“When you see someone often flashing their rank or position, or someone whose name is often bandied about in public, don’t be envious; such things are bought at the expense of life… Some die on the first rungs of the ladder of success, others before they can reach the top, and the few that make it to the top of their ambition through a thousand indignities realize at the end it’s only for an inscription on their gravestone.”
SENECA, ON THE BREVITY OF LIFE, 20
Wow, I really like today’s quote from The Daily Stoic — one of my favorites in the whole book so far. That’s a powerfully written bit of wisdom from Seneca and now I feel like I might have to get that book and read the whole thing.
He’s basically saying that we shouldn’t choose ambition at the expense of our human connections with family and other people. Don’t chase accomplishments or titles or the gaudy trappings of success. “Such things are bought at the expense of life”, says Seneca.
Accomplishments mean nothing when you have no one to share them with. They might be written on your gravestone, but who freaking cares at that point? Least of all you! Wouldn’t it be better to have things written there about your character and your impact on others’ lives?
Look, working really hard at something you want is not something terrible or wrong. But if it comes at the expense of living life to the fullest, then it’s hard to see what the point is. As author Ryan Holiday points out, “You are a human being, not a human doing.” Interestingly, that’s the exact opposite of the common phrase often heard in business self-help groups. But it highlights that being alive, living your experience as it unfolds — these things are more important than ambition for ambition’s sake, and the disconnect that comes from that.
We have to decide what’s more important in our lifetimes — is it the achievement of high honors? Or having fully loved and lived your life? Which phrase should they inscribe on your gravestone?
Retire at 65, forgot how to live
This makes me think of the people who have worked (often in the same industry or even the same job) for decades, slogging away for year after year in the hopes of reaching some sort of security in their life. They are also ‘keeping up with the Joneses’ and trying to give the impression that they’ve arrived in some way, whether it be Employee of the Month or promotion at their job, or perhaps a new boat or car in their driveway.
Finally they reach age 65 and enough financial security, so they stop working and are ready to start living. The only problem is that they haven’t given enough time to living along the way, and they find themselves without enough connections or bonds with other people. They don’t remember how to “just be”, and they have forgotten how to live along the way, and they don’t have the human connections to foster the life they want.
I don’t want to be that person. I want to start living now, and continue living, so that when they finally write my gravestone inscription, it says “He really lived his life, and he loved a lot of people along the way.”
