A young lady decided to denounce all worldly things and live in the wilderness. She reduced her needs to the bare necessities: food, clothes and shelter.
She was happy, having escaped the hustle and bustle of city life. No debts, no deadlines, no money issues, no month-end… nothing to worry about.
One afternoon she took a nap under an oak tree and woke up to find holes in her robe – rats. She went to a neighbouring village, asked for old pieces of cloth and patched up the holes.
Again, she took a nap; again she found more holes – damn rats! She patched up her robe again and again until she ran out of material. Finally, she decided to get rid of the rats.
She returned to the village, and instead of asking for old cloths, she asked for a cat. The rats were no longer a problem, but the cat needed milk. Then she went back to the village to ask for milk.
After a few trips to the village, she decided to get rid of the milk problem by asking for a cow. But now she needed land for the cow to graze and a fence to keep it from straying or getting stolen.
She went to a local chief to ask for land. After getting land, she went to the city to buy a fence. But there was another problem; she needed money and a truck to carry the fence back home…
Eventually, the young nomad sighed and realised that her life was becoming complicated all over again. This time, what was the cause? A rat. Again, she resigned from the rat race and decided to patch her robe over and over again to avoid over-complicating her life.
Saving a drowning child
I just finished an essay that raised hundreds of millions of dollars for Unicef. One may argue that the essay was the inflexion point in the attitudes of Americans towards philanthropy. The reason we have hungry-Africa-children-adverts, I argue, is because of this essay. It was written by an Austrian philosopher, Peter Singer who argued as follows:
Suppose a child was drowning in shallow waters and you happened to walk by. Surely, the right thing to do would be to wade into the shallow waters and rescue the child. More importantly, it would be morally wrong (and maybe even evil) to let the child drown.
The underlying principle is that your cost of saving the child is insignificant compared to the child’s life. Yes, you may ruin your suit or suffer an inconvenience, but none of this can measure up against a life. Therefore, one is morally obliged to save the child’s life.
Singer extended this rule to apply it to children facing hunger and starvation in India. He argued that giving $5 to save a child from dying of starvation is no different from wading into what is to you, shallow waters, but to the child the difference between life and death. In addition, he argued that the $5 would be spent on trivial things anyway – ice cream, a t-shirt or shampoo!
Simplicity, Patience, Compassion
“I only have three things to teach,” said the great philosopher Lao Tzu.
Simplicity, patience, compassion.
These three are your greatest treasures.
Simple in actions and thoughts,
you return to the source of being.
Patient with both friends and enemies,
you accord with the way things are.
Compassionate toward yourself,
you reconcile all beings in the world.
Today’s takeaway
Both Singer and the young nomad remind us that our lives are not just complicated, they are complicated by mostly unnecessary and or trial things. Many of our goals are inspired by an underlying want. If we keep digging into the layers of wants, we eventually get to the core of what drives us, and often it is something trivial.
While I accept that it is good to pursue upward mobility and test the limits of one’s capabilities, it is equally important to realise that this pursuit is an option; it is a choice and not a necessity. Therefore, when the time comes for one to shed some weight, one ought to do so knowing that most of what one deems important is not.
One way to practice this way of life is to frequently give away unimportant things. So, maybe go through your cupboard, garage or store room. Find the things you thought you needed and give them away to someone truly in need.
Let’s see what happens. Let me know what you gave away and I will give you kudos in next week’s newsletter.
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As always. Thank you for taking the time to read today’s newsletter. Until next week.
Yo
Vusi.
P.S. Last week I promised to invite you to a course. Please bear with me; the week was crazier than I thought. Your invite will arrive this coming week.
In the meantime, please tell someone about today’s newsletter. Better yet, ask them to join our little community at vusisindane.com/newsletter.
