Reading & the Good Life
Join the conversation! Every Friday at Noon EST, Perennial Meditations readers are welcome to gather for Reading & the Good Life (Register here), a casual space for connection, contemplation, and conversations on the art of living.
Dear Readers,
If you’ve ever wanted to attend a Reading & the Good Life meetup (Register here), this Friday’s “best of” session is a great place to start. We’ll chat casually about the previous year’s reading and revisit a few insightful passages. As a reminder, our next book (beginning next week) is The Art of Happiness, a collection of writings by the Greek philosopher Epicurus.
As you read this week’s passages, consider reflecting on these questions:
(1) How can I embody these lessons in daily life?
(2) What might stand in the way of implementing these ideas?
(3) How can the following insights help me live the ‘good’ life?
1. The Wisdom of Polarities
At the very roots of Chinese thinking and feeling there lies the principle of polarity, which is not to be confused with ideas of opposition or conflict. In the metaphors of other cultures, light is at war with darkness, life with death, good with evil, and the positive with negative, and thus an idealism to cultivate the former and be rid of the latter flourishes throughout much of the world. […]
— Alan Watts, Tao: The Watercourse Way (Ch. 2)
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2. The Art of Attention
Attention (prosoche) is the fundamental Stoic spiritual attitude. It is a continuous vigilance and presence of mind, self-consciousness that never sleeps, and a constant tension of the spirit. Thanks to this attitude, the philosopher is fully aware of what he does at each instant, and he wills his actions fully. Thanks for his spiritual vigilance, the Stoic always has “at hand” (procheiron) the fundamental rule of life: that is the distinction between what depends on us and what does not. […]
— Pierre Hadot, Philosophy as a Way of Life (p. 84)
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3. Nonreactive Living
Mindful awareness thus encompasses the entire project of human flourishing. To be mindful means to remember to let go of compulsive reactivity and realize a nonreactive way of life, while to be aware means to know how to refine the psychological, contemplative, philosophical, and ethical skills needed to achieve these goals. … Mindful awareness both embeds my attention in the raw immediacy of experience and serves as the moral compass that guides my response to that experience. […]
— Stephen Batchelor, The Art of Solitude (Ch. 12)
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4. The Wisdom of Connection
Interdependence is not a sign of weakness or ineptitude, but a reminder that human beings are social beings, or as Cicero said: ‘The primary reason for the public coming together is not so much weakness as a sort of innate desire on the part of human beings to form communities.’ To embrace interdependence is to recognize that social cooperation is not a choice but a natural necessity, and politics is the art of pooling resources and working as a team in order to maximize the benefits of social cooperation, while finding a just and equitable distribution for its costs. […]
— Vittorio Bufacchi, Why Cicero Matters (Ch. 3)
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5. The Paradox of Life
We began with a discussion of the shadow, and we may well ask the following question: What does paradox have to do with the shadow? It has everything to do with the shadow, for there can be no paradox—that sublime place of reconciliation—until one has owned one’s own shadow and drawn it up to a place of dignity and worth. … Take the roof off any human life, and one will find the paradoxes that are the preparation for a religious life, a vision of that which is greater than the personal. Conflict to paradox to revelation; that is the divine progression. […]
— Robert A. Johnson, Owning Your Own Shadow
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Thank you for reading; I hope you found something useful.
Until next time, be wise and be well,
J.W.
P.S. Feel free to comment, ask questions, or suggest future reads!