Don't pursue happiness. Seneca, Epistles 4.31.2-3
Seneca
compares the common human lust for fame and fortune with the song of
the sirens in ancient myth: as the sirens lured sailors to their
doom, so our desires for material success will lure us to
unhappiness, if we make the mistake of chasing eagerly after them.
Feeling the pull of desire is not bad, per se; what is bad is giving
in to the temptation to pursue recklessly after whatever it is we
think we want. We have to learn to be enough for ourselves on our
own, without our desires (fulfilled or not: in the end, fulfilling
them is impossible, so it is always better to cut our losses before
the pursuit of what is impossible harms us too much).
Ad
summam sapiens eris, si cluseris aures, quibus ceram parum est
obdere: firmiore spissamento opus est quam in sociis usum Ulixem
ferunt. Illa vox quae timebatur erat blanda, non tamen publica: at
haec quae timenda est non ex uno scopulo sed ex omni terrarum parte
circumsonat. Praetervehere itaque non unum locum insidiosa
voluptate suspectum, sed omnes urbes. Surdum te amantissimis tuis
praesta: bono animo mala precantur. Et si esse vis felix, deos
ora ne quid tibi ex his quae optantur eveniat. Non sunt ista bona
quae in te isti volunt congeri: unum bonum est, quod beatae vitae
causa et firmamentum est, sibi fidere. Hoc autem contingere non
potest, nisi contemptus est labor et in eorum numero habitus quae
neque bona sunt neque mala; fieri enim non potest ut una ulla res
modo mala sit, modo bona, modo levis et perferenda, modo
expavescenda.
You
will attain the highest peak of wisdom if you manage to shut your
ears. Stuffing them with wax is not enough: you need something more
potent than the ear-plugs Odysseus gave his crew, in the myth (†).
The sirens' song was seductive, yes, but it was not publically
broadcast, like the song we must fear, the song that resounds not
from one lonely crag but from every corner of the earth. Your task is
to travel safely not just through one passage tainted with
treacherous pleasure, but through all the cities in the world. Keep
yourself deaf to the prayers dearest friends dedicate to your own
good fortune, for though the intentions here be good, the blessings
sought are evil. If you really want to be happy, beg the gods to
prevent any of the success your friends wish for you from actually
coming to pass. The things they want to shower upon you are not
really good. There is, in fact, only one thing good: that you should
find yourself trustworthy, and rely upon yourself; this is the origin
and foundation of a happy life. However, it cannot be yours unless
you have learned a proper contempt for labor and condition,
two notional things which are actually neither good nor bad, in
themselves. For it cannot happen that any real thing—any actual,
material reality—is sometimes bad, sometimes good, sometimes easy
and a joy to bear, other times horrible so that we must flee from it.
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(†)
On his way home from the sack of Troy, Odysseus sailed past the
desolate cliff of the sirens, sea-nymphs whose captivating song lured
ancient sailors to their doom when they ventured too close and were
dashed against the rocks. To prevent his crew from wrecking, the wily
Ithacan stopped their ears with wax, but he also had them tie him to
the mast, with no ear-plugs, so that he might hear the song whose
beauty made men forget their mortality (cf. Odyssey 12).
Ancient tradition depicts the sirens as humans (usually women) with
birdlike features, and locates their home in the eastern Tyrrhenian
sea, somewhere along the Italian coast extending from the straits of
Messina into the gulf of Naples.