He was sitting on a bus, travelling along the coast of the Atlantic Ocean with a group of tourists. They had left from the city of Salvador, the capital of the Brazilian state of Bahia, and were headed to Caraiva, a beach town south of the city.

‘Think without thinking? Do without doing? What do these "spiritual" sayings really mean?’

These were the thoughts going through his mind -- and he thought about them obsessively. He was looking for something more out of life, something more significant, something deeper. What did this "something" consist of? He didn’t know, but he knew it had to exist. It’s what he had been searching for, what he had become obsessed with.

He was sitting on the bus, talking to a girl from the area. But for some reason he was annoyed by everything he said. He was trying to express himself, trying to share his experience of life, but nothing he said seemed like it got to the heart of the matter.

Then a strange thought occurred to him: maybe thinking without thinking just meant letting go.

How could it be that simple?

He decided to try it. Somehow, amazingly, he started feeling better, like he could express himself. His Portuguese improved, thoughts and words became easier, effortless even. He felt like himself again.

Maybe," he thought, "maybe I’ve found what I’ve been looking for. Maybe the answer was just too simple for me. How could it be that the best way to find something could be to stop looking for it?"

The bus arrived at the beach. The group got off the bus, and the two sat down in the sand, apart from the rest of the group. She had her hair in braids, with little shells in them, dark skin, brown eyes. It’s not that he hadn’t noticed that she was pretty; he just hadn’t really let himself think about it much.

She wrote in the sand: "Quero beijar você."

"I want to kiss you."

For some reason, this was completely unexpected. The only thing he could think of was whether this had something to do with the letting go. In his confusion, he asked, "Why?"

Shrugging her shoulders, she just said, "Because I want to."

For months, he had been thinking about the meaning of life and of failure, about how to act in a way that would allow one to reach his potential and overcome suffering. But in not looking for an answer, he was finding one. It had been right under his nose all along.

She kept writing: "Esta noite." -- "Tonight."

The letting go thing seemed important. So back in Salvador, he didn’t call her. It felt weird, uncomfortable even. There were a lot of doubts: Is this real? Isn’t it contradictory? Shouldn’t I try to understand what I’m doing? But he didn’t call her that night, or even the next day. Letting go seemed more important.

Eventually the day arrived for him to leave the city. The Bahiana came to say goodbye. They walked off on their own, and they kissed.

"Why didn’t you just call me?" she asked.

He realised he still didn’t know anything about letting go.

‘Maybe I just need more time in Bahia’, he thought. ‘After all, there must be some reason for it to be called the terra da felicidade (land of happiness). Maybe it has something to do with the air, or the water, or the fact that it never gets cold here. Maybe it has to do with the carnival celebrations or with samba. In any case, I think I should come back.’