Seneca, On the Happy Life 64: A Lofty Standpoint

This you do not understand, and you bear a countenance that does not befit your condition, like many men who sit in the circus or the theater without having learned that their home is already in mourning.

But I, looking forward from a lofty standpoint, can see what storms are either threatening you, and will burst in torrents upon you somewhat later, or are close upon you and on the point of sweeping away all that you possess.

Why, though you are hardly aware of it, is there not a whirling hurricane at this moment spinning round and confusing your minds, making them seek and avoid the very same things, now raising them aloft and now dashing them below?

—Seneca the Younger, On the happy life, Chapter 28 (tr Stewart)

The text of Seneca the Younger’s On the happy life abruptly ends here. I don’t know if the later sections were lost over the centuries, or if Seneca never finished them. I would certainly have liked to read more, but what has been given is already far more than enough. The philosopher has reminded me in so many ways to look at everything from a lofty standpoint, not with any sense of superiority, but with a broader perspective on how I should understand my own human condition in right relation to all other things.

If I view myself only narrowly, from the immediate confines of my fortune and amusements, I will never understand who I really am, why I am here, and what I have to live for. I will never grasp how much I have wasted, how I have harmed myself and done wrong to others, and how close I now am to having abandoned all of my blessings. I will be confused about what to love, and so I will pursue all the wrong things, and neglect all the right things. I will want what is bad for me, and therefore I will both crave it and curse it. I will just be throwing myself around blindly if I cannot distinguish between what is reliable and what is unreliable.

Yet if I seek the higher ground, and look at everything from above, what appeared jumbled and confounding will now reveal meaning and purpose. I will learn that I am not determined by my circumstances, but by the character of my own choices and actions. I will recognize that nothing external to me is good or bad unless I choose to make it so, and that every situation is an opportunity for becoming better. I will not replace a love for what is greater with a preference for what is lesser. I will embrace Nature as the measure of all that is good, and respect the place of all these things in the harmony of Providence.

I may have wanted to read more of Seneca’s book, but I don’t need to. So too in my own life, I may have wanted more time and more chances, but I don’t need them. What has been given is already far more than enough. I am very much mistaken if I think that living any longer, with more possessions, power, or recognition, will give me a better life. By all means, pass such things my way, but only my good use of them will make any difference at all. Even the briefest, simplest, most humble, and most unassuming life is sufficient to live with excellence. The good can die young, poor, and forgotten, because the good never need to become old, rich, and renowned.

I have been a teacher, a counselor, a bartender, a writer, and a quite reliable gofer, and sometimes I was even paid for it.

I have played music with an orchestra in a fancy concert hall, and with an Irish folk band behind chicken wire in the best dive bar in town.

I have paid for a new car in cash, and swept the house for loose change to buy lunch.

I bungled my way to a doctorate, and even became a questionably ordained minister. I display the diploma for the latter, but not for the former.

I wandered remote mountains in perfect contentment without seeing another soul for days, and I wandered the streets of big cities feeling completely alone surrounded by millions.

I have stood up to bullies and demagogues, and I have almost always lost the battles on their terms, but I have almost always won them on mine.

I have drunk the finest single malt from crystal, and rotgut from a paper bag. I learned that neither made me a better man, and often made me a worse one.

I briefly met Mother Teresa, and she spoke only a very few words to me that changed my life. I later met a murderer when I was working in prison ministry, who added a few more words that changed my life even more.

I have dug myself into the darkest holes, and grappled my way back up into warm sunlight. I have fallen down far too many times to count, but to this day I have always gotten back on my feet, however much the worse for wear.

Through it all, I became used to the Black Dog always nipping at my heels.

The most selfish person I ever knew broke my heart, and the most compassionate person I ever knew tried to help me mend it. 

I lost a child, and I tried to raise two more. I have no idea what will become of them, but I hope that they will always think for themselves, and that they will never lose their sense of what is good and beautiful.

Those were all quite wonderful, and sometimes even extraordinary, things to have. I am grateful for them, but I never needed them. I will welcome it if circumstance offers something else, but it would only be an encore. I don’t need more, I only need to make right of what I already am.

All I ever need to be happy is to make a decision, at any given moment, to depend upon the virtue of what I do, not upon what is done to me. Any kind of moment will suffice to do well. 

Written in 3/2017