What's Your Actual Goal?
What's the main quest of your life?
“We all seek to know whether we shall be rich; but no one asks whether he shall be good.” (Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, 46)
It’s odd how 99% of people, if you ask them “would you rather be rich or good”, they would answer “good”. But 99% of people spend more energy trying to get rich than trying to be good.
We stress about our money more than we stress about our goodness.
I’m guilty of the same!
I think there’s lots of reasons, but the biggest one that pops into my brain is our desire to measure and compare. If I become rich, nobody can deny that. If I become good, anyone could deny that. It’s less concrete.
In fact, an angry person could start one false rumor and ruin my reputation. Nobody would see me as good anymore. Even worse, I might do lots of good deeds all day long and not get any recognition for it.
Well then what’s the point of trying so hard to be good? The answer is simple…
What else is there to be but good?
The goal is not to be good so that…
The goal is simply to be virtuous. The Stoics have four pillars of virtue:
wisdom
courage
justice
moderation
The goal is to live by these pillars. That is the main quest. Everything else is just a side quest. The pursuit of money, fame, and even friends, is all secondary to the pursuit of wisdom, courage, justice and moderation.
You may not agree with these pillars. You might not think of these as your pillars of virtue. That’s fine. Find better pillars. Find yours.
Define what it means to you to live a virtuous life. Then, live that way.
Question of The Day
What are your pillars of virtue?
Your Friend,
Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski
“We all seek to know whether we shall be rich; but no one asks whether he shall be good.” (Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, 46)