Seneca, Moral Letters 19.3

Peace you can claim for yourself without being disliked by anyone, without any sense of loss, and without any pangs of spirit. For what will you leave behind you that you can imagine yourself reluctant to leave? Your clients? 

 

But none of these men courts you for yourself; they merely court something from you. People used to hunt friends, but now they hunt money; if a lonely old man changes his will, the morning-caller transfers himself to another door. 

 

Great things cannot be bought for small sums; so reckon up whether it is preferable to leave your own true self, or merely some of your belongings.

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 19

 

I find myself both grinning and clenching my jaw at Seneca’s reference to the fear of losing our “clients”. It is a perfect challenge to my generation, so spoiled, shallow, and grasping. We were raised to become the perfect professionals, which meant nothing but a mastery of buying and selling, won with a fluency in the clever crafting of image. 

 

This made it tragically easier to follow a life of total self-service, under the appearance of progressive enlightenment. Very few of us escaped from the trap, none of us without a good number of scars to show for it. 

 

It doesn’t have to be that way. Instead of being dazzled by the many trinkets, or getting sucked into the shifty games of manipulation, there remains the option of recovering what is genuinely human, and of retiring from everything that is coldly inhuman.

 

Why worry so much about the vagaries of social standing, which are at the mercy of gossip and flattery, when I could busy myself with a moral standing, which is always mine to keep? Why fret over losing my power and influence over others, when the only power and influence that matter are those I have over the content of my own character? 

 

Contrary to all the worldly expectations, I have nothing to lose and everything to gain by making a Stoic Turn. It is impossible to be deprived of what wasn’t mine to begin with, and whatever exists within the heart and the mind remains beyond the reach of the bandits and the players. 

 

And there should be no delusions here about assuming that my bosses, partners, colleagues, or customers are concerned with my best interests. I will indeed find good people among them, and yet whatever is noble in their souls will have nothing to do with business profits, and everything to do with a simple presence of understanding and love. It is contradictory to say that I must sign a contract or exchange money to find any such human decency. 

 

If they only want you for what you can give them, head for the hills. If they love you for your own sake, then the fancy balance sheets can be tossed out the window. No more excuses. Integrity matters more than style, commitment stands for more than commodities. 

 

Yes, everything has a price, though not always in status or cash. Once I revere the goods of Nature, I will gladly trade petty property for a victory in virtue. 

—Reflection written in 8/2012