REPOST: Marillion, "Living in Fear"

Reposted since it seems to fit so wonderfully with Seneca, Moral Letters 4:

-bsc

• • • • •

Stoicism is a philosophy of peace. You will never find a Stoic telling you how eager he is to destroy his enemies, or how excited he is to exact vengeance.

But surely, if I don't fight my enemies as they fight me, I will lose, and I will die?

I may die, but I will not lose. I must protect what is right, defend the innocent, and demand justice wherever I go. I will indeed fight. But once I play by the rules of the aggressor, I am no longer the victim. I have now just become another agressor.

All of us will die, at one point or another. I care only that I do so with a sense of love, and never of hate.

As I drift into the end of things, Marillion, as always, reminds me of what I need to know.

Marillion, "Living in FEAR", from F.E.A.R . (2016)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggPB8O-OJNg

Our wide eyes
Aren't naive
They're a product of a conscious decision
The welcoming smile is the new Cool
The key left in the outside of the unlocked door
Isn't forgetfulness
It's a challenge to change your heart
There's always a price to pay
Living in f e a r is so very dear
Can you really afford it?

We've decided to risk melting our guns as a show of strength

As a show of strength
We've decided to risk melting our guns as a show of strength
As a show of strength

Our wide eyes 

are not so weak
They're a product of a hard-won wisdom
So we will turn the other cheek
The apple pie cooling on the windowsill
Is such a welcome change from
Living in f e a r
Year after year after year
Can we really afford it?
Can you really afford it?

We've decided to start melting our guns as a show of strength
As a show of strength
We've decided to leave the doors unlocked, our face unlocked
As a show of strength

We're not green
We're just pleasant
We're not green
We're just pleasant
We're not green
We've decided to start melting our guns as a show of strength

Our wide eyes

 aren't naive
They're a product of a kind of exhaustion
Will there come a time when we believe
The only way ahead is to put down our arms
When we finally know
The bitter consequence of not doing so
There's such a price to pay
For living this way
Living this way

We don't invite crime
We don't invite crime

Will you let one lost soul change what we stand for?
I don't think so

What a waste of time
The Great Wall of China
What a waste of time
The Maginot line
The Great Wall of China
Chto za trata vremeni
Berlinskaya stena
What a waste of time
Die Berliner Mauer
What a waste of time
What a waste of time

Written in 12/2016

Marillion, "Warm Wet Circles"

As a reference for Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy 5.23:

Way back in 1987, serendipity made it so that I first heard this song by Marillion, just as I was finally making sense of geometry (better late than never!) and fascinated by the properties of circles, and also just as I was irreversibly falling into philosophy, pondering what it meant to be aware of a universal concept. My fate was sealed. 

There are circles everywhere, and my ability to find how they are all the same, even as they are also different, is one of those wonders of the mind. 

Fish's lyrics were at their height for this album, approaching the level of genuine poetry, as he compares all sorts of circles, and how they move our lives:

The engagement ring, The pool ball. The ring of old beer on the bar, The glow of the streetlights. The glow of the headlights, The tube of lipstick. The cigarette. The turning finger. A mother's kiss on a first broken heart, A bullet hole. Ultimately, the cycle of all things coming around again, right back where they started. 

And, most explicitly, the warm wet circle of sexual intimacy, and how foolishly it is all lost. 

What a brilliant tune, though maybe it was just my take on it that made it special to me. . . 

Marillion, "Warm Wet Circles", from Clutching at Straws (1987)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bi-xj-cpFU

On promenades where drunks propose to lonely arcade mannequins
Where ceremonies pause at the jeweller's shop display
Feigning casual silence in strained romantic interludes 
'Til they commit themselves to the muted journey home 
And the pool player rests on another cue 
Last nights hero picking up his dues 

A honeymoon gambled on a ricochet 
She's staring at the brochures at the holidays 
Chalking up a name in your hometown 
Standing all your mates to another round
Laughing at the world 'til the barman wipes away the warm wet circles
The warm wet circles 

I saw teenage girls like gaudy moths 
A classroom's shabby butterflies
Flirt in the glow of stranded telephone boxes
Planning white lace weddings from smeared hearts and token proclamations
Rolled from stolen lipsticks across the razored webs of glass 

Sharing cigarettes with experience with her giggling jealous confidantes
She faithfully traces his name with quick bitten fingernails 
Through the tears of condensation that'll cry through the night 
As the glancing headlights of the last bus kiss adolescence goodbye
In a warm wet circle 

Like a mothers kiss on your first broken heart, a warm wet circle 
Like a bullet hole in Central Park, a warm wet circle 
And I'll always surrender to the warm wet circles 

She nervously undressed in the dancing beams of the Fidra lighthouse
Giving it all away before it's too late 
She'll let a lovers tongue move in a warm wet circle 
Giving it all away and showing no shame 
She'll take a mother's kiss on her first broken heart a warm wet circle
She'll realise that she played her part in a warm wet circle

The song is actually part of a trilogy on the album that all flows together, "Hotel Hobbies / Warm Wet Circles / That Time of the Night". You know you just want to listen to the whole thing! ;-) Bill me if you think it was a wasted fifteen minutes.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFQwkm_xbF0

Fish, "View from the Hill"

My sense of nostalgia, spurred on by the nipping of the Black Dog, will often make it difficult for me to appreciate memories. I immediately see the worst in them, and I instinctively wish to turn away.

I once didn't touch a fine musical instrument, or even look at it, for many years, on account of the emotional baggage that went with it. I have books, CD's, and DVD's on my shelves I cannot bring myself to read, listen to, or watch to this very day.

Even as my thinking would slowly but surely improve, this problem only seemed to get worse, as if some force was pushing back at me. A part of me, I suppose, wished to remain miserable and close my eyes to anything involving pain. 

It may take some time to embrace the fact that both the pain and the pleasure are necessary parts of life, as well as necessary means to finding peace and joy. 

I have an especially pleasant recollection of spending a summer in Austria with the girl I thought would be my best friend forever. She flew in a few weeks after I did, and I felt like my heart would explode when I met her at the airport in Graz. I felt even more twitterpated when I saw that she had brought along recent tapes I had made for her, including this album by Fish, who had just recently departed from my favorite band, Marillion. 

And so, like foolish kids, we listened to it together, over and over, often splitting the headphones, as kids will still do to this day. We would loudly sing out lines from it together, full of melodrama, and then laugh at one another. These were surely the best of times. 

My usefulness to her passed within the next year or so, and then the album sat ignored for almost twenty years. I constantly listened to everything else by Marillion or by Fish, but not this record. It just hurt too much. It's a shame, because it's probably his best work. 

And the other day I dusted it off, and I finally played it again. Was it agonizing? Hell, yes. Was to worth it? Absolutely. 

I had not really grasped the meaning of this song back then, and I now saw how it would have helped me not to have neglected it. It actually contains the gist of most everything I have struggled to come to terms with over the years. 

We are all sold an image, an ideal of a perfect life, and we usually fall for it, hook, line, and sinker. The illusions of success defined by power, wealth, and fame are what drive us, and we are then willing to abandon everything else in pursuit of this fantasy. 

"It will all be better when I get this, or win that, or achieve whatever I have been told is worth achieving."

And in the meantime, we forget justice, we forget compassion, we forget love. We are told to climb the hill, and to push everyone else aside, even to trample on them, and then we will see further. 

A friend once described the song better than I can: "You work your ass off to make money, and you spend the money to buy crap, and you make a giant hill of the crap. Then you stand up on your hill, having pissed on the people down below, and you suddenly have the nagging sense that you just wasted an entire life to see further, when all you needed was to see deeper."

At the age of twenty, I thought it was a great song. At the age of forty, it is now a profound song. Did it describe all of my own foolishness, years before I did any of it? Yes, it most certainly did. 

Written in 7/2010

Fish, "View from the Hill" from Vigil in a Wilderness of Mirrors (1990)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkdMCo4Nf3Q

You sit and think that everything is coming up roses
But you can't see the weeds that entangle your feet
You can't see the wood for the trees 'cause the forest is burning
And you say it's the smoke in your eyes that's making you cry

They sold you the view from a hill
They told you that the view from the hill would be
Further than you have ever seen before
They sold you the view from a hill
They sold you the view from a hill

You were a dancer and a chancer, a poet and a fool
To the royalty of mayhem you were breaking all the rules
Your decadence outstanding, your hopes flying high
One eye looking over your shoulder, one eye on the hill

You used to say you were scared of heights, you said you got dizzy
You said you didn't like your feet being too far off the ground
But they said that up there you'd find the air would be clearer
Promised you more space to move and more room to breathe

They sold you the view from a hill
They told you that the view from the hill
Is further than you'd ever seen before

You were holding out forever, thought they'd never turn your mind
Your ideals they were higher than you ever could have climbed
We thought they couldn't buy you, that the price would be too high
That the riches there on offer they just wouldn't turn your eyes
But your conscience it was locked up in the prisons of your schemes
Your judgment it was blinded by your visions and your dreams
Praying and hoping that the view from the hill
Is wider than you've ever seen before
For the view from the hill we held our heads so high (smell the roses)

All the loved ones that you lied to are strangers left behind
All the ones that really mattered well you stood on as you climbed
You were holding out forever for your fathers and your peers
Holding out for everyone that ever walked in here
The edge was inside and you rode it all the way
You were playing the games that you learned yesterday
Hanging around like a fool with a name
You are holding your place for the view, the view from the hill

They sold you a view from a hill
Took it all for a view from a hill
And you find the views no further than you've seen before

They sold you the view from a hill

They sold you the view from a hill
And you stood and took the view from the hill

It's simply coming up roses

Marillion, "A Few Words for the Dead"

As a reference for Seneca, On Peace of Mind 5.4:

This songs takes its time to build up, but then again, so can life. . .

 Marillion, "A Few Words for the Dead", from Radiation (1998, remixed 2013)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_m1HbjAMu60

Can you make it on your own
Can you take it by the throat
Make your own luck, learn the skills
Get in early for the kill

It carries on

Pick up the weapon
Marry it, give it your name
Define yourself by it
Take it down 'the disco

Trigger happy, pulling power
Lady killer, take 'em out
See the weirdos on the hill
Come to get you if you stand still

It carries on

Somewhere in history you were wronged
Teach your children to bang the drum
Tell all the family, tell all your friends
Teach your brothers to avenge

It carries on

Or you could love
You could love

Lie down in the flowers
In the blue of the air
Open your eyes
Why use up your life for anything else?
No need to fight for what everyone has
What do you need?
It's already there
It's already there

You could love

So he carried the stars in his pocket
Drank the sunrise till he was drunk
He embraced the angels
They swam like little minnows in his blood
Ghosts in his eyes
Out walking beside him
Laughing like children in his mind
They chanted his mantra together

You could love

They were happy

Arena, "Crying for Help IV"

As a reference for Seneca, On Peace of Mind 1.13:

Some people will claim that asking for help is a sign of weakness, and others will see it as a true sign of strength. When Serenus asks Seneca to help him overcome his doubts and fears, Seneca actually answers.

It is never a light thing, just because the suffering of another happens to be inconvenient. When others seek our assistance, we can finally put our money where our mouth is. By doing real good for others, we also do good for ourselves.

I listened to a lot of music during what I call my Wilderness Years, where the only people who barely stuck with me were my closest family. Even they had no idea what to do with me. I spent my time alone, and I cried out for help all of the time. It all seemed to fall on deaf ears.

"Give it time. It will get better."

Arena was a sort of offshoot of my absolutely favorite band, Marillion, and I would listen to their first album over and over. This track was one I looked forward to hearing, even as I dreaded what it had to say. It described exactly how I felt every day, and I would either crawl down a hole or lash out.

I remember going in complete desperation to a professor I had in graduate school, a Jesuit priest, and I bared my soul to him. He suggested prayer, and perhaps some medications, and sent me on my way.

As I walked out, I then saw him meeting with a happy crowd of students, all eager and excited, to go see a movie together.

To this day, I think of how much it would have meant to me if they had asked me to join them. I even stood there for a moment, secretly hoping the idea would magically pop into their heads. It obviously didn't, and I walked home alone.

Was I angry then? Yes. Now I can only think that when someone asks me for anything, absolutely anything, I need to give all of what I can. We are at our best together. 

Arena, "Crying for Help IV", from Songs from the Lion's Cage (1995)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Jghe46M6tM

Who makes these choices?
Who waves the final hand?
When wisdom is more than  age or reason
Who makes these choices?
Who makes the final stand?
When solitude is all that you believe

It's all the same
And you really should have known
It's all the same
When your heart grows cold and you're all alone
This has no name
This feeling that I used to know
It's here again
I can see the tortured souls as they cry for help 

Take my hand
I'll lead you through the traps and snares
Take my hand
I'll feed you and I'll clothe you like
My only child
There is nothing left to fear
My only child
There is nothing left to hurt you now!

Who makes these choices?
Who waves the final hand?
When all around
I hear the sound
Of pleading for a helping hand
Who makes those choices?
Who makes the final stand?
When far away I hear them say
They couldn't give a damn!
Give a damn! 

They're crying for help.
Help me!
They're crying for help
Help me! . . .

Marillion, "Don't Hurt Yourself"

As a reference for Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 8.43:

Marillion, Don't Hurt Yourself", from Marbles (2004)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3_GMYStFSQ

There'll come a time when all of this is over
Something else will grow and take it's place
The brand new car: scrap metal in a junkyard
The children playing will grow up and leave home
Put it away this dream you can't stop dreaming
Put it away this anger and desire
The open road is infinitely hopeful
Take all those memories and throw them in the fire

And don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt yourself anymore

There's an old man on a warm and sunny island
No job, no money, just a smile to call his own
Know what he says?. "The past will only haunt you.
Live for today. Each day's an open door.

Don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt yourself anymore"

Nothing to lose is nothing to fight over
The shining stars!
They've seen it all before.

Don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt yourself
Don't hurt yourself anymore

Dust keeps coming. Rust keeps coming. Weeds keep growing.
Where you going?

Marillion, "I Will Walk on Water"

Every man has a song or two that helped him save his life. This was one for me.

Some people are only happy when everything is completely explained, filed, indexed, and accounted for. For every claim, there must be peer review. For every insistence, there must be verifiable evidence. For every experience, there must be hard proof.

And then there are those moments in life, when you know exactly the truth of what you are going through, but all of the experts and pundits tell you that you are surely mistaken. If it can't be reproduced in the laboratory, it surely can't be real.

Life isn't a laboratory. Things will happen that are truly mysterious, wonderful, and uplifting. The Universe is far bigger, and far more amazing, than what the special folks in their lab coats claim to understand. There is indeed magic, and there are indeed miracles.

None of it is about superstition, or about imaginary causes. It simply means that Nature and Providence will work in ways that we can't expect. Thank you for that.

Written in 12/1992

Marillion, "I Will Walk on Water", from Six of One, Half Dozen of the Other (1992)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5e9UhF4IDBo

Something is coming out of the rain
Magic
it's happening again
Like the last time
I don't know how it happens
But I know what to do
Comin' up from the ground
I think it's you

I will walk on water

You sent me the red sun and the purple sky
Cirrus clouds and grins
Atoms of roses
The power to do anything
In the chaos of colors
And the fluttering of wings
You carry me up
And I'm free again

Don't let anyone tell you
This is impossible
What we have here is bigger than fear

I will walk on water

Don't let anyone tell you
This is unbelievable

Don't let anyone tell you
This is impossible

Hold on to me
Believe what you see
Hold on to me
Believe what you see

I will walk on water

Marillion, "El Dorado"

Marillion, "El Dorado", from F.E.A.R. (2016)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hulRCXm_tIg

i. Long-Shadowed Sun

I remember...
The enchanted English walled garden
Days of summer air and honey-suckled nights
The capricious dance of lavenders and cabbage-whites
Made more than 3D, glowing in the evening long-shadowed sun
Nowhere better
But in England, although nothing really changes, the weather always does…

ii. The Gold

The gold stops us
The gold always did
The gold took more lives than Uranium
Than Plutonium
Pandemonium…

The thunder approaches
The heavy sighing of the monster…
Come to break the heavy weather
Come to silence all the singing birds
Tearing up the sky like paper
White-welding through dark steel of clouds
And the release of the sudden rain

The gold stops us
The gold always did
The gold took more lives than Uranium
Than Plutonium
Pandemonium
The Gold!

Jet engines and demolition
And the summer rain
Like finding a lost child

The roads are traveled by many
Like promises of peace
And some choose not to go
The f e a r looks like bravado
It always did
I see them waiting, smiling
On the borders in dawn's mist
Or lost to the world in their upturned boats
I'll be free or I'll die trying to be
Trying to BE

iii. Demolished Lives

I see myself in them
The people at the borders
Waiting to exist again
Brothers, sisters, sons and daughters
Denied our so-called golden streets
Running from demolished lives
Into walls

The “haves” and the “have nothings”
The accepted and rejected
We can’t keep letting them in
We can’t keep letting them in?

The gold stops us
The gold always did
The gold took more lives than Uranium
Than Polonium
Pandemonium

And as I stand here wondering why
A man beheaded on a smartphone
Falls into my pocket from the sky
Modern life
Everything is everywhere...’know what I mean?
Handy
And obscene

iv. F E A R

F E A R is everywhere here
Under the patio
Under the hard-earned bought and paid-for home
Cushions, scented candles and the lawn
Mowing to the beat and the rumble of the coming storm

We all know about the wars that are raging
All the millions who just cannot see
There's so much more that binds us than divides us
But our f e a r denies it
While the papers stir it
The colors of the flag we wave
Were and will become blood red again

And the madmen all say they hear voices
God tells them what to do
The wars are all about money
They always were
And the money's dressed up in religion
And when it's not showing off, the money's hiding

Something is cooking inside me...
It ain’t ready, but already...
I'm becoming harder to live with
Becoming harder to live with
You say I'm becoming harder to live with
I’m becoming harder to live with
But you can't see into my head
You can't see into my head
You can't see into my head

No, you can’t see into my head

And the roads are full of weapons
That slide by in the night
Tanks all covered in yellow mud
Pass you on the motorway
As you drive by with the kids and the buckets and spades
Happy Days

v. The Grandchildren of Apes

Metal in the air
Brimstone in the lungs
Breathe deeply of it
The wind is carrying the pictures
The rain is muttering the names
The wind-chimes in my garden ring like keys
To all the stolen doors

We are the grandchildren of apes, not angels
But only we are gifted with the eyes to see
On days without f e a r, when our heads are clear
That angels, we could be

Marillion, "Beautiful"

As a reference for Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 4.21

I recall playing this song for someone when it was first released, who immediately described it as "sentimental sh#t written for people who can't be bothered to become popular. It's no wonder it never broke the top ten in the UK charts."

I smiled on the inside, because that was precisely the point.

Marillion, "Beautiful", from Afraid of Sunlight (1995)

https://www.google.com/search?q=marillion+beautiful&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-1-ab

Everybody knows we live in a world
Where they give bad names to beautiful things
Everybody knows we live in a world
Where we don't give beautiful things a second glance
Heaven only knows we live in a world
Where what we call beautiful is just something on sale
People laughing behind their hands
While the fragile and the sensitive are given no chance

And the leaves turn from red to brown
To be trodden down
To be trodden down
And the leaves turn from red to brown
Fall to the ground
Fall to the ground

We don't have to live in a world
Where we give bad names to beautiful things
We should live in a beautiful world
We should give beautiful a second chance

And the leaves fall from red to brown
To be trodden down
To be trodden down
And the leaves turn green to red to brown
Fall to the ground
And get kicked around

You strong enough to be?
Feel the faith to be?
Sane enough to be?
Honest enough to stay?
Don't have to be the same
Don't have to be this way
C'mon and sign your name
You wild enough to remain beautiful?
Beautiful

And the leaves turn from red to brown
To be trodden down
Trodden down
And we all fall green to red to brown
Fall to the ground
But we can turn it around

You strong enough to be?
Why don't you stand up and say?
Give yourself a break
They'll laugh at you anyway
So why don't you stand up and be
Beautiful?

Black, white, red, gold, and brown
We're stuck in this world
Nowhere to go
Turnin' around
What are you so afraid of?
Show us what you're made of
Be yourself and be beautiful
Beautiful

Essence

All those years of studying the metaphysics of Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas were never wasted, because they helped me to understand the distinction between a substance, something that exists in itself, and an accident, something that exists in another thing.

I am a particular human being in substance, who will undergo many accidental changes in his life. I will be young or old, rich or poor, alone or in company. I may act in different ways, or be acted upon in different ways. I may be in one place or another, and in one time or another. But I will always remain a human being throughout all these different conditions, as long as I live.

The related concept of essence is hardly obscure or mysterious. It is simply the identity that many particular substances share in common. It isn't my humanity, or your humanity. It is the mutual humanity we all participate in. My own specific being is mine, but our universal identity is what binds us all together. We both have something that is distinctly our own, while at the same time something that belongs to both of us. It is the principle that unites us.

All of our living can benefit from this insight. I need not look only to my being and benefit, or only to your being and benefit. Humanity is by definition an inclusive, and not an exclusive, concept.  This is why love is the law for a creature gifted with reason and choice.

Over the years, I have grown to care less if I can explain such things through scholarship. I have grown also to consider how such things can help me to live and love with excellence. All of the theory will be useless if it is not actually experienced and practiced.

I look at myself, and I usually don't see much of anything at all. I then look at all my many neighbors in this whole wide world, however similar or different they may appear, however appealing or unappealing they seem to me, and I perceive essence.

You and I are not defined by our accidents. You and I do indeed live as distinct substances. But all those billions of substances share in a common essence. This can be one of the most comforting thoughts there could ever be.

Marillion, "Essence",  from Happiness is the Road (2008)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWhpWziEOEk

Tell you what I want
Essence
Tell you what I need
Essence
What I'm looking for
Essence

Sit in silence close your eyes, feel the magic everywhere inside you
Fingers toes head heart and soul, connected deep to every living thing
Not just the taste, the touch, the smell
Or the face you know so well
Not the 400 word description
The book, the film, the faithful depiction
Get out of here
Get out while you can
Choose life, strive for essence

Choose life, Choose living
Choose life, Choose living
Go digging, Go digging
Go digging, Go digging
Go digging for essence
for Essence
for Essence

Sit in silence and watch the sky
Feel the magic deep inside you
Every woman and every man
Turn off your mind and you'll understand

Sit in silence and watch the sky yeah
Feel the energy inside outside

Ain't one damn thing means a thing in this life
til you get close to Essence, til you try
Every man and woman listen to me, hey
Live in the moment or you'll never be free

Essence
Essence
Essence

Choose life, Choose essence

Written in 1/2009

Marillion: Living in FEAR

Stoicism is a philosophy of peace. You will never find a Stoic telling you how eager he is to destroy his enemies, or how excited he is to exact vengeance.

But surely, if I don't fight my enemies as they fight me, I will lose, and I will die?

I may die, but I will not lose. I must protect what is right, defend the innocent, and demand justice wherever I go. I will indeed fight. But once I play by the rules of the aggressor, I am no longer the victim. I have now just become another agressor.

All of us will die, at one point or another. I care only that I do so with a sense of love, and never of hate.

As I drift into the end of things, Marillion, as always, reminds me of what I need to know.

Marillion, "Living in FEAR", from F.E.A.R . (2016)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggPB8O-OJNg

Our wide eyes
Aren't naive
They're a product of a conscious decision
The welcoming smile is the new Cool
The key left in the outside of the unlocked door
Isn't forgetfulness
It's a challenge to change your heart
There's always a price to pay
Living in f e a r is so very dear
Can you really afford it?

We've decided to risk melting our guns as a show of strength
We've decided to risk melting our guns as a show of strength
As a show of strength

Our wide eyes are not so weak
They're a product of a hard-won wisdom
So we will turn the other cheek
The apple pie cooling on the windowsill
Is such a welcome change from
Living in f e a r
Year after year after year
Can we really afford it?
Can you really afford it?

We have decided to start melting our guns as a show of strength
As a show of strength
We decided to leave the doors unlocked, our face unlocked
As a show of strength

We're not green
We're just pleasant
We're not green
We're just pleasant
We're not green
We've decided to start melting our guns as a show of strength

Our wide eyes aren't naive
They're a product of a kind of exhaustion
Will there come a time when we believe
The only way ahead is to put down our arms
When we finally know
The bitter consequence of not doing so
There's such a price to pay
For living this way
Living this way

We don't invite crime
We don't invite crime

Will you let one lost soul change what we stand for?
I don't think so

What a waste of time
The Great Wall of China
What a waste of time
The Maginot line
The Great Wall of China
Chto za trata vremeni
Berlinskaya stena
What a waste of time
Die Berliner Mauer
What a waste of time
What a waste of time

Written in 12/2016

Marillion: The Uninvited Guest

As a reference for Epictetus 49:

Marillion, "The Uninvited Guest",  from Season's End (1989)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn4R569NAiM

You may not recall the moment that you asked me
But your invitation was clear
You'll pretend you've never met me but it's far too late
Now I'm here

Cause I'm the one who knows what scares you
I'm the one who loves you best
I'm the thirteenth at the table
I'm the uninvited guest
I'm the Banquo at your banquet
I'm the cuckoo in your nest
I'm your fifteen-stone first-footer
I'm the uninvited guest

I was there when you said insincere "I love you's"
To a woman who wasn't your wife
And I fronted you the money
That you ran away and blew
On the biggest regret of your life

Cause I'm the one who knows what scares you
I'm the one who loves you best
I'm the thirteenth at the table
I'm the uninvited guest
I'm the Banquo at your banquet
I'm the cuckoo in your nest
I'm your New Year's resolution
I'm the uninvited guest

I'm the face you hoped you'd never see
But always knew you would
I'm the one thing you knew you shouldn't do
But did because you could

I'm the evil in your bloodstream
I'm the rash upon your skin
And you made a big mistake all right
The day you let me in
And you can fly to the other side of the world
You know you'll only find
I've reserved the seat behind you
We can talk about old times

Cause I'm the one who knows what scares you
I'm the one who loves you best
I'm the thirteenth at the table
I'm the uninvited guest
I'm the Banquo at your banquet
I'm the cuckoo in your nest
I'm your fifteen-stone first-footer
I'm the uninvited guest
Let me in!
I'm your New Year's resolution
I'm the uninvited guest

Epictetus, The Handbook 49: Pleasure, Pause, and Balance

When you imagine some pleasure, beware that it does not carry you away, like other imaginations. Wait a while, and give yourself pause.

Next remember two things: how long you will enjoy the pleasure, and also how long you will afterwards repent and revile yourself. And set on the other side the joy and self-satisfaction you will feel if you refrain.

And if the moment seems come to realize it, take heed that you be not overcome by the winning sweetness and attraction of it; set in the other scale the thought how much better is the consciousness of having vanquished it.

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 34 (tr Matheson)

Impressions and feelings can be tricky things. For the Stoic, it is not the pleasure or the pain itself that is good or bad to us, but rather our estimation and use of pleasure or pain that become the measure of their value for our living.

I can relate very immediately to Epictetus’ suggestions. I hardly think that any pleasure has done me any good at all if I have allowed myself to be immediately swept away by it. If it isn’t worth pausing, and considering it rightly, I am acting in the haste of blind surrender.

Now the way to estimate a pleasure can be to simply weigh the benefit and the cost. How much of myself am I giving, and what am I truly receiving? Caveat emptor. Most every life-defining mistake I have made arose from failing to rightly balance the credits and debits. Whether it be sex, money, drugs and alcohol, power, or fame, that first tingle of desire seems to offer so much. What it so often cost me was my own integrity, responsibility, freedom, and sense of respect. Some of those foolish decisions, made off the cuff and with hardly a thought, have come back to haunt me hundreds of times over.

I will often consider which sort of contentment will be deep and lasting. Will it be the pleasure of gratification, which is a thoughtless and careless abandonment, or the joy of right action, which proceeds from reflection and responsibility?

Note how often it is only the image and appearance, and not the deeper reality, that appeals to us, and it only takes the time and effort of judgment to see through the illusion. A pretty smile can seem so much more powerful than a loving soul, a sweet promise so much more convincing than genuine trust. I need only look beneath the mask. I have come to know many people in this life who are masters of illusion, but it hardly takes magical powers to see through the disguise. Do the deeds match the words? Do those promises sound too good to be true? Is the appeal to your character and sense of right, or to your gratification and sense of might?

When confronted with a pleasure, I try to take that time, and I try to consider the right balance of my own living, such that I am wary of paying too much later for a pittance right now. The right rewards of life are clear to us if we only keep focused on a love of what is true and good.

My old chums, Marillion, can come to my aid once again. In their song "The Uninvited Guest", they warn us that some of our rash decisions come with too high a price. Once I’ve let the temptation over my threshold, it is often to hard to force it back out:

I was there when you said insincere "I love you's"

To a woman who wasn't your wife

And I fronted you the money

That you ran away and blew

On the biggest regret of your life

Written in 9/2002

Image: Johannes Vermeer, Woman Holding a Balance (1664)

Marillion, These Chains

As a reference for Epictetus 15:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjLuzfsRuXE

Everything crashed
His wife left him
He lost all his money
And most of his friends
He lay awake all night
Lonely and desperate
Contemplating starting again

These chains are all your own
These chains are comfortable
Four in the morning
Sat in the kitchen
Keys on the table
Went out for a drive
He didn't know
Where he was going
Didn't know
If he was alive

The dawn was breaking
A new day was rising
Shadows creepin' over the fields
He watched the pink light
Steal across the horizon
He realized
He saw with new eyes

These chains are all your own
These chains are comfortable
This cage was never locked
Born free but scared to be
This cage was made for you
With care and constant attention
This cage is safe and warm
Will you die and never know what it's like
Outside?

—Marillion, "These Chains", from Radiation (1998)

Epictetus, The Handbook 15: Master and Commander

It is silly to want your children and your wife and your friends to live forever, for that means that you want what is not in your control to be in your control, and what is not your own to be yours.

In the same way if you want your servant to make no mistakes, you are a fool, for you want vice not to be vice but something different.

But if you want not to be disappointed in your will to get, you can attain to that.

Exercise yourself then in what lies in your power. Each man's master is the man who has authority over what he wishes or does not wish, to secure the one or to take away the other. Let him then who wishes to be free not wish for anything or avoid anything that depends on others; or else he is bound to be a slave.

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 14 (tr Matheson)

I have on a number of occasions tried to explain to others, in the most direct ways I can find, that Stoicism is not a philosophy one needs to be terribly gifted or educated to understand. It isn’t the principles themselves that offer me any obstacles, but my own habits and the pressures of social conformity that can make it difficult to practice. I just need to take off the blinders, though that can be easier said than done.

One of my quick summaries goes something like this, and I’m really just paraphrasing what Epictetus says above: “If I make myself dependent on the things I can’t control, I’ll be a slave, and I’ll be frustrated and miserable. If I make myself dependent on the things I can control, I’ll be my own master, and I can be free and happy.”

At those few times when my attempts at an explanation actually sink in, I usually see an immediate response of recognition. “Yeah, that makes total sense, and I’ve heard people say things like that before. They were usually the most humble and happy people I ever knew.” I may then hear a lovely recollection of a relative or neighbor who was surely a Stoic, regardless of whether he had read Epictetus.

The habits of corporate America were already creeping into higher education when I was a student, and I began to recognize certain formulas that were being used to “build the brand”. One of these was what I called the mock interview, where an employee confidently and cheerfully answers a certain set questions to help the consumer see the human side of the company.

I have to smile when I see one of those questions: “If you could pick one thing you wish you could do more of, what would that be?” I then expect one of two answers: “I’d like to do more to help the community,” and “I’d spend more time with my wonderful family.”

I knew a fellow in marketing a few years back who was proudly showing me one of these pieces online, so I finally asked what the Stoic in me always wanted to ask. I asked him why he just didn’t spend more time with his family, if that’s what he really wanted. What was holding him back?

“Well, my work just keeps me so busy, all the hours and all the travel, so I just can’t be with them as much as I want. I don’t really have a choice, do I? But I guess I’m doing it for them, so they can live in a nice house, and the kids can go to a good school, and they’ll have some security when I’m gone.”

For once, I didn’t press the Socratic point, because I judged it would do more harm than good, but I did think about it for myself.

If I think something is the most important thing I should be doing, I should simply be doing it. If I think something is getting in the way of what is most important, I need to leave the obstacle behind.

What is the good I can leave for my family? Love or money? If the latter is getting in the way of the former, I obviously can’t pursue both equally. If something, like the pursuit of a career, is taking control over what I should truly want, then I’m not really choosing my own life, but allowing others to choose it for me.

All of this then makes me honestly ask myself if I really do want mastery and freedom, a life where my control over my own conviction and character come first, or whether I am still hiding under the illusion that I will be happier as a slave to all those things outside of my power.

We all face that challenge, and how we respond to it will make all the difference. Marillion, some of my musical heroes, put it this way:

These chains are all your own

These chains are comfortable

This cage was never locked

Born free but scared to be

This cage was made for you

With care and constant attention

This cage is safe and warm

Will you die and never know what it's like

Outside?

Written in 3/2004