“Eat merely to relieve your hunger; drink merely to quench your thirst; dress merely to keep out the cold; house yourself merely as a protection against personal discomfort. It matters little whether the house be built of turf, or of variously colored imported marble; understand that a man is sheltered just as well by a thatch as by a roof of gold.
“Despise everything that useless toil creates as an ornament and an object of beauty. And reflect that nothing except the soul is worthy of wonder; for to the soul, if it be great, nothing is great."
Most people I know choose to define themselves by the gratification of the body, along with its various accessories. I may believe that they are mistaken in doing so, but I can understand very well what urges them on. The passions make constant demands, and they can do so with great insistence.
If they are ignored, they complain ever more loudly, and if they are fed, they will always reach out for another portion. Is it any wonder that we let them lead us around by the nose?
I also know some people who, perhaps burned too often by their longing, decide that they must now hate their bodies, and treat the desires of the flesh like unwanted intruders. I may believe that they are mistaken in doing so, but I can understand very well what urges them on. Once bitten, twice shy.
If I transform someone, or something, into my enemy, it becomes so much easier to condemn and to cast aside. Is it any wonder that we like to despise what makes us feel uncomfortable?
I know all too well how it is to be tossed between these two extremes, and I have only slowly been learning to strike a balance, by starting with a rather different measure.
I am faced with the circumstances of pleasure, property, or position, and I assume they must be everything that matters, or they must be nothing at all. It takes a broader perspective to see them merely as something, just another part of the whole picture, and to make them relative instead of absolute, to distinguish between the means and the ends.
There is neither a need to surrender to the wants of the body, nor is there is a need to exclude them. They must exist in proportion, by how well they are in service to the needs of the soul. Once I no longer consider them for their own sake, they no longer have any power of their own accord.
Let me rise above what it asks of me, and instead let me consider what I should ask of it.
How much is enough? Only what Nature requires to get the bigger job done. As a tool is something I take up at one moment to achieve a task, and I lay it down as soon as the work is complete, so too all the conveniences of this life do not have to become diversions. They have their place, and it is my place to learn to master them.
Food, drink, clothing, or shelter should indeed be very satisfying, but they are only good for me when they help me improve my ability to know and to love. The same is true for money, power, or sex, such that what they are to me follows from a sense of who I wish to become.
Right or wrong living always takes precedence over more or less taking. If it is no longer the sum total of what I want, then I will only use as much as I need.
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