“Humanity needs more free time,” says José Mujica, former president of Uruguay, in an interview with the “New York Times”

A street flower seller in Montevideo in his youth, a guerrilla fighter, imprisoned for a very long time, José Mujica believes in particular that humanity, as it is, is condemned since it is dominated by the market.

José Mujica, known as Pepe Mujica, the astonishing president of Uruguay from 2010 to 2015, with a folkloric appearance and an extraordinary life, gave an exceptional interview on Friday, August 23, to New York Times (paid article). He has experienced everything in his life. In turn, he was a traveling flower seller in the streets of Montevideo in his youth, a guerrilla fighter in the 60s, a supporter of the armed struggle, imprisoned for 15 years in the jails of the dictatorship, tortured for two years at the bottom of a well with only rats and frogs as companions, with whom he shared his crusts of bread, and whose friendship helped him survive.

He is best known for refusing to move into the presidential palace after his election as president. That huge four-story building. Inside, you have to walk the equivalent of three blocks to get to the kitchen to make tea. Pepe Mujica has never stopped living in his tiny 45-square-meter house with a tin roof with his wife and the three-legged dog he adopted, a president who shuns red carpets and trumpets, and professes a philosophy of simple living for a better society.

At 89, Pepe Mujica still has some messages to send to the world. He believes, among other things, that humanity, as it is, is doomed since human beings, these animals that are both intelligent and stupid, seem today to be dominated by the market, this religion that has made them voracious buyers. Humans live to buy, work to buy, and live to pay.

Uruguay, for example, has 3.5 million inhabitants. It imports 27 million pairs of shoes each year. So, we all work, in pain, to produce waste. We dedicate our lives to satisfying needs that multiply. Thus subjected to the law of necessity, we lose our freedom. We lose our life. Here are his last tips. Humans need to have more free time, he believes, to be more rooted. To give meaning to their lives. To fight for happiness, not for wealth. Because life is beautiful. What differentiates humans from other animals is the ability to find a purpose. To investigate, to play music, to play sports, to read, to write, to find what fills existence. If they do not find it, the market will make them pay bills until the end of their days. If they find it, they will have a reason to live.