How to Enjoy the Spectacle of Chaos
And why we should remain calm amidst death, disaster, and hardship
The Stoics use a ship in a storm as an analogy for how to harden ourselves against adversity of any kind.
In my version, the ship is the world and the passengers are the voices of our inner discourse.
Let’s flesh out this analogy to its Stoic roots.
A large wooden sailing vessel plows through the ten-foot swells of an Aegean storm in 100 AD, black storm clouds overhead, shredded sails snapping in the wind, jagged cracks of lightning illuminating the chaos. The ship is hundreds of miles from shore and visibility is limited. Its crew and passengers number thirty – thirty men and women cling to masts and crouch in holds.
The merchant screams through the thunder, “my myrrh and vases of olive oil and wine will sink to the bottom of the sea.” The mother afraid for her son directs her anger towards the merchant for being blinded to the suffering of the flesh and blood and breath all around him. The young girl shrieks in a wordless and endless high pitched wailing, and those near enough to hear it before the wind carries it off into the distance are torn in two at pitying her on the one hand and anger at her on the other. The young man laments to himself, “Why does this have to happen to me? And why now?”
The Stoic philosopher stands above deck with a different mind. He looks at the moon and the waves and the specter of death. He can taste the air and the flailing bits of water from the rain and the sea; it is pure and clean. There is nowhere else to go and nothing else he can to do. He has accepted everything about this moment to the depths of his being. Every decision has been made for him except for one - whether he chooses to own this moment or fall victim to it, whether he chooses to join the chorus of hysterical babbling or witness the works of nature in silence.
He asks himself: what is left but to enjoy the spectacle?
There is a commandment in the military that is repeated so often that it subconsciously modifies the behavior of its members: “Calm breeds calm.” Either I can lament the heaviness of my pack or I can joke about it – calm breeds calm within a group. Either I can scream into the mouthpiece of my radio when a bullet cracks by my ear or I can take a breath, speak slowly, and enunciate clearly – calm breeds calm within a group.
To breed calm in others, we must first learn to breed calm within ourselves. Why not then be calm at all times, when things go from bad to worse to worst, so that when we close our eyelids to blink and then reopen them, and the line separating life and death is suddenly right before us, we remain in command of our minds?
The Merchant with veins bulging in his neck stops his shouting to disagree with me, pivoting his eyes – they look feral, wild, insane – to look into my own. “I make my living from these goods. What will I do without them? I slaved for them.” What will all your complaining about the wind and lightning get you? Nothing. Will it save your olive oil? No. Will it keep your myrrh dry? No. Will it save your life? No. Will it make the remainder of the journey worse for everyone who has the ill fortune to be anywhere near you? Yes.
Whether they die on this journey or make it to shore, you will have shown them what you are inside. You haven’t trained yourself to want everything that nature can throw at you, which is why you’re raving mad by wanting exactly the opposite of reality in this very moment. You haven’t trained yourself to value how you get a thing over actually getting it, which is why you’re acting like you’re alone on this earth, a walking and talking violation of the Golden Rule. You haven’t trained yourself to master your inner discourse, which is why you’re spending your time enslaved to whatever short-term thought blossoms inside of your skull: myrrh and money and conniving and possessions and envy and jealousy and panic.
Is this what you slaved for? Is this what you’re grieving for? As this ship breaks apart, you can either spend your last moments clutching a sack of gold or lending an arm to the grieving woman – you cannot do both.
What then? What’s the opportunity cost of your panic? While that Stoic over there has a certain serenity about him as this ship breaks in two beneath his feet, you’re over here foaming at the mouth and clawing at the air. While there is a group of people near him, finding strength in him, leaning upon him, and looking to him, you’re over here by yourself like the rat down in the keel with the Plague.
And then the Young Man joins the fray: “I have my whole life ahead of me. I’m being dealt a bad hand. Just get me through this and let me start living.” Start living? What, are you dead right now? If you were dead, how could you be afraid? You’re afraid so you must be alive. And if you’re alive, how can you claim to have a “bad hand” when life itself is a gift? What follows? Why start living if you make it to shore when you can start living right now, taking command of this moment and wrapping your hands around it and putting it to good use for the first time in your life?
The terms of your existence are just that: terms. You do not know when the universe will call you back and recycle your body into the earth; and then the earth will be swallowed by the expanding sun; and then the sun will collapse upon itself and become a white dwarf; and then this white dwarf will float majestically in space, all that remains of your woe-is-me and short-term thinking and mindless self-pity.
All you can control in any given moment is how you choose to respond to it. You can do so as a man or a beast.
Epictetus would remind us that we are witness to the great unravelling of time, to nature’s execution of her works.
We can either choose to form our judgments according to natures will or against it.
We can either choose to live right now or wait for some future moment that may never come.
We can either choose to learn from our failures or we can drown our inner discourse in lies.
Calm is cultivated through habit; it must be thought on and written on and acted on until the current script is rewritten. And what is calm but the expression of gratitude for everything that comes?
Can we not be so grateful for every purple fig and glass of wine and each and every second of eye meeting eye so that if this ship falls apart and bodies and shattered boards are scattered about the waves, that we can give this gift of life back without bitterness and without regret and with the deepest gratitude a divine ape can conjure?
What is left but to be calm for those around us?
What is left but to enjoy the spectacle?
Good take on Stoicism. Many years ago was transiting the straits of Hormuz. Iranian jets came toward us a faked a missile launch (one flies away as the other accelerates toward us). I was newby sailor below decks. 1mc announced vampire, vampire. Chief petty officer turned white as a ghost. He had almost 20 years and on his and my first deployment. And he froze. I had a dash of panic and then acceptance of what would or could follow. That calmness still follows today in the much reduced stress of manufacturing. I get comments every review how calm I am.
"by wanting exactly the opposite of reality in this very moment."
Definitely needs to be discussed more. The other day during a dinner out with friends, a fellow coworker made an excellent point.
"Today's generation of kids want to be fed out of a silver spoon. They want the world without putting in any effort towards it. They expect results from nothing. And god forbid something wrong go their way. Then all hell breaks loose and everything collapses."
Those who can't handle their reality will definitely not be able to handle the pressures that come with it. Before learning to control thoughts during times of stress, one must acknowledge the stress. Embrace it. Live through it, control it, then kill it. Thank you for the description of how to combat hardships. Epictetus would be proud.