A Game with No Referee

There was a time when I walked with my head held high, knowing I could buy anything. I had heavy watches on my wrist, well-tailored suits, and cars gleaming in the driveway. And yet, if I closed my eyes back then, all I saw was a desert. A man who lived for himself, surrounded by polite silences and friendships that were nothing more than well-dressed interests.

Then came the fall.

Falling doesn’t happen all at once. It’s not a cliff; it’s the ground slowly giving way. At first, it feels like a stumble, a bad deal, a temporary setback. You still believe you can recover, that all it takes is a stroke of luck, a well-negotiated agreement, and a little more effort. But then another loss comes, and another, and suddenly, the phone stops ringing, invitations become scarce and smiles grow quicker. And one day, you realize that no one is left to call without money.

At first, I resented solitude. Then, I learned to like it. There is a dignity in being alone. Now, I stroll as someone who no longer needs to prove anything. I can sit on a park bench and watch the day go by without anyone demanding a destination. Coffee tastes purer when no meetings are waiting on the other side of the cup.

The other day, I sat in a small cafe, the kind no one notices, and watched a man count coins to pay for his bread. His hands were large and worn, made for carrying something heavier than those coins. The cashier waited, indifferent, as he picked out the smallest ones, sliding them across the counter. He didn’t ask for a discount, smile, or apologize for the time it took. He paid. He took the bread, put it in his pocket, and left without looking back.

I was once a man who paid without thinking, signed papers without reading the numbers, and always had more than I needed. Now I understand that gesture, that bread, that absence of haste.

I don’t believe in the idea that pain teaches. Pain has no pedagogical value, offers no life lessons, and doesn’t improve anyone. Suffering doesn’t purify anything. Simone Weil said that suffering only destroys, and I agree with her. We don’t learn from what wounds us—we merely adapt, trying to survive. What changes a person isn’t suffering but what comes after when they are standing again.

In practice, I have learned the difference between being and having. Society values men not for who they are but for what they can generate. It doesn’t matter if you are kind, cultured, or honest; what counts is whether you can produce wealth. You are worth something as long as you have something. If you lose it, you vanish.

I am a poor man, but a better one. I know this with the clarity of someone who has looked in the mirror and felt ashamed of what he saw. But no one seems to notice. They keep pointing to my failure, my inability to run a business. They say I should have been more intelligent and more strategic. But I don’t hear anyone say, “You’ve changed. You’ve become someone worth liking without any ulterior motive.”

Perhaps it’s because the world values winners. Maybe it’s because, in the end, no one cares about who you are—only about what you can offer.

The other day, I saw a boy playing alone on the sidewalk, kicking a bottle cap like a golden ball. He kicked it precisely, calculated his force, and twisted his body to get the best angle. He never looked at me, never expected anything from me. I stood there for a moment, watching.

Bread in a man’s pocket. A bottle cap at a child’s feet. Some things are worth more than they seem. Some things are simply what they are.

Schopenhauer said that society is nothing more than an organized mass of selfishness. Civilization, with all its sophistication, does nothing but disguise humanity’s original savagery. The market dresses up privilege as merit when, in reality, it is nothing more than a sequence of luck, power, and exploitation. Since the beginning, men have not been judged by their character but by their bank balance. And like a game with no referee, the winner is left to count his chips while the loser learns how to disappear.