Seneca, On Peace of Mind 9.2

We never can so thoroughly defeat the vast diversity and malignity of misfortune with which we are threatened as not to feel the weight of many gusts, if we offer a large spread of canvas to the wind.

We must draw our affairs into a small compass, to make the darts of Fortune of no avail.

 For this reason, sometimes slight mishaps have turned into remedies, and more serious disorders have been healed by slighter ones.

When the mind pays no attention to good advice, and cannot be brought to its senses by milder measures, why should we not think that its interests are being served by poverty, disgrace, or financial ruin being applied to it? One evil is balanced by another.

Most everyone will talk about extending his reach, but very few will be content with simply having a firmer grip. We admire a tree that grows so very tall, while we rarely pay attention to the depth of its roots. A man will constantly be praised for what he has on the outside, and yet the content of his heart and mind are passed over.

An uncomfortable side effect of learning to think in a more Stoic manner can be a sense of alienation from popular culture, though I must remember that this inconvenience is far outweighed by the benefit of becoming more familiar with my own nature. Taking a Stoic Turn is far more than merely cosmetic.

People will speak of finding happiness in their jobs, their homes, their families, or their luxuries. As pleasing as these things will surely be, I can only think that I do not truly possess any of them at all, for how they come and go is often quite beyond my power. As satisfying as their presence certainly feels, I can only return to the fact that being happy can only be in my merit, not in the merit of anything else.

So, I attend to my own soul, while so many others attend to the impressions they make on the souls of others. I cultivate a little plot of dirt at my feet, while my neighbors buy up vast fields and orchards as far as the eye can see. I feel out of place in their eyes, even as I know I am working to find my place in Nature.

I bring to mind this image of Seneca’s, that the bigger the sail, the more the vessel will be at the mercy of the storm.

I can learn to focus on my own virtues through calm reflection, and by listening to what timeless wisdom, whatever its source, has to tell me. This is what I was made for.

Too often, however, I will become distracted by all the bright lights and loud noises, and then there is another means for me to be get back on the right path. Nature herself will correct me, by throwing misfortunes in my way, telling me that I have strayed too far from what is rightly my own.

Sometimes they are small frustrations, but if I do not heed them, there will inevitably be much greater dangers coming my way. When I start caring for what is beyond me, the new objects of my affection and concern will remind me that they are not mine to possess.

Yes, this will hurt, a bit at first, more and more if I insist on being stubborn, and yet the pain is little compared to the prospect of losing myself. Just as the lesser suffering of the cure is required to dispel the greater suffering of the disease, so a loss of circumstance can be necessary to save my soul. When I start nibbling at Fortune, Fortune bites back. I am well advised to heed the warning, and to be grateful for the lesson.

Nature never acts in vain, and for every action there will be a reaction. If I won’t heed the call of my own reason on the inside, then perhaps I will heed the warnings from the forces on the outside. To be robbed, to be mocked, to be shamed can do me good.

Written in 10/2011