I am listening to Fuyumi Abe’s "How to Live."

Looking at the title alone, it seems like an answer. How to Live. How we should live. Yet listining to this song, I feel what is there is not an answer. Rather, it is a question that remains within the body, never quite settling into one.

A way of living is not something taught by someone else. True, there are plenty of words in books, movies, social media, and life advice columns. But those are not ultimate answers. They are more like sounds that ring only during a specific season. Like a voice suddenly remembered only on a certain evening. Just as the heat begins to ease slightly and a hint of late August starts to blend in somewhere, it arises for no particular reason.

How to live. That question does not arrive in a loud voice. It does not come like a revolutionary slogan, nor does it immediately look like a life-changing decision. It is smaller, more fragile. Yet, it does not fade away.

Fuyumi Abe’s voice possesses that smallness. The voice does not push itself too far forward, does not declare anything with certainty, and does not try to move the world. But it is there.

I believe that sense of "being there" is so important in music. Not something that asserts itself strongly, but something placed right beside you before you realized it. Something that, when you notice, has changed the pace of your breathing.

The title "How to Live" is strong. But the song itself is not strong. That is what makes it beautiful. A weak voice rides on a strong title, and a small body faces a grand question. Within this imbalance lies the beauty of this song.

The phrase "way of living" easily becomes heavy. It turns into an ideology, self-improvement, a career, or a lifestyle. But is it not actually something much more ambiguous? Can I get out of bed this morning? Should I reply to someone? Should I go outside today? Should I walk down this path? Should I stay quiet a little longer? Should I keep things undecided for now? A way of living exists within such small choices. And for most of them, we do not understand their meaning even when looking back later.

Why was I listening to that song back then? Why did I need that voice in that season? Why do I suddenly remember it years later? I cannot explain. But the body remembers.

Music becomes memory not because it is stored as information, but because it passes through somewhere in the body. The air at that time, the darkness of the room, the streets I walked, the feelings I could not tell anyone. These bond with the sound and suddenly return later.

"How to Live" has an atmosphere like the eve of a revolution. But it is not a political revolution. Rather than the eve of the world changing, it is the eve of something inside oneself beginning to change while still remaining unvoiced. It feels as though something is about to end, yet what is ending remains unknown. It feels as though something is about to begin, yet we do not know if it is a blessing or a loss.

It resembles the end of August. Summer still remains, yet it is no longer summer. The light is strong, but only the length of the shadows has shifted slightly. The world presents the same face, but you alone notice the scent of an ending slightly ahead of time. At times like that, one thinks, "How to live?"

Yet if we answer that question too quickly, we likely overlook something. Answers are convenient; they move people and are easy to explain. But questions stop people, keep them from advancing immediately, and create silence. And there are sounds that can only be heard within that silence.

I think Fuyumi Abe’s "How to Live" is music that belongs to the side of that silence. It is not a song that teaches a way of living. Nor is it a song that illuminates the correct path. Rather, it makes you pause just before the path. What will you do from here? Are you truly going that way? Is there still a voice you have yet to hear? In this manner, it leaves behind only the question. And I believe that is just as it should be.

A way of living is not something to be decided, nor is it a finished product or a posture to display to others. It is something that rises while swaying time and again within the seasons. Something that gradually alters its form through the sounds that have passed through the body, lost time, and words left unsaid.

How to Live. It is not an answer. It is a question. And perhaps music exists to help us endure remaining with the question.

© SHIRO & Co.

First published: 2026-05-22