Nature’s response to hardness

Or how to disappear in place

1 unless a seed falls to the ground…

“For the only safe harbour in this life’s tossing, troubled sea is to refuse to be bothered about what the future will bring and to stand ready and confident, squaring the breast to take without skulking or flinching whatever fortune hurls at us.”
~ Seneca, Letters from a Stoic, Letter CIV

We have far less control over life than we would like to admit. We can be grateful to live in a land at peace, not prone to natural disasters, to have friends and family nearby. But…

“…in the midst of pleasures there are found the springs of suffering. In the middle of peace war rears its head…The summer’s calm is upset by sudden storms more severe than those of winter.”
~ Seneca, Ibid, Letter XCI

Being able to cope in stressful situations was for generations an evolutionary advantage—you keep a cool head while your neighbour panics and gets eaten by the sabre-toothed tiger—the danger is acute and passes quickly. The problem with modern stressors is that they never stop. To name but a few: worry, illness, pressure to deliver results, digital distractions, endless streams of negativity, the comparison trap, false dichotomies and the need to have an opinion on everything, bullies, the inner voice telling you you’re not enough…
If you intend to merely survive, then coping is fine—the human body and psyche are immensely stress-absorbent (up to a point)¹. But to thrive, coping is not enough: the only way to deal with stress in the modern world is to die to it².

Now to that seed: the seed falls to the ground and, er, doesn’t do much—it’s exposed to Seneca’s troubled sea. “Dying” here is about letting life—the wind, the weather, the fools, the algorithms—happen around us without struggle, without resistance, without fighting back. This isn’t crawling into a hole to bewail our lot, it’s deciding what is important and where to place our focus. If I am struggling with something, I am necessarily consumed by it; by choosing to be uninvolved, all that time (wasted!) fighting now belongs to me. I don’t have an opinion, so I don’t have to defend it; I don’t have a “profile” so I don’t have to set out my stall and pretend I have all my shit together.

To sum up: when you’re dead, nothing matters.

Does exercising our freedom to deal decisively with stressful things mean they don’t affect us? Of course not. We struggle, we are overwhelmed; we refocus, we overcome. It’s not one decision in overconfidence, it’s thousands of painful decisions made in humility.

2 between the cracks

“..in those who follow nature they [their characters] are straightforward and uncomplicated, and differ only in minor degree, while those that are warped are hopelessly at odds with the rest and equally at odds with themselves.”
~ Seneca, Ibid, Letter CXXII

We can absorb life, then, without being consumed by its dramas and ambiguities. By allowing life to happen on its terms, we have the capacity to listen, reflect and interpret its signals. Like a seed absorbing moisture and warmth inevitably puts down a root, an openness to the full bandwidth of life leads to roots of wisdom and love. By way of contrast, a root of bitterness will suck up all the bitterness it can get (surprise), becoming more warped in the process.

If we are not growing healthy roots, we cannot emerge as ourselves in the real world. We will be a caricature or will bend the world to our stereotypes.

3 room to grow?

“The long run is a misleading guide to current affairs. In the long run we are all dead.” ~ John Maynard Keynes, A Tract on Monetary Reform (1923)

Keynes reminds us that waiting for perfect conditions is a fallacy. Waiting, as in not expending effort doing purposeful things, is in my experience, synonymous with laziness and fear. Yes, I admit I’m lazy and fearful. Why?

• The uncertainty of outcomes
• Unintended consequences
• Real-world experience of Sod’s Law in operation
• Discounting of upside risk
• Caring too much

By refusing to react to hardness, we create space around us into which nature will allow us to grow. A body and soul all tensed up is ready to survive a battering but not ready and confident to take a step forward.

4 we can choose the game, but we don’t make the rules

A log on the fire yields itself to the flames and in doing so, gives warmth to others.

I have never been one for the pursuit of wealth or status for its own sake. But I have sought to increase enlightenment through self-study. While I prefer the latter, it is no better than the former, so I can’t boast against it. Those pursuing material riches are working just as hard as I am to synthesise faith and intellect³. Probably harder. Whatever the profession or confession, without wholehearted⁴ sacrifice for the sake of others, we’re missing the point of existence. Thus the flower blooms out of evolutionary necessity and we marvel at its tenacity and beauty. Win-win.

---