Yoshida Shoin — A 29-Year Life Still Moving the World 160 Years On

Season 2 opens with Yoshida Shoin, the great son of my home prefecture, Yamaguchi. His private academy, Shoka Sonjuku, was a humble hut, and he taught there for barely two and a half years — yet from it emerged the men who drove the Meiji Restoration and built modern Japan.

Shoin himself died at twenty- nine, completing no great enterprise with his own hands. Why, then, did such people grow under him? Because he did not merely teach — he ignited. Even in prison, he lectured fellow inmates and found each one's strength. A twenty-nine-year life still moves people 160 years on.

This is what it means to leave a culture, not a building.

What do you work for?