on moving from objects and people that have served their purpose in your life

i’ve seen some pretty harsh critiques of marie kondo’s ‘life-changing magic of tidying up,’ but i really enjoyed it. as 2016 winds down, i’m thinking a lot about one of her more poignant lessons. to paraphrase (longer passage excerpt below): everything you ever own need not be used for its full lifetime. not every item of clothing needs to be worn threadbare by you and not every object you possess needs to be kept until it no longer functions. some things are good for an instant, a season or two, years, or forever. it’s important to be able to know when that function has been served and then be able to let that thing go.

in a strange twist, she also applied that general thinking to people in our lives. with people it seems like the “usefulness” is more about teaching lessons. and, just like objects, sometimes the lessons are learned quickly and others they’re learned over longer stretches of time.

but with both objects and people, they’re good for a time, and then the time comes to move on. in my view, this is natural. in our consumerist society, this truth is paradoxical. on one hand, we have little problem gathering and disposing of things, but on the other we hoard things that are borderline useless and for entirely too long.

i really believe that to truly cherish what’s important, you must move on from things that have outlived their purpose. as i’m planning out my personal retreat, i’m carrying this thought in with me and seeing what unfolds. who knows where that’ll lead me…

When you come across something that’s hard to discard, consider carefully why you have that specific item in the first place. When did you get it and what meaning did it have for you then? Reassess the role it plays in your life. If, for example, you have some clothes that you bought but never wear, examine them one at a time. Where did you buy that particular outfit and why? If you bought it because you thought it looked cool in the shop, it has fulfilled the function of giving you a thrill when you bought it. Then why did you never wear it? Was it because you realized that it didn’t suit you when you tried it on at home? If so, and if you no longer buy clothes of the same style or color, it has fulfilled another important function—it has taught you what doesn’t suit you. In fact, that particular article of clothing has already completed its role in your life, and you are free to say, “Thank you for giving me joy when I bought you,” or “Thank you for teaching me what doesn’t suit me,” and let it go.

Every object has a different role to play. Not all clothes have come to you to be worn threadbare. It is the same with people. Not every person you meet in life will become a close friend or lover. Some you will find hard to get along with or impossible to like. But these people, too, teach you the precious lesson of who you do like, so that you will appreciate those special people even more.

When you come across something that you cannot part with, think carefully about its true purpose in your life. You’ll be surprised at how many of the things you possess have already fulfilled their role. By acknowledging their contribution and letting them go wth gratitude, you will be able to truly put the things you own, and you life, in order. In the end, all that will remain are the things that you really treasure.

To truly cherish the things that are important to you, you must first discard those that have outlived their purpose. To get rid of what you no longer need is neither wasteful nor shameful. Can you truthfully say that you treasure something buried so deeply in a close or drawer that you have forgotten its existence? … Let them go, with gratitude. Not  only you, but your things as well, will feel clear and refreshed when you are done tidying.

—Marie Kondo, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, pages 60-61

final thoughts from seneca: figure out what you need and shape your life based on that

“When the spirit has prepared itself beforehand, it is not so clear just how much real strength it possesses; the surest indications are the ones it gives on the spur of the moment, when it views annoyances in amateur not merely unruffled but serene, when it refrains from flying into a fit of tempter or picking a quarrel with someone, when it sees to everything it requires by refraining from hankering after this and that… Until we have begun to go without them, we fail to realize how unnecessary many things are. We’ve been using them to cause we need them but because we had them. Look at the number of things we buy because others have bought them or because they’re most people’s houses. One of the causes of the troubles that beset us is the way our lives are guided by the example of others; instead of being set to rights by reason we’re seduced by convention. There are things that we shouldn’t wish to initiate if they were done by only a few, but when a lot of people have started doing them we follow along, as though a practice became more respectable by becoming more common. One they have become general, mistaken ways acquire in our minds the status of correct ones…

These are the people who pass on vices, transmitting them from one character to another. One used to think that the type of person who spreads tales was as bad as any: but there are persons who spread vices. And association with them does a lot of damage. For even if its success is not immediate, it leaves a seed in the mind, and even after we’ve said goodbye to them the evil follows us, to rear its head at some time or other in the future…” — seneca, letter cxxiii (123)

this passage had a lot of gems for me.

1. the fact that the work of “preparing the spirit beforehand” doesn’t show up immediately just resonated with me for some reason. i think that’s related to what i wrote the other day about seneca’s thoughts on how living virtuously takes practice. that type of effort/work doesn’t show up instantly like some other work does. but those moments when the effort pays off are important (like refraining to fly off into a temper).
2. ​so much of what we live with these days is unnecessary, but we use it because we have it. until we have begun to go without them, we fail to realize how unnecessary many things are. i’m pretty interested in how consciously choosing to have less can teach us to need less. i wrote the other day about seneca’s thoughts on essentials vs luxuries and now i’m thinking of marie kondo’s work, too…
3. ​avoid spending time with people who are vice-spreaders. it’s harder to shed the influence of their thoughts than one would think. definitely taking that thinking with me into 2017. and a related point…
4. one of the causes of our troubles is that we guide our lives based on the lives of others. this is just generally a problematic reality. when few people have done something, we’re fine to not follow. but as things grow in popularity we follow along as if things get more respectable the more common they are. but that just isn’t always a causal pathway. lots of people can collectively be into some fucked up shit just as easily as they can be into good things. but i always have been and will likely always be someone who tries to be critical of all things in that lane. stopping to ask why and whether or not that thing is good for me is super important. i think about this with television and binge watching series’ all the time. do i really need to be caught up on game of thrones because everyone else is?

the big point behind this passage for me, and really all of seneca’s writing (this is the last seneca post i think), is this: figure out what you need and shape your life based on that; not what others say they need. the process of defining what you as an individual needs is one that i don’t actually see people being supported to do. school doesn’t do it and society does it in the worst, back-handed, implicit, and generally oppressive ways. i really like alain de botton’s school of life and now i’m wondering if there’s some way to have something like that here in the states…

hm!

writing: 16:18
​spell-check, link-finding, & formatting: 7:18

thoughts from seneca on essentials and luxuries

“That race of men to whom taking care of the body was a straightforward enough matter were, if not philosophers, something very like it. The things that are essential are acquired with little bother; it is the luxuries that call for toil and effort. Follow nature and you will feel no need of craftsmen. It was nature’s desire that we should not be kept occupied thus.”​ — seneca, letter xc (90)

yet again, seneca’s thinking bolsters something i’ve thought but haven’t written down. or maybe it’s full-on stoic philosophy, but i hesitate to attribute it to stoic philosophy in general because i hear seneca was an edge member of the group. anyways, the older i get and the more people i visit, the more astounded i am at the amount of supplies people have to live. creams and washes and pills and supplements and more.

i hope that someday sooner rather than later, people can see all this stuff we’re using and stop it. aging is normal. the marketplace of goods and services designed to slow or prevent aging is superfluous. if you’re not getting enough vitamins via your diet, why not change your diet? taking vitamin supplements so you can continue to consume a diet that doesn’t meet your needs seems silly.

all this reminds me a little bit of an article i saw the other day about the declining sales of fabric softener. the article, which seemed pretty tongue-in-cheek to me (and decidedly less tongue-in-cheek than the earlier wall street journal article that spawned the media conversation it seems), pinned the declining sales on millenials. and, maybe this is too prideful of me, but i’m 100% happy to take on that blame. i think millenials are rightly seeing the excess that was marketed and sold to our parents and rejecting it. maybe in its heyday fabric softener did something perceived as valuable. but that time is past and we’re over it.

of course, there are always exceptions to these things, but seneca’s point remains. i think the essentials of survival require little of individuals and society to procure. it’s only when we try to get fancy that we (consumerist capitalism?) take shit out of control.

writing: 12:07
spell-check, link-finding, & formatting: 9:00

living virtuously is possible for everyone, but takes practice

“And there is a world of difference between, on the one hand, choosing not to do what is wrong and, on the other, not knowing how to do it in the first place… virtue only comes to a character which has been thoroughly schooled and trained and brought to a pitch of perfection by unremitting practice. We are born for it, but not with it. And even in the best of people, until you cultivate it there is on the material for virtue, not virtue itself.” —seneca, letter xc (90)

this quote stuck out to me because i appreciate the emphasis it puts on effort. i know that effort isn’t equally valuable in all circumstances, but virtue is one area where i think it is. i believe goodness is an inherent capacity, but that doesn’t mean that everyone cultivates it. and when you see it in someone, that generally means that they’ve put in the effort to cultivate it.

i actually do think it’s easier to be wicked. i’m not totally sure why, but one way i’ve thought about it is the second law of thermodynamics. since the universe tends towards chaos, it makes sense that it’s easier to do the thing that leads to more chaos as opposed to more order.

that said, i think ability to defy the nature of the individual for the good of the collective is one of the things that makes intelligent life special. there are all sorts of intelligence in life so i’m not just talking about humans here, but i digress. putting in the time and effort to practice being a virtuous person is a difficult, but worthy endeavor. the signs of someone who has put in that work show up in their everyday life, their speech, and their work, too. 

it’s tremendously hopeful to remember (or at least believe) that all people have capacity for virtue, whether or not they live into it. in fact, i think if i didn’t believe that, i’d have a much more difficult understanding humanity as a whole.

writing: 9:58
spell-check, link-finding, & formatting: 10:15

yet another problem of academia…

“I have been speaking so far of liberal studies; but think how much superfluous and unpractical matter the philosophers contain! Of their own accord they also have descended to establishing nice divisions of syllables, to determining the true meaning of conjunctions and prepositions; they have been envious of the scholars, envious of the mathematicians. They have taken over into their own art all the superfluities of these other arts; the result is that they know more about careful speaking than about careful living. Let me tell you what evils are due to over-nice exactness, and what an enemy it is of truth!” — seneca, letter LXXXVIII, (88)

i have a love-hate-but-mostly-hate relationship with academia. and i think the longer i’m around it, the longer most of it frustrates me. maybe i’m just young and i’ll look back at this and eat my words. but for the time being, i’m just going to continue throwing shade.

the gold for me in the above little passage from seneca is the last line and a half: “…the result is that they know more about careful speaking than about careful living. Let me tell you what evils are due to over-nice exactness, and what an enemy it is of truth!”

i often have the sense that, for want of exactness, academic research misses the forest for the trees. i can’t tell you how many people i know who are doing research that they think is pointless. on one hand, i understand that the freedom from proving the impact of one’s work is necessary to take long-shots that are risky, but could return really great insights. but i also believe that some things (like academic appointments) really shouldn’t be forever. especially if you ain’t doing shit. (>_>)

i guess my real issue is when, over time, it seems clear that a particular person or area of work of a particular person isn’t showing any promise, things are allowed to continue onward. that’s the point at which i think things become more about ‘over-nice exactness’ and an enemy of truth. it is definitely possible to waste time, energy, and financial resources on things that aren’t useful. and that, imo, is when things become the enemy of truth. not because they’re bad in and of themselves, but because they’re distracting from things that could making the world a better place.

all that said, i think individual academics can bring significant insight to situations. a late favorite professor of mine, alice amsden, has been on point in her predictions about the rise of economies in some countries way more so than any individual, including others in her field, ought to be. i can’t help but chalk that up to her decades of research and persistent study.

so maybe this is all just a wash. this whole thing from seneca was really about grammar so maybe a lesson can’t be drawn in the way i’m trying. oops?