The Good Life

     "What is the good life?" This, one of the simplest and most basic questions in philosophy, is also one of the most disputed. (It is complicated by the fact that it is often impossible to tell if someone has truly lived a good life until they are dead, thus bringing into question whether one can really be said to be "living the good life.")

     Recently, I was struck by De Tocqueville's description of the American Indians. "The Indian," he said, "knew how to live without needs, to suffer without complaining, to die singing." 

     His characterization of the Indians reminds me of Epictetus, a Stoic philosopher.  "...if you seek to avoid sickness, or death, or poverty, you will be miserable," said Epictetus. "Therefore, remove altogether your aversion for anything that is not in our power and transfer it to those things contrary to nature that are in our power." For Epictetus, the good life was not about making things go your way. The good life was about contentedness and acceptance of life, even in the middle of what Kipling calls "those two impostors," Triumph and Disaster, in his poem If.

     For Kipling, too, the life worth lived is not a successful or happy one. It is a life where 


"you can make one heap of all your winnings

    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings    

And never breathe a word about your loss..."


That's because Kipling is unconcerned with winnings or losings. For him, life is about more than material gain. It is about the ability to 


"talk with crowds and keep your virtue,       

Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,"


If, says Kipling, 


"neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,    

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute    

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,   

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,       

And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!"


We see here that Kipling's idea of a Man is independent of one's station in life, one's education or career or fame or wealth or even dreams. It is about an inner moral fiber that is untainted by the world around it.      
     Epictetus had similar advice for men. He advised his readers never to blame or be moved by outside circumstances, but rather to "keep guard over themselves as though they are their own enemy lying in wait."     
     "For no one," he says, "can harm you unless you wish it. You will be harmed only when you think you are harmed." For Epictetus, virtue is about an inner self-control that is unaffected by external circumstances. "These inferences are invalid," he says. "'I am richer than you, therefore I am better than you'; 'I am more eloquent than you, therefore I am better than you.'...For you, of course, are neither property nor speech."


     But I could boil down all these ideas on the good life into three simple goals to achieve, it would be a return to De Tocqueville (with a slight tweak for the musically challenged.)


     1. Live without needs     


     2. Suffer without complaints    


     3. Die without regrets


     To live without needs does not mean that one should live in a tent hunting buffalo. It indicates the kind of mental independence that is required to "walk with Kings" without losing the common touch, and it means that one should not be attached to the things in one's life, whether they be material possessions, property, ideas, or relationships. "Never say of anything, 'I have lost it,' but rather 'I have given it back," says Epictetus. "What concern of yours by whose hand the Giver asks for its return? For the time that these things are given to you, take care of them as things that belong to another, just as travelers do an inn." The idea that our things are not ours, but belong to God, enables one to truly live without needs–and in so doing, better serve those around us.

     To suffer without complaints is a rare skill–certainly one I have not mastered. But a complaint is a sure sign of a self-absorbed person, and not the sign of a "someone who has been assigned to this post by God," as Epictetus says. To only care about one's own self is pride, and pride leads to the worst kind of self-deceit. To have an inaccurate and twisted view of the world should be avoided in all circumstances, but to place yourself at the center of your world is to lose your focus on the things that really matter.

     To die without regrets–"to die singing," as De Tocqueville put it, is perhaps the hardest task of all. Perfection is a virtue not found in human beings on this side of heaven, and "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." (1 John 1:8, KJV) To die without regrets, then, is perhaps the most arrogant and dishonest gesture a man can make in his own strength.

     But our lives are not our own. "Remember that you are an actor in a play of such a kind as the playwright chooses: short, if he wants it short, long if he wants it long," says Epictetus. "For this is your business, to play well the part you are given; but choosing it belongs to another." Thus, in a strange twist of circumstance, to have no regrets–not because of one's pride in one's role, but because of a confidence in the abilities of the Playwright–can perhaps be the most humble and truthful gesture a man can make. It is not the mark of a proud man, but the mark of a man living in total surrender. It is a telling acknowledgment of the ability of God to make "all things work together for good." (Romans 8:28, KJV)


     To live, to suffer, to die. These things are common to us all, and to set goals based on those things is not an aspiration to greatness, as the world measures such things. But it is an aspiration to a good life that can be had for the taking. All it requires is that we conduct ourselves as actors in the hands of a playwright. Our intended role may be that of a cripple or a beggar, but our reward will be a "peace that passeth all understanding" (Philippians 4:7) and an unshakeable confidence that you can return your life to the Giver singing.