Sometimes resisted. Occasionally misattributed.
Finality is unfashionable. It introduces a moral dimension to craft. Ethics as limit. To speak of finalities is to imply that not everything improves with iteration; that some forms reach a point beyond which further adjustment degrades. Certain sentences ought not to be optimised.
Where contemporary discourse rewards optionality, to finish is to imply authority. Mastery requires cessation. It demands quieting one’s selfishness for the greater cause of finding the right answers.
Against the reflex to explain, the only durable position is authorship, as it does not ask to be understood, but allows itself to be tested. It endures misreading. It survives neglect. It does not correct the record in real time. It has already borne the cost of coherence.
Authorship waits. When the noise cycles exhaust themselves, what remains is not the loudest work, nor the most visible, nor the most adaptable. Restraint reads as arrogance to those trained in accumulation.
For forms that demand completion: it is enough to be.
—R.
© 2026 Rhéa Hleihel. All rights reserved.
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