Studying The Good Life

It has come my time to go, but where to? what to do? who to be? how? To graduate is to sink deep into existentialism.

I had only to take five credits this semester to graduate, but I instead enrolled in eighteen: my heaviest load yet. I had a question—a jabbing thought—that I wanted to investigate: what does it mean to live a good life?

I chose three courses that would entertain the subject: Existentialism (taught by Prof. Evans), Positive Psychology: The Science of Happiness (Bono), and Buddhist Traditions (Grant).

All three offered answers. And a fourth, Contact Improvisational Dance (Marchant), also helped, if in unexpected ways.

Now, at the close of the semester, I want to revisit the question of the good life by pooling together what I’ve learned. Several themes arose in each of these course, which makes sense, since the four domains—philosophy, science, religion, and bodily movement—all declare the same mission: aiding the well-being and flourishment of human beings.

[su_pullquote align=”right”]If we can understand what puts one individual’s life in order, we can know how to design a city that nurtures happy individuals.[/su_pullquote]How is any of this political? Two reasons. First, Plato believed that in the individual we can locate a microcosm of the larger society. If we can understand what puts one individual’s life in order, we can know how to design a city that nurtures happy individuals.

Second, we are better poised to participate politically when we have first worked on ourselves. Those who “selfishly” have their lives together can then serve their communities with resilience over the long term.[su_pullquote]We are better poised to participate politically when we have first worked on ourselves.[/su_pullquote]

What follow are several “lessons,” rough takeaways, from my coursework. Each one is supported by literature, scripture, data, and my professors’ authority. But here I present them in my own voice, without citations. If this sacrifices credibility, it is in the service of candor and simplicity. (Any misinterpretations are my faults—not my professors’.)

[su_pullquote align=”right”]I see personal value in reflecting about what is less an intellectual and more a spiritual matter: how to live well.[/su_pullquote]In my life writing often is a meditative, contemplative act. As the semester ends, I see personal value in reflecting about what is less an intellectual and more a spiritual matter: how to live well. Perhaps there is the added benefit that you also find some value in these words. So, without further ado—since there is no room, in the good life, for ado:

Practice quiet solitude and meditation. As I write this, a party bellows throughout my apartment building. In our cities there is noise; traffic, televisions, music, and conversations make it difficult to concentrate. Rarely are we silent and alone. Why change that? To be alone is to force ourselves to be with ourselves, to confront our deepest worries and fears. In the company of me, I have no choice but to listen to myself.

We should do this precisely because it is not fun. Confront your demons, the saying goes, and it is right. How else to overcome them?

It is for the same reasons that we meditate. It is no wonder it works: when we depart the cacophony of noise that follows us around, we get to listen to more peaceful things: our breath, the waves, the wind, the quiet of a world that mankind every other second rustles.

Develop meaningful relationships that help you grow. We need breaks from quiet solitude; the question is with whom to spend them.

Surround yourself with people who are better—smarter, more compassionate, healthier—than you, the paraphrased saying goes.

We should aim for the company of friends from whom we can learn and grow, those who challenge and hold us to a high standard, those with whom we can be vulnerable, open, and raw.

Do one thing. Do not multitask. Anyone who has downed coffee while typing an essay while listening to music can attest to the fact that the human body can do many things at once. But it cannot do many things at once well.

We like to go fast, to move about the world accelerated. We like to maximize our time and broaden our mind’s capacity. This way, we think, we can get more done.

Yet when we focus our minds’ attention, our performance and satisfaction increase significantly. A meditative focus on one task or thought immerses us in that task, allowing us to direct all our energies, attention, and thoughts to it, and not to twenty other things at once.

Next time you eat a meal, do only that. Sit at your table and eat it. Don’t talk to your roommate, listen to music, or look out the window. Think about your food: look at it, feel it entering your body, consider it in your mouth.

Resist the urge to seek constant pleasure. Every person sets aside time and money for activities that leave a smile on their faces: dessert, sex, vacations. But a “hedonistic” life focuses only on maximizing pleasure while minimizing pain. This approach creates problems.

First, it fails because we adapt to pleasure. The “hedonic treadmill” refers to what happens when someone has something good, enjoys it, then adapts to it and seeks pleasure that is bigger, and bigger, and bigger.

Second, hedonism erases the small pleasures. Particularly when great things happen to us—job promotions, new cars—it’s worth remembering the many small things that fill us, too: the sunrises, babies’ laughs, and smiles from strangers.

If hedonism is the maximizing of pleasure over pain, “eudemonia” is the pursuit of something more ambitious: long-lasting, stable happiness, independent of pleasure or pain.

Learn to love the bad times, too. “To live,” Nietzsche said, “is to suffer.” Pain is a natural part of life. Yet often we attempt to paint over it with pleasure. We seek to repress, forget, or avoid discomfort.

The alternative approach is simple acceptance: This is how I feel. How interesting, that this is how I feel right now. When we recognize our emotional states as natural, temporary states of existence, we recognize, Okay, this is how I feel right now. We can ask: Why?

Negative emotions serve important purposes in our lives; they indicate to us our dissatisfaction with our environment and nudge us to make changes so that we feel better. If repressed, these signs go unread.

Find mentors and teachers. Few people know things off the bat. Fortunately, we do not live in a world where we are limited to what we intrinsically know. In such a world, growth stagnates; knowledge cannot be diffused, and minds cannot flourish.

In our world, people follow health coaches, go to school, and learn from work colleagues. People know that other people have something to offer. In our world, no one knows everything, and everyone knows something, so we ask for help in the form of a book, a training regimen, a therapy appointment, a university course.

However it looks, help entails a loss of pride. Too often, we stop short of reaching out to others because we believe, individualistically, that, ‘It is upon me to improve.’ Seeking help, through this lens, amounts to an admission of weakness.

The weakness is the inability to admit imperfection. Strong are those who seek help knowing it makes them more, not less.

Never be a blind follower; live your own life. The best teachers are those who lay out options, and then allow the student to decide their own next move. They tell the learner, ‘You are in charge of choosing for yourself.’

It is all too easy to conform to how others have told us to live. Pastors, parents, friends, fashion figures—all want to push upon us their ideas of what it means to live (and dress) well. They wouldn’t have audiences if they didn’t have some wise things to say.

Yet existential philosophers and Buddhist figures emphasize that blind devotion to another person—no matter how intelligent—amounts to loss of autonomy.

No person can know better than me how best to live my life. To strive for independence from those who help us is to assert that others will not decide my life for me.

But recall your responsibility to something bigger. ‘This is about more than just me,’ we realize amid all the talk of independence. We exist, and not by accident, in groups—families, ethnicities, political factions. They rise and fall with us; we participate in our communities’ fates.

People feel compelled to contribute to causes beyond themselves. Faced with an excess of time, resources, or wealth, many people find themselves drawn to aiding communities, whether directly or indirectly. The communities benefit, and so do they: selflessness creates feelings of purpose.

This world is about more than just one of us. It is about the billions of humans, the quintillions of animals, and the uncountable number of plants. It is about wellbeing broadly, and not about one “happy” person at the center of it all.[su_pullquote align=”right”]Questions about the good life won’t end. What does it mean to you?[/su_pullquote]

Questions about the good life won’t end. What does it mean to you? Write me. I’d love to know.

Dan Sicorsky ‘19 studies in the College of Arts & Sciences. He can be reached at dan.sicorsky@wustl.edu.