Meditations, Book III, Section 8

Meditations, Book III, Section 8:

Never esteem of anything as profitable, which shall ever constrain thee either to break thy faith, or to lose thy modesty; to hate any man, to suspect, to curse, to dissemble, to lust after anything, that requireth the secret of walls or veils. But he that preferreth before all things his rational part and spirit, and the sacred mysteries of virtue which issueth from it, he shall never lament and exclaim, never sigh; he shall never want either solitude or company: and which is chiefest of all, he shall live without either desire or fear. And as for life, whether for a long or short time he shall enjoy his soul thus compassed about with a body, he is altogether indifferent. For if even now he were to depart, he is as ready for it, as for any other action, which may be performed with modesty and decency. For all his life long, this is his only care, that his mind may always be occupied in such intentions and objects, as are proper to a rational sociable creature.

Invictus (Re-reading)

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole, 

I thank whatever gods may be 

For my unconquerable soul. 

In the fell clutch of circumstance 

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance 

My head is bloody, but unbowed. 

Beyond this place of wrath and tears 

Looms but the Horror of the shade, 

And yet the menace of the years 

Finds and shall find me unafraid. 

It matters not how strait the gate, 

How charged with punishments the scroll, 

I am the master of my fate, 

I am the captain of my soul.

Michaela Murphy on Resilience

An interesting TED talk on resilience by Michaela Murphy. A commenter says, "[t]he last 60 seconds are a master class in the art of growing up".

Staying Calm: The Results

I've been trying to track down an international payment that I sent from Korea to the United States that disappeared. I've been making phone calls to this and that place in America. I went to my bank here in Korea yesterday morning.

I've never been good at controlling my emotions, but when this started, I set myself the task of approaching it in a Stoic manner. What might easily might have become a conflict or showdown infused with emotion and hostility has become a fun, people-centered, and--if I may I say it--tasteful adventure. 

When encountering rule-bound inflexibility and intransigence on the part of organizations, instead of getting upset at the lack of simple fairness, being calm allows you to think of different approaches. It also gives you confidence. By not being emotional, you don't needlessly undermine the moral authority of your objective. 

One customer service representative I spoke to misunderstood the bad connection on the international phone call as my deliberate refusal to speak clearly. He said, like an infuriated parent, "You WILL NOT mumble!". It was obnoxious, and actually, vicious, but staying task-focused allowed me to finish giving him the information that was the point of my phone call. Later, talking to a different customer service representative with a different organization, the previous person having been so rude, praising her good manners was all the sweeter! 

Stoic Practice Opportunity

A payment of $600 that I sent to America has gone missing. Hohoho, a Stoic practice opportunity.  Some reminders for me, as I deal with this: "To bear this well" will be good fortune. Life is easy, if you want it.

Meditations, Book II, Section 13

Meditations, Book II, Section 13:

Remember that all is but opinion and conceit, for those things are plain and apparent, which were spoken unto Monimus the Cynic; and as plain and apparent is the use that may be made of those things, if that which is true and serious in them, be received as well as that which is sweet and pleasing.

Life is Easy--If You Want It

Life is easy--if you want it to be. Of course, there are plenty of extreme circumstances in which that might not be the case--being a war refugee, for example--but generally having never been in such extreme circumstances, I can't honestly say. I can affirm this to be true, however, for much more ordinary situations. Let me describe what happened this weekend.

Yesterday was a holiday, and my bank took the opportunity of the three-day weekend to perform some kind of upgrade on their systems. Consequently, everything was shut down. There was no ATM service. One could not withdraw money. One could not use one's card in stores or places to eat. There's usually a helpline, but that too was shutdown. 

I guess that they tried to announce the temporary shutdown in advance via text message or other means. However--perhaps because I got a new phone after opening my bank account a few years ago(?)--they didn't have my up-to-date contact information. I'm just not sure what the reason was, but, in any case, I didn't get any message in advance, and I didn't prepare by withdrawing enough cash to cover myself while the bank was offline.

Yesterday morning (Friday), I went to a neighborhood supermarket for this or that, and I tried to use my card, but it didn't work. The cashier said a message appeared on her screen that said the bank would go back online early Saturday morning (the next day), and my card would work then. I had a tiny bit of money in a different account, so I just used my other card. Everything runs like clockwork in Korea, so it never occurred to me that the bank might not be online Saturday morning as she said, and I didn't plan for it not to be. I took out most of the remaining money from my second account and used it as if I would be able to access my main account the next day.

This morning (Saturday), I went to Busan for a Toastmasters' meeting. I had a little bit of money left in my wallet, and I used that for the bus and subway fare. Before Toastmasters, I stopped by a Dunkin' Donuts and had a bagel. Never thinking twice that my regular bank card wouldn't work, I tried to pay for the bagel with it. But when the clerk tried to run it, she got a message on her screen that said my bank was still offline, and that it would be offline until eight o'clock this evening. I paid for the bagel with my other card, which left only about one dollar in that account. 

At this point, I began to think about whether I could accomplish my plans for the day and how I would get home. I didn't have enough money for regular train or bus fare. If the bank came back online at eight o'clock, that would be plenty of time. But if not, unless I borrowed money from someone, which I'm usually very reluctant to do, or unless I asked if someone would let me crash on their couch (I don't know anyone from Toastmasters that well yet), I would be stuck in Busan all night with no place to sleep. I decided to check the bank's web site, and it said they would come back online Sunday morning. 

As I walked from Dunkin' Donuts to the Toastmasters' meeting, and turning this over in my mind, and starting to feel a little anxious, this thought appeared: Now is the time to apply the things you've learned from reading Stoicism.

For once, I caught myself before emotions started to snowball. I'm grateful for this more than anything else. I was able to participate in the meeting in a happy and calm way and without being distracted at all. 

I realized after the meeting that I did actually have enough money for a 'standing ticket' on the train. This wouldn't leave me with enough money to get completely home--my place is 40 minutes by bus from the train station in my city, but at least it would get me to my city. Without access to my bank account, and not knowing exactly when the bank would come back online, the closer to home, the better.

After arriving at the train station in my city, I set out on the three-hour walk to my house. I didn't have enough money for water or for lunch, and I was very thirsty and hungry, but I was happy. The weather was gorgeous--it was bright, sunny, and windy, and I frequently stopped to take photos of the river, the flowers, the mountains in the distance, and the sky. Along the way, there is a place with giant reeds, or, 'silver grass'. They are at their finest in early fall--now--and I never would have gotten to see them had none of this happened. They looked just beautiful waving in the autumn wind under billowy clouds and blue sky. When I got into my section of the city, I saved myself several kilometers by crossing through the mountain instead of along the road. When I finally got home, I scrounged up some change for something to eat and something to drink. Boy did it taste good!

In previous eras of my life, or even this current era of my life (though much less frequently), when I don't catch myself, I would have floundered about, resentful, unhappy, and unable to think clearly, and not thinking clearly, would have made the situation far worse for myself by making decisions based on negative emotions.

The funny thing is, the whole story seems almost uneventful, and what to do stupidly obvious. However, I can't overstate the fact that things just don't turn out like this when negative emotions are in charge, thus making clear thinking impossible. Yet, having caught myself, and then having been able to create a space where clear thinking did become possible, the situation is not only resolved and over, it's even a pleasant memory.

Nothing is bad or good but thinking makes it so. Life is easy, if you want it. 

 *          *          *          *         *          *          *          *

Lovely photos from my walk home on a lovely day. 

Lovely because today, I remembered how to think properly, when it counted.

Meditations, Book II, Section 9

Meditations, Book II, Section 9:

Consider how quickly all things are dissolved and resolved: the bodies and substances themselves, into the matter and substance of the world: and their memories into the general age and time of the world. Consider the nature of all worldly sensible things; of those especially, which either ensnare by pleasure, or for their irksomeness are dreadful, or for their outward lustre and show are in great esteem and request, how vile and contemptible, how base and corruptible, how destitute of all true life and being they are.

I regard this one as especially important for maintaining perspective. It's hard to remember; harder still to translate into action based on that perspective.

There is the tendency to measure oneself against an ideal. I think this is the wrong view. Much better it is to measure oneself either according to (1) how you used to be; (2) how you might have acted overall--i.e., across all situations across time--were you not attempting to put these ideas into practice.

Meditations, Book II, Section 7

Meditations, Book II, Section 7:

Theophrastus, where he compares sin with sin (as after a vulgar sense such things I grant may be compared:) says well and like a philosopher, that those sins are greater which are committed through lust, than those which are committed through anger. For he that is angry seems with a kind of grief and close contraction of himself, to turn away from reason; but he that sins through lust, being overcome by pleasure, doth in his very sin bewray a more impotent, and unmanlike disposition. Well then and like a philosopher doth he say, that he of the two is the more to be condemned, that sins with pleasure, than he that sins with grief. For indeed this latter may seem first to have been wronged, and so in some manner through grief thereof to have been forced to be angry, whereas he who through lust doth commit anything, did of himself merely resolve upon that action.

My Achilles' Heel

Suppose that you've grown not to have your emotions swayed by things that happen or things that people say in particular areas of life. Despite this, there are yet specific areas where you are sensitive and reactive. Or, alternatively, your sensitivities evolve over time. As you grow or experience the world, you come to place importance on different things than when you were younger, or even just a few years before, and through this, as part of the package that things come in--though perhaps without realizing it--you also acquire a new sensitivity about them as the flip side of your attachment to them. Or--a third possibility--you grow out of practice in certain areas of potential sensitivity that you had previously mastered. 

There's only one answer, of course. You must apply the techniques to all areas in which you are sensitive and reactive. It won't do to avoid them or to inflate the importance of other requirements as a means of not facing them, nor will it do to buy into the mind's way of reserving from general circulation particular cherished things and placing them outside the reach of the techniques.

Manhunt

My sister's house is right in the heart of the search area for the man who shot the Pennsylvania state troopers. Schools are closed or something, and everyone has been hunkered down in their houses. Roads are closed off, they say; it's hard to go places. Police cars in driveways; helicopters in the sky, etc. 

I sent her a message via Facebook. I'd bring them some groceries or something if I were there--if that's even possible--but, I'm way over here, on the other side of the world, so, there's not much I can do.

Well, keep calm and stoic on, sister.

About six years ago, I visited her. I did lots of long walks while I was there. One day, I walked down into the town where the fugitive is supposedly from. Another time, I went on a six or so hour hike traversing the length of this nearby state park, down a park road to the two-lane highway, then up the highway (which involved stepping over the guard rail every time a car passed, because I don't trust people not to hit me), then back up a smaller road to my sister's house. I remember when I was walking along the highway, how pretty the sky looked above the pine trees and folds of mountain through which the highway threaded itself. 

What struck me most while I was there was how grim everything felt, economically, socially, and individually. 

Things don't have to be like that--at all(!)--but no one imagines anything different. 

Put a cheerful smile on our faces. Turn the music up. Roll up our sleeves. With our can-do good cheer and effort, we could turn this around!