There is a great difference
between slackening your hold of a thing and letting it go. The founders of our
laws appointed festivals, in order that men might be publicly encouraged to be
cheerful, and they thought it necessary to vary our labors with amusements, and,
as I said before, some great men have been wont to give themselves a certain
number of holidays in every month, and some divided every day into play-time
and work-time.
Thus, I remember that great
orator Asinius Pollio would not attend to any business after the tenth hour: he
would not even read letters after that time for fear some new trouble should
arise, but in those two hours used to get rid of the weariness which he had
contracted during the whole day. Some rest in the middle of the day, and reserve
some light occupation for the afternoon.
Our ancestors, too, forbade any
new motion to be made in the Senate after the tenth hour. Soldiers divide their
watches, and those who have just returned from active service are allowed to
sleep the whole night undisturbed. We must humor our minds and grant them rest
from time to time, which acts upon them like food, and restores their strength.
Some people tell me that if everyone lived as I
suggest, then nothing would ever get done. I can only say that much would still
get done, but it might not be quite the same balance of tasks we tend to do
now, and we might not be as rushed and frantic as we are now.
There would probably be far less time and effort
spent on things, and there would be far more time and effort spent on people.
There might be fewer luxuries, but there would also be a greater appreciation of
what constitutes an actual necessity.
These are usually the same people who laugh at me
for having been a Boy Scout. “What the hell did any of that ever get you?” I
usually offer them the Scout’s Law, still deeply ingrained in my memory:
A Scout is trustworthy, loyal, helpful,
friendly, courteous, kind, obedient cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent.
“So it makes you a nice guy. Great. What use is
that?”
I try to calmly point out that it has absolutely no “use”
beyond itself, that it is itself its own end, the formation of moral worth. Being that way is precisely what life is about.
They look at me with either confusion or disgust.
The Stoics list their cardinal virtues a bit
differently, but the content is ultimately the same, and so it should come as
little surprise that Stoic values are also met with confusion or disgust.
Perhaps we worry so much about constantly being
busy in trade and industry because we are overlooking the proper business of
life.
To do anything at all in a relaxed and leisurely way
does not mean we are being lazy; it all depends on what we think is more or
less important. I suppose if I wanted to acquire as much wealth and fame as
possible, I probably would need to spend fifteen hours a day at the office, but
if I wanted to work on primarily being a decent human being, would all of that tedium
really be required?
In all the corners of this world I have stumbled
into, the happiest people I have ever met are invariably the same people who manage
to keep their priorities in order, with the externals in service to the
internals.
They are glad to break a sweat, but they will not
break their own backs lugging around useless weight. By understanding that life
is to be lived instead of bought and sold, they are able to distinguish between
what actually needs to be done and what can easily be let go. They know their professional
“jobs” are a part of who they are, but not even close to all of who they are.
If my work is somehow in conflict with my leisure,
I’m fairly certain I’m in the wrong line of work.
Written in 1/2012
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