Moral Letters for Modern Times
On The Value of Work (Stoic Wisdom 031)
The true value of work is when it brings you not possessions, but self-possession, and knowledge of what is worth pursuing and what can be safely cast aside.
Deuteros, I see you clearly among the crowd. By your actions, you turn your potential into practice.
Keep along in this fashion, and you will be successful in the ways that matter most. You will learn self-knowledge and self-possession, and from these, you will know which things are to be valued and which are to be shunned.
Thus will you have the elements for a happy life.
Your progress is under constant threat, not least when you are in the presence of other people. They will push you and pull you, and exhort you to one course after another because that is the way of society.
The direction of travel does not matter so much as going along with the crowd, wherever it is headed. We can tolerate a foe in our midst more easily than a free thinker. The enemy’s purpose and maneuvers we understand, while the independent-minded is unpredictable and subversive.
