Seneca, On Peace of Mind 1.9

"No one," I say, "that will give me no compensation worth such a loss shall ever rob me of a day. Let my mind be contained within itself and improve itself. Let it take no part with other men's affairs, and do nothing that depends on the approval of others. Let me enjoy a tranquility undisturbed by either public or private troubles."

But whenever my spirit is roused by reading some brave words, or some noble example spurs me into action, I want to rush into the law courts, to place my voice at one man's disposal, my services at another's, and to try to help him even though I may not succeed, or to quell the pride of some lawyer who is puffed up by ill-deserved success.

At one moment I want to crawl down into a little hole, and then at another I feel ready to charge out and fix all the ills of society. I may attribute this to being discouraged or encouraged by the changing circumstances around me, though I fear it has far more to do with the uncertain convictions within me.

If a single obstacle forces me to run away, or an inspiring appeal then has me protesting in the streets, that says far more about my own vagaries than those of the world. It isn’t this or that situation that is dragging me down or raising me up, it is my own unwillingness to make good of this or that situation.

I know, and I am sure Serenus knows, that the problem is somehow in our own thinking, even if we are not quite sure how to pinpoint the problem.

We say we know, but then we don’t do. We make commitments, and then we don’t keep them. Our circumstances toss us this way and that, such that we can no longer tell up from down. We alternate between crying, “I give up!” to yelling, “I’ll show you!”

I can hardly say there is anything stable in my life if my whole outlook changes whenever something is inconvenient or convenient, unpleasant or pleasant. I should see the warning signs when I violently flip from one extreme to another, from the lowest low to the highest high and then right back again, and I should be quite wary if this can even happen from one part of the day to another.

I do recognize a certain pattern here, and it is that this almost invariably happens when I have allowed my passions to run ahead of my understanding. I am doing quite a bit of feeling, as is quite natural, but I am not doing terribly much thinking, and that is quite unnatural.

There is a problem when the dog walks the man, instead of the man walking the dog.

It can be deeply troubling to find myself in such an uncertain state. I may blame the world, or I may blame myself, but blame alone achieves nothing. I was given the power of reason to learn to be accountable for myself, and that is where I need to slowly and carefully build my strength.

My very meaning and purpose should not be drawn into question by whether or not I happen to see my shadow, whenever I poke my head out of my burrow.

Written in 4/2011