Sisyphus, The Rock, and the Roll.

Y'all may have to help me out with this one.

“I think of Sisyphus as a hero.” A great psychologist, top leadership expert, and a good friend said this to me the other day on the phone. Sisyphus is of course the guy who rolls a rock endlessly up a mountain, only to have it roll back again, and he has to repeat his task endlessly, with the same result. I had never heard him called a hero. “Really?” was my astute reply. “Yep,” I recall my friend explaining to me. I was surprised. “I’ll have to think about that.” And a day later I called him back to ask for a bit more detail.

Before I go on, I should give you the basic back story of the famous mythological figure. And I’m not making this up. According to ancient sources, a baby boy named Sisyphus was born into money and power that came from his father. He went on to become, like that father, a king. And he came to be known as a greedy, avaricious, self-aggrandizing and deceitful ruler, who often killed those who sought to come into his country. This may be starting to sound vaguely familiar. His only concern was to maintain his own power, and he devoted most of his time and energy to that end. He had a brother he hated and so he seduced the man’s daughter as part of a failed plot to kill him. Two children resulted from the sorry episode, and their mother, the niece Sisyphus had seduced, is said to have killed them both. It wasn’t a happy group of people.

The bad king also made another major error in later on betraying Zeus for his own intended gain. He wasn’t much for respect and loyalty to others. As a punishment, the chief of all gods sent Death to visit the man and put him into chains. But the slippery king was not to be so easily stopped, and he managed to trick Death into showing him how the chains would work, and the Grim Reaper himself ended up locked in place. Zeus, as you might imagine, was not to be thwarted so easily. So he took charge himself and bound Sisyphus to the endless task for which he has become famous. His new life was to push a large rock up a mountain to the top, but right before fully accomplishing the job, the rock would elude his control and roll back down the hill. So Sisyphus would have to start all over again, pushing it back up again fruitlessly, since it would always roll back down, and this would be repeated forever.

We can see here several patterns. One is the cycle of aspiration, striving, near success and ultimate failure. Rinse and repeat. We find it too often in life. Is this the dog chasing his own tail? Is it a metaphor for all of existence? What exactly is it?

When we think of the man now, we tend to envision only this endless end state. The rock. The roll. The return. The redo. And on, and on. The French existentialist philosopher Albert Camus saw this portrayal as emblematic of our condition, viewed as absurd. We strive; we fail. We try again; we fail again. We’re born, we work hard at an education, and then at a life, and when we finally get to the point high enough on this mountain to have some real wisdom, we roll back down and die. And of course, there are religions that tell us we’re then born again to roll that rock back up another hill.

So, I asked my friend, absent all the hideous background information on the mythical character that might these days qualify him as a certain political party’s next nominee for high office: How can he be thought heroic?

He quickly told me about Admiral William McCraven’s excellent graduation speech which has been turned into the book, "Make Your Bed." McCraven talks about Navy Seal Training, and how the first lesson is to make up your bed in the morning and to do it perfectly. That reminded me of a conversation I had with my college roommate many years ago. I asked, “Why don’t you make your bed?” He said, “I’d just have to do it all over again the next day, and over and over. What's the point?” I mentioned the conversation to my wife and she said, “With a lot of people, it’s cleaning the sink, an equally endless task.” Or else, sweeping the floor. Or, you-name-it. Consider for contrastive pondering a parallel: “Why didn’t you eat anything today?” Answer: “I’d have to do it all over again tomorrow. What’s the point?”

Some things are just going to need to be redone or repeated. There are very few actions in our daily lives that are “one and done" forever. But, let’s get back to Admiral McCraven. He says this about making your bed:

<<The wisdom of this single act has been proven to me many times over. If you make your bed every morning, you will have accomplished the first task of the day. It will give you a small sense of pride and encourage you to do another task, and another, and another. And by the end of the day, that one task completed will have turned into many tasks completed. Making your bed will also reinforce the fact that the little things in life matter. If you can’t do the little things right, you’ll never be able to do the big things right.>>

With a lot of great football coaches, regular practice isn’t often about learning fancy plays and developing great strategies. It’s about blocking, tackling, running, and catching. “What are we going to do today, Coach?” – “Block, tackle, run, and catch.” – “What about tomorrow?” – “The same.” When I was an undergraduate, the UNC tennis team was often number one in the country and also known for how much they ran in practice, around and around the track and in wind-sprints. You’d think they were the track team. They’d run and run and run and run. And in a big tournament, near the end, when their opponents could barely move or breathe, they still had gas in the tank, from all that basic, simple, repetitive running.

So I thought about Sisyphus. Not mainly about his greed and deception and awful behavior as king, but about his endless task after those years. And then I saw the connection. Hubris. Pridefulness. Ego. There are endless mountains to climb for the undisciplined grasping ego. Nothing is ever enough. You roll the rock up the hill and then you have to do it again. You’re only as successful as what you’re doing now. Yesterday is gone. The world you always feel a need to impress has just one question: What have you got for me today?

Whether 100 days or 100 months or 100 years into his punishment, even Sisyphus may have gotten the message. The bloated ego can never be satisfied. The desperate quest of getting to the top of the hill never ends.

So let’s imagine our man has had an epiphany, a “mountaintop experience” on one of his trips up, or down. He realizes how foolish he had been, how evil, how duped by his own endless, self-defeating self-deceptions. And he takes a new attitude, maybe like a Navy Seal. Each day, making up the bed perfectly is a task worth doing. It’s a job in which you can take pride. It has a beginning and an end, each time. It doesn't have to lead to anything else to be worth your work. But it most often does, anyway.

But wait. What about rolling a rock? Let's get creative: Does Sisyphus do exactly the same thing every day? Well, on a superficial level, he pushes the rock up for the first time only once, and for the second time only once. He rolls it on Monday, then on Tuesday, and maybe from the front of the hill and perhaps then the side. He may angle it up like the stripe on an old Barbershop pole. It could be that he shoves it all the way with his arms once, then with his shoulder the next trip. He next uses his feet. Maybe he backs it up, inch by inch by foot by yard, or meter, depending on the metrics of Hades. He very likely becomes the best rock roller of all time. Those 10,000 hours are now ancient history. He's the Master. He can do it in so many different ways it’s mind-boggling. He zens out at some times, just feeling his breath and the feet in his shoes, and at other times he sings while he shoves, then maybe recites ancient poetry. He makes up stories. He prepares to sing again, or talk to the birds. You can even hear him at a distance saying, “I dedicate this roll to Hera, for putting up with Zeus.”

Maybe he rolls it because he has to, only until that magic moment when he rolls it because he wants to, and that’s a major change. Perhaps he begins to roll it as an object lesson for all the rest of us, as a cautionary tale on one level, and an inspirational story on another. You can imagine his thought, as he projects it out to us: "No matter how many times this stone rolls down, I’m on it. I’m pushing it back. I won’t be defeated. Ever. And neither should you. You’re as free as your attitude and your choice to persevere. And: So am I. We can push on, as often as it takes. And is it without meaning? Who says? I hereby give it meaning. Watch me."

So. Who is a hero? One who works for the good of others and never just his own narrow ends. A hero engages in arduous or dangerous activity for the sake of other people, for their good, for our benefit. And maybe after a life of the opposite as a king, old Sis finally got the message and changed his tune to do exactly this.

When I was talking to my wife about the rock and the roll, I said, “Can you imagine weeks and months into this business how amazingly fit and STRONG this guy would have become?” She said, “How about the pain?” Yeah, maybe he’d be sore, aching all over. But he’d have the chance to work through it, right? No pain, no gain. Maybe that's a part of it, too. So, yeah, he could have become a strange and powerful hero with the inner judo, the spiritual alchemy that we all often need.

For Make Your Bed: https://amzn.to/36rpE88

The McCraven video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBuIGBCF9jc

What is Life?

What is life? A dream? A great illusion? The analogue of a computer simulation on a cosmic scale? A divine zoo? A gift? An accident? An absurdity? Or ...

Is it an experiment? A training camp? A carnival? A risky adventure? An action and mystery novel full of comedy, romance, and tragedy that we're all trapped in—or perhaps, that we each can help write?

Is it an extravagant test? A noble gesture? A celebration of possibility? A celestial play of primordial fire? A chance at, and a dress rehearsal for, the truly unimaginable, yet to come?

Could it be: Outward Bound for souls? A spiritual garden and surrounding wilderness for the highest form of growth? A place set apart where you can choose to crawl or fly? Is it much more or much less than it seems?

What, then, after all, is life?

The Fault in Our Thoughts

I wrote a couple of days ago about discovering the Young Adult mega hit novel, The Fault in Our Stars. I had heard about the author and his legendary editor, and just wanted to see what the two of them had come up with that was such a blockbuster. I first noticed the exceedingly advanced vocabulary of the main characters, the 16 year old Hazel and her 17 year old boyfriend, Augustus. Today, I want to look briefly at their thoughts about life and the world.

In a cancer support group for young people, before Hazel and Augustus had actually met, the leader asked the group what they most feared. Augustus, the new "hot boy" in the room who had already caught Hazel's eye, answered, "Oblivion." Hazel could not contain herself and lectured him, as she recounts:

“There will come a time, when all of us are dead. All of us. There will come a time when there are no human beings remaining to remember that anyone ever existed or that our species ever did anything. There will be no one left to remember Aristotle or Cleopatra, let along you. Everything that we did and built and wrote and thought and discovered will be forgotten and all of this” - I gestured encompassingly - “will have been for naught. Maybe the time is coming soon and maybe it is millions of years away, but even if we survive the collapse of our sun, we will not survive forever. There was a time before organisms experienced consciousness, and there will be a time after. And if the inevitability of human oblivion worries you, I encourage you to ignore it. God knows that’s what everyone else does.” (13)

Augustus introduces himself, and they fall in love. Who could resist a girl with such an attractive worldview? I'm kidding. Hazel's words reflect a very famous and bleak passage in philosopher Bertrand Russell's old essay, A Free Man's Worship. Augustus later says to her:

"I’m in love with you, and I know that love is just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable, and that we’re all doomed and that there will come a day when all our labor has been returned to dust, and I know the sun will swallow the only earth we’ll ever have, and I am in love with you.” (153)

He even later reports a middle school science teacher's worldview with these words:

“You still secretly believe that there is an element of magic to this world? It’s all just soulless molecules bouncing off each other randomly.” 220

Hazel, toward the end of the book, writes: 

“We live in a universe devoted to the creation, and eradication, of awareness.” 266

Here's the problem. We know consciousness and conscious awareness first hand. We have ample experience of it. We have absolutely no experience of the eradication of awareness. By definition, we can't. And we have no compelling evidence or proof of any sort that any instance of human consciousness, or animal awareness, for that matter, is doomed to extinction. But the fashionable nihilism of this captivating book relentlessly assumes the most reductionistic implications of modern science, with hardly a speck of acknowledgement that a hopeless, grim worldview is, as philosophers say, "severely underdetermined" by the facts we do have.

Biological life in this world surely ends. And all the bodies with brains, and the means of expressing the awareness that has been mediated through those brains, eventually cease to function. But we actually have no idea what happens to the consciousness that has occurred in connection with the functioning of those brains, from these facts alone. Reductionism holds that there is no existence of consciousness apart from the functioning of complex brains. But that is just as much an article of faith as anything can be.

At one point, the slightly older Augustus actually reveals that he suspects there is Something, or Somewhere for us after death. Hazel is quite surprised to hear this coming from such an otherwise obviously smart guy. She says:

“I’d always associated belief in heaven with, frankly, a kind of intellectual disengagement.” (168)

And yet, her father later says this to her, after admitting he doesn't quite know what to believe about such ultimate issues as afterlife:

“I believe the universe wants to be noticed. I think the universe is improbably biased toward consciousness, that it rewards intelligence in part because the universe enjoys its elegance being observed. And who am I, living in the middle of history, to tell the universe that it - or my observation of it - is temporary?” (223)

And that's about as positive a view as is ever expressed in the book. Augustus, though, seems to have glimpses of something big, and important, and heroic about our life under the admittedly challenging conditions that surround us. At one point, he says:

“Everyone wants to lead an extraordinary life.” (169)

And he seems to suspect, deep down, that, maybe, any heroism or extraordinariness that we do attain in this world connects up to something bigger, something he can't quite define or describe. And I suspect that he's right.

In my view, the contemporary fault in our thoughts is to merely assume any such suspicions are no more than wishful thinking, and that nothing more is possible, beyond the physical matter and energy that we can discover through our physical tools of observation. The flaw in our thoughts is to embrace such a bleak and reductionistic worldview as unavoidable, when the real mysteries of consciousness themselves may be small apertures into far greater mysteries that can invite us to rethink our lives more deeply. Anything that prevents our trying is a deep fault, and flaw, indeed.

Impact First, Then Income

My motto for my work has always been simple: 

Impact First, Then Income.

My primary concern is a positive impact. My secondary concern is a positive cash flow. And that matters, because the prioritization I try to maintain will suggest certain activities and discourage others. As a philosopher, writer, and speaker, I want to make a difference for other people, as well as myself, and my family. I want to put giving over receiving, spreading over gathering. Of course, finances matter. They matter a lot. But other things matter even more. And it's those other things that should be our ultimate guides.

But, I can almost hear a question, which is even, perhaps, a skeptical hesitation: Is this sort of perspective simply a luxury for the few - to think first about making a difference and only second about making a dollar? My answer is: No, I truly don't think so. No matter where we are in life or what we're facing, it's important to focus first on the contribution we're making, on the good we're doing. That's ultimately the best way to get help, or a job, or a promotion, or the big payday that most of us would like to see. But it's also right for its own sake. We're here to give more than we get, and to leave the world a little better than we found it.

I'm convinced that coming at the equation from the other end is always a mistake. Those who think first about making money and only second about making a difference will eventually encounter trouble in some form. And they'll risk not becoming the best they're capable of being.

Even if you work focally with money in a field like financial services, it's important to see beyond the the market and the monthly report. We all work with people. And that should fundamentally guide us. What's the real human benefit of your work? Is it everything it could be? is it what it should be? Will a certain decision enhance my impact, or only my income? Those are the questions we all need to ask. Money without meaning is empty.

How am I using my talents, my abilities, and my opportunities? What difference am I making for other people? Could I do more? Could I do better? Those are the fundamental issues. And then matters of finance can helpfully be raised. Income is necessary for most of us, and profit is good, if it fits properly into our overall lives and values.

Don't let the tail wag the dog. Put first things first. Focus on what you can do to bless and benefit those around you, and you'll see good come back to you in surprising ways.. 

Making Our Mark On the World

Hi everyone! Blogging this morning from the beautiful Wilmington, NC airport, preparing to board. I wanted to tell you about something interesting that came to light in the past few days.

The journal Nature reported this week that paintings of hands and animals in seven limestone caves on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi may be the oldest human art yet discovered. It's estimated that the people who did these simple paintings put their mark on the stone walls more than 39,000 years ago.

Since the beginning, human beings have wanted to make their mark in the world, to say "I was here!" I love it that so many of the paintings were outlines of hands. "This is me." Or, "This is my son." Or, This is my mate."

Those artists could have had no idea that we'd be talking about the hands and the animals they painted, more than 39,000 years after they made those simple, but inspired markings.

Likewise, we have no idea how far and wide our simple daily acts may reach and what impact they may have on others. The cave painters could never have predicted that their work would move us in 2014 to reflect on our own lives, and on how we make our own marks on the world.

And their lessons are many. One is that the smallest things can leap and fly across space and time with amazing results. Try to remember that in the little things you do.

Today.

The Joy of the Journey

There’s a special joy in doing what you’re meant to do. 

This week, so far, I’ve travelled to Colorado Springs for a talk at the great Broadmoor hotel, speaking to 450 business owners. The hotel itself is spectacular, and I always seem to be put in the West Building, which is quiet and beautiful, with serene views outside the window of my suite. To get to the main building, where I had dinner last night with one of the top speaking agents in the country, a really great individual who also has an unexpected and interesting background as a songwriter, with tunes, so far, in eighteen films, I had to walk on a path bisecting a scenic lake, mounting a gently sloping footbridge in the middle, surrounded by mountains. The temperature was perfect. The evening was magical. 

Who knew that being a freelance philosopher could put me in so many wonderful places, where the glories of nature are on such magnificent display? And the people I meet along the way enrich my life immensely.

And then came the talk, the speech for which I had made the journey. I had forty minutes, a relatively short time these days for philosophy, but it was ethereal. We pondered, we analyzed, we laughed, and we explored the wisdom of the ages on one of the most important topics of all - how each of us can have our best impact on the world in the short span of years that we have, and how we can have true success, deeply satisfying and sustainable success that fulfills us, in everything we do.

It was a treat to represent the great philosophers, east and west, and to add my own interpretive frameworks. And everyone who was there went away with a laminated wallet card on the ideas we talked about. I’ve given out these cards on each of my topics, for more than twenty years. I’ve probably handed out millions as little gifts. And as a result, people stop me in airports and hotels, and in other places, and pull out their wallets and show me the card that they say they got six or nine or twelve years ago at a talk they heard me give and still remember. What a kick! Those little laminated wallet cards are almost the paper version of tweets, but they last, and can be carried about and kept and referred to again and again. The way tweets stand to blogs, these little cards stand to books, and have a special magic all their own.

My talk at the Broadmoor was, as such a thing almost always is, a joy, What Emerson would have called an ecstasy, and an honor. In the whirlwind of time allowed on a busy meeting day, we ranged through space and time, appropriating the insights of the ages for our own lives, and thinking anew about what we want from our time, and our efforts. 

It’s always a new experience for me. I never memorize talks and hit the play button in front of an audience. I do like the great jazz guys and improvise around a framework. I surprise myself. I sometimes say things I’ve never even thought before, but in that moment, I realize a new truth and pass it on to others.

Now, I’ll have two days at home, and then a quick trip to Florida, to philosophize again, for a small group of executives who make sure the lights stay on at such places as Google and NASA, operations where power reliability is crucial. We’ll get to talk about the life wisdom that’s also powerful and always reliable. And that will keep the lights on for them, as it does for me.

I tell you this today in hopes that you are also, in your own way, participating in the joy of living your proper mission and adventure. And if you haven’t quite found that yet, let me encourage you that it awaits you and can be both lived and loved.

So examine your own experience. You’re here to do great things, and to have great joys. I want that for you.

Today.

Constancy Again. Wait. What?

"Constancy is the foundation of virtues." Francis Bacon.

We rarely hear the word 'constancy' any more. And that's too bad. Because constancy is deeply connected with virtue. But wait.

We rarely hear the world 'virtue' any more, either. And that's also too bad. From the ancient Greek and Roman philosophers who thought deeply about the challenges of life and the strengths we need in order to face them well and prevail, we have some great insights regarding both virtue and constancy.

Virtues are just strengths of character, like courage. They are also habits. A patient man is a man who has the habit of patience. A courageous woman has a habit, or deep disposition, to respond to danger with bravery. No virtue is a one shot deal. Each of the great virtues requires repeated exercise, or a form of constancy, in our response to the world.

Spontaneity gets maybe too much good press. It can be a source of creativity, and adventure, and great fun, but without a foundation of virtue, even creativity can be destructive. Who wants to be around a creative sadist? And so, spontaneity has its proper place within a context of constancy, the foundation of a reliable character. Not all sameness is boring. Not all predictability is a guise of stagnation. A deep moral constancy is the basis for any good journey through this world. Think about that , and examine yourself for that constancy of soul that will give you strength. And then go boldly and virtuously forth.

Today.

Making Your Difference

The spiritual writer Thomas á Kempis once wrote, "At the day of Judgement, we shall not be asked what we have read but what we have done."

Reading can certainly be one of the greatest roads to life wisdom. When we read the distilled thoughts and reactions of other fellow travelers on the human journey, we broaden our own perspectives about life. Reading calls on the imagination. And it can be done at our own pace. It is a unique and powerful form of discovery. 

But traveling any road requires action. A book or magazine, a newspaper or website or email, is, at best, a tool to be used for better living. In an age when the pace of life seems to crowd out those quiet stretches of time required for extended reading, we all need to be reminded of its importance.  But Kempis reminds us even more powerfully that our reading should affect how we live. Our ultimate calling is to make a difference in our world. Today. And tomorrow.

Make sure you're doing your best to make your difference, day to day.

Freedom Riders and The Magic of Commitment

What brings people together with a special sense of excitement and meaning? What amps up motivation and commitment through the roof? What bonds people into great winning teams? I recently watched two PBS broadcasts about the civil rights movement in the United States, in the early sixties. The many student volunteers who rode buses from northern universities into the far land of Mississippi to engage in voter registration in the June of 1964 faced hostility, violence, and constant threats during a hot and scary summer. And now, decades later, looking back, they report that it was the time of their lives. They say things like, "When it was time to leave and go home, I knew that I'd never have an experience like that again, a sense of doing something to change the world, and a sense of extended family with people I'd probably never see again."

A friend of mine once talked with lots of veterans of World War Two and was surprised that he kept hearing them speak of their wartime experience as "the time of my life." They were being shot at and bombed, under the most difficult daily living conditions they had ever experienced. But they often reminisced about those days as something truly special. They spoke of bonds they made with guys who were very different from them in so many ways, but who became like a band of brothers.

Those two contexts clearly involved (1) a strong sense of purpose, (2) constant danger, and (3) a special bond that seemed to arise out of elements 1 and 2. It could be that from our collective early human history as hunters and gatherers, we developed a special experience of purpose amid danger, and an intensity of commitment in relationship to those who shared that purpose and that threat. It was a matter first of survival, and second, of flourishing. Those who did not bond and arise to overcome the odds did not survive. And we are the inheritors of those survivors.

It could well be that there is a deep motivational mindset that arises in such a context, which allows us, in turn, to rise to the occasion and do great things that go far beyond the mundane, and become almost magical.

You occasionally see it on sports teams, without the extremity of danger confronted by those in the civil rights movement, and those who have fought in wars. I saw in on one particular Notre Dame football team, during my many years there, the team that, interestingly, won the National Championship of 1988. So, it seems possible that the special bonding and motivation that we're talking about depend, not on danger itself, but on a sense of very high stakes. When the stakes are high enough, we respond. And, if that's true, then, in principle, we could create the conditions for this in our work lives. Why should it be that those who came back from the second world war, and those who returned to school or work from The Freedom Summer of 64, should never have that special experience of service again?

A friend just came back from the big rock music festival of the summer, in Dover, Delaware. He said of the 80,000 people around him that "They were all so happy to be there." They wanted to be there. They were there with a purpose. And, he said, "They were a happy bunch, as a result." They were part of something big, something they believed in, and they were there with a commitment that was "all in."

Why can't we create conditions in our companies where nearly everyone feels a sense of purpose, a sense of being part of something big, something that's going to "change the world" for the better in some way that makes them feel "all in"? When the purpose is great enough and the stakes are high enough, it can happen. Then, why do we ever settle for so much less?