“But
if we give up all society, turn our backs upon the whole human race, and live
communing with ourselves alone, this solitude without any interesting
occupation will lead to a want of something to do: we shall begin to build up
and to pull down, to dam out the sea, to cause waters to flow through natural
obstacles, and generally to make a bad disposal of the time which Nature has
given us to spend.
“Some
of us use it grudgingly, others wastefully; some of us spend it so that we can
show a profit and loss account, others so that they have no assets remaining,
than which nothing can be more shameful. Often a man who is very old in years
has nothing beyond his age by which he can prove that he has lived a long
time."
It
should never be a question of being “in” society or “out” of society; this is
the excuse of the one in despair, the one who sees only the extremes instead of
the mean, a state in which I have often found myself. That mean doesn’t come from
nervously balancing my fiery instincts, but rather comes from having the proper
aim.
There
are times to engage, and there are times to retire. Through it all, philosophy,
as a sense of the true and the false, of the right and the wrong, will be my
only guide. Through it all, whatever the circumstances may be, I can know why I
am here.
What will
happen if I only run away from all of it, from the fact that it sometimes hurts,
that it sometimes hurts mightily? It isn’t just that I will feel bored by my isolation,
as that is a function of my passions. No, what will strike at my being is that
I am no longer a creature of action.
I was
made to act, and I was made to act in cooperation with my neighbors, who are simply
other expressions of the very same nature I possess. They may be right next to
me, or they may be a thousand miles away, but I was made for them, and they
were made for me.
If I fail
to act at all, I fail to be human at all. Life is itself a principle of action,
and the life of a man is a principle of action through judgment. I will always
be driven to do something, and the
trick is in learning what it is that I should do.
I if
deprive myself of right action, I will find myself seeking out other things to
do, simply for the sake of doing them, only to give myself a sense of purpose,
however misguided it may be. I will occupy myself with busywork, not with
meaningful work. Here we have the misery of those who slave at their work, but
have no idea why they do what they do.
Here we
have the lives that are wasted away, constantly occupied, while still achieving
nothing at all. People will look to the supposed results on the outside,
forgetting that the true rewards are on the inside. They tear this down, and then
they build something else in its place, and then what they have built is torn
down in turn. It doesn’t seem to end.
Back
during my last days living in Boston, the whole city was in turmoil because of
what they called the “Big Dig”. I can no longer even remember all the gory
details, but it involved rebuilding all the major highways, and bridges, and
tunnels that were supposed to keep traffic flowing in the city.
So for
many years the traffic got far worse, since thousands of people were busy
spending billions of dollars working to make it all better, tearing up
everything that was already there.
By the
time they were done, it was all obsolete, and it would now take thousands more
people, and billions more dollars, to update it again. That, my friends, is the
very definition of busywork.
Now
imagine if we had spent all that time, and money, and effort in learning to
care for one another, instead of yelling at one another while stuck in traffic.
Yes,
many politicians, corporations, contractors, and lawyers made it big from the
Big Dig. They used their time, as so many fools do, to spend, and to waste, and to
borrow when they are broke, and to spend and waste again. When they die, they
are thought successful, because of how much they spent, wasted, and borrowed.
I must
never confuse doing anything at all with doing something well. If I deprive
myself of moral merit, I deprive myself of my own worth.
Written in 6/2011
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