This text comes from a voice note I recorded on a walk along the river last week. I don’t remember what triggered the thought- but I found it interesting. You can also listen to a read-aloud of this piece over in the podcast section. Thanks for being here.
Something that I have realised growing up - and am still realising - is that who succeeds in this world is absolutely not determined by morality, in fact, probably the opposite. And I think it’s something nobody wants to teach children, because obviously we want children to be better than us. But what might be valuable to teach children is that your morality may not determine your material success, but it definitely does have an impact on your personal happiness and your peace of mind. And just because it doesn’t determine your material success does not mean that it’s not worthwhile to seek higher moral integrity. In fact, it makes it all the more worthwhile.
We need to stake a sense of pride in our morals, even, to balance out all of the human and flawed and sometimes terrible things that we do to survive. And to thrive. Because everything needs balance. And that might sound quite cynical, but modern life feels like a constant weighing up of potential decisions towards goodness or selfish excess and wealth. And I actually do think that moral goodness is fundamentally incompatible with serious material wealth. Maybe it’s all the early 20th Century social theory I consumed during university speaking, but I maintain: moral ‘goodness’ is fundamentally incompatible with serious material wealth. Unless you find a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, of course, and it has not been stolen from anyone, mined by anyone or hoarded as others lack basic necessities. But that kind of accumulation of wealth only exists in fairy-tales.
And I don’t mean that people who have more than others should feel shame ipso facto - or hide away behind ever higher walls (as many do). I mean to say that what you do with what you have matters. How you treat others; whether you share; whether you choose to go all in for the greed or only some of the way (or not at all). And most importantly, how aware you are of your position, relative to others. I’m not of the opinion that anyone should be expected to think of all others at all times, to spend their lives agonising over the impact of every move on the cosmic balance. In fact, it can be tempting to do so in a world like this, where guilt and fear and a dawning realisation that we live in an artificial, blown-up bouncy castle that will pop someday soon, forcing us back onto the ground, are omnipresent. Where we know that the real culprits, the people who have fucked us all in a manner that can only be described as Machiavellian, will probably be the only ones that get away with it, à la Don’t Look Up. No - that’s no way to live - and sometimes being bad is fun.
But we all have a choice. Some people might be able to sleep at night, knowing that they’re assholes. Take pride in it, even. My philosophy right now is: try to strike a balance. Be good, have fun, don’t self-flaggelate if I fuck up. Know that I’m incredibly, incredibly lucky. Enjoy it. And remind myself that I’m not a saint, and that’s okay. As long as I try to be fair. Accepting that morality is a spectrum saves us from the urge to say ‘fuck it’, to sink into the seductive idea that survival of the fittest justifies stomping on whoever or whatever is in our way, just because we can. I’d rather sleep well at night, and I don’t care if that’s boring. If you don’t want to listen to me, listen to Aristotle, who said that ‘a master of any art avoids excess and defect’1. Unglamorous, but true.
From the Nicomachean Ethics. Found through Aurelian Craiutu, https://aeon.co/ideas/moderation-may-be-the-most-challenging-and-rewarding-virtue.