Boethius, The Consolation 2.12

. . . “And may they continue to hold fast,” I said, “that is my prayer. While they are firm, we will reach the end of our voyage, however things may be. But you see how much my glory has departed.”

And she answered, “We have made some progress, if you are not now weary entirely of your present lot. But I cannot bear this dallying so softly, so long as you complain that your happiness lacks anything, so long as you are full of sorrow and care.

“Whose happiness is so firmly established that he has no quarrel from any side with his estate of life? For the condition of our welfare is a matter fraught with care. Either its completeness never appears, or it never remains. One man's wealth is abundant, but his birth and breeding put him to shame. Another is famous for his noble birth, but would rather be unknown because he is hampered by his narrow means. A third is blessed with wealth and breeding, but bewails his life because he has no wife. Another is happy in his marriage, but has no children, and saves his wealth only for an heir that is no son of his. Another is blessed with children, but weeps tears of sorrow for the misdeeds of a son or a daughter.

“So none is readily at peace with the lot his fortune sends him. For in each case there is that which is unknown to him who has not experienced it, and which brings horror to him who has experienced it.

“Consider further, that the feelings of the most fortunate men are the most easily affected, wherefore, unless all their desires are supplied, such men, being unused to all adversity, are cast down by every little care. So small are the troubles which can rob them of complete happiness.” . . .

—from Book 2, Prose 4

Yes, admits Boethius, he still has great blessings, and yes, he can still find hope. But he has also lost so much. Again, the absence seems to outweigh the presence. His attention to what he does not possess is distracting him from what he actually does possess. This frustration is quite familiar to me, and is something of a variation of the old saying, “the grass is always greener on the other side.”

When my wife is developing a new recipe, she will stand there with a puzzled look on her face as she tastes the dish, and then after some tinkering, tastes it again. “Something is missing,” she will say, with a mix of annoyance and curiosity. “I just don’t know what!”

My daughter, who had developed quite a talent for art, was once trying to paint a landscape. She would add a dab of paint here or there, but then she cast aside her attempt in anger, committed to starting all over again. I believed what she had painted to be quite beautiful, incredibly subtle and delicate from someone at her age.

“No!” she insisted. “It’s terrible! The colors are all wrong!” For whatever she had achieved, she found something lacking, something she couldn’t quite describe or put down on canvas.

I have often longed for certain things or situations, thinking that life will all be better once I have them. Then they might happen to come my way, yet I still feel dissatisfied, and I will quickly turn to a longing for something else I hope to possess. I may know absolutely nothing about the object of my desire, or why it might be good for me, but I want it nonetheless. I suspect it is precisely because I don’t have it, and because I don’t understand it, that I am convinced I so desperately need it.

However much a man may have, there will often still seem to be an yearning for something else, even when he has no idea what that something may be. It is something like trying to fill a bucket with a hole at the bottom, or the restlessness of an itch that can’t be scratched, or the completely filling meal that is still somehow not quite satisfying. More is added, another attempt is made, something different is consumed, but it isn’t enough.

So a poor man wishes he was rich, and a rich man wishes he was poor. An unrecognized man wants to be famous, and the famous man wants to be unrecognized. A solitary man seeks company, and the man in company seeks solitude.

Give a man a fine education, and he worries that he doesn’t have a good enough job. Give him a good job, and he wants a better one. Give him a better job, and he complains that he isn’t getting enough respect. Give him the respect, and he bemoans that everyone admires what he has, not who is truly is. Take away everything he has, and he starts again from square one.

Furthermore, give a man very little, and he may, however begrudgingly, manage with very little. But give him more, and then even the slightest inconvenience or disruption becomes unbearable for him.

I think of the words of Michel de Montaigne: Marriage is like a cage. The birds outside desperate to get in, and the birds inside desperate to get out.

So if we are unhappy with what we have because we think it is insufficient, and want what we don’t have because we don’t yet think that it is also insufficient, are we trapped in an unending cycle of want?

Even the first time I read the Consolation, I already had the sense that Lady Philosophy was setting us up for something more fundamental. Once more, I cannot help but think here that happiness isn’t the problem at all, but assuming that happiness rests in things and circumstances might well be the biggest problem.

Written in 7/2015