Alexandersmap

    Tag: Arete

    • Big Things

      “Big things happen because you do a lot of small things supremely well and they compound over time.” — Jim Collins, Good to Great

      The compounding effect of small things done consistently over time builds momentum in our lives. To do those small things supremely well all the time is a stretch goal, for that is reserved for those destined for personal excellence (Arete). Most people choose good enough.

      The daily standard we set for ourselves is thus essential to how close we ever get to personal excellence. I have a long way to go myself, perhaps you’re tracking better. The question we all must ask ourselves as we immerse in this daily reconciliation with ourselves and time is straightforward: what do we want from life? Every habit, routine and system is built with our why somewhere in our minds, and our success or failure in doing all those small things supremely well is the lag measure of our days (and a lead measure of our lives).

      Taking a microscope to our small things, which way are they directing us? Is today our high point for the balance of our lives or the base for an epic climb to greatness? These next steps matter a great deal given the answer, don’t they?

    • The Given

      “I inherit from the past of my family, my city, my tribe, my nation, a variety of debts, inheritance, rightful expectations, and obligations. These constitute the given of my life, my moral starting point.” — Athenian oath

      If the way we live our lives is based on the routines and beliefs we establish for ourselves over time, the foundation for those routines and beliefs is that which we’ve been given by the circle of people who have surrounded us from our beginning. The desire to break free from that circle begins in our teenage years, but there’s no getting around the momentum of the given. Our very identity is formed by those we’ve been surrounded by. Is it any wonder that some people move away, that they may be someone else?

      When we think about the people who have influenced us most, we begin to understand ourselves more. Our positive and negative voice that quietly whisper to us as a running dialogue, waiting to rise to the surface to make an appearance in our best and worst moments? Given. Our fallback position on everything from religion to politics to underlying feelings about people who are “different from us”? Given. Our lives begin with momentum. But that which is given is merely our foundation. We are the architect for who we become beyond our base.

      “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” ― Jim Rohn

      That circle changes over our lifetime. The gravitational pull of our belief system from when we were a child changes as the circle influencing us changes. When we go off to college or move to a faraway place, we are breaking free of that which once influenced us and placing ourselves in a new, developing circle. Most of us have the personal freedom to choose who we want to be. It begins with who we surround ourselves with, and how we spend our days. Habits and routines are as essential to our becoming as who we started out as in the beginning.

      Lately I’ve been in many conversations about what we’ve been given. Our emotional, intellectual, physical and financial foundation established momentum for each of us. It’s up to us to keep that momentum going from there, but there’s no doubting the impact of the forces that brought us here. It’s easier to become what’s next with a running start than it is from a static position. Reflecting on our own momentum might enhance our empathy for those who start without any. When we think about it, we are all part of the same tribe, aren’t we?

      “We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” — Winston Churchill

      We are all part of someone else’s circle. Isn’t it just as fair to ask ourselves what are we giving, perhaps even more than what are we getting? That Athenian oath doesn’t just speak of rightful expectations, but of obligations too. Living a meaningful life demands that we use that positive momentum to pull others up as well, that our circle grows larger. Great societies and cultures are built on such things as this. This is true excellence, for it lives beyond us.

    • To Live Creatively

      “Many times, in writing I have looked over my own shoulder from beyond the grave, more alive to the reactions of those to come than to those of my contemporaries. A good part of my life has, in a way, been lived in the future. With regard to all that vitally concerns me I am really a dead man, alive only to a very few who, like myself, could not wait for the world to catch up with them. I do not say this out of pride or vanity, but with the humility not untouched with sadness. Sadness is perhaps hardly the right word either, since I neither regret the course I have followed nor desire things to be any different than they are. I know now what the world is like and knowing I accept it, both the good and the evil. To live creatively, I have discovered, means to live more and more unselfishly, to live more and more into the world, identifying oneself with it and thus influencing it at the core, so to speak. Art, like religion, it now seems to me, is only a preparation, an initiation into the way of life. The goal is liberation, freedom, which means assuming greater responsibility. To continue writing beyond the point of self-realization seems futile and arresting. The mastery of any form of expression should lead inevitably to the final expression—mastery of life. In this realm one is absolutely alone, face to face with the very elements of creation. It is an experiment whose outcome nobody can predict.” — Henry Miller, The Colossus of Maroussi

      Another long quote to start this blog, and surely the SEO needs improvement. So be it. I might have doubled the length for all Henry Miller had to say. In fact, stop reading my blog altogether and go pick up the book. We are the people he had in mind when he wrote these words. Can’t you see him looking over his shoulder at us? If Miller was looking to the future with hopefulness that the world would catch up to his way of thinking, well, he may have been sorely disappointed. We all shake our heads at the madness in the world, and the inclination to dumb it all down for the benefit of the power brokers with all the fancy toys. Some things never change.

      To tag along with Miller as he wanders around Greece on the cusp of World War II is fascinating for the historian in me, for we know how the story ends but not always how the world felt about it as things were playing out. Miller found his soul in Greece just before things got truly crazy. What of us?

      Some of us write to reach self-realization and rarely go beyond it to reach for mastery. I talk a good game myself, but my default is to quiet quit on mastery. It takes a level of discipline I’ve learned I don’t want to grind out of myself to be a master craftsman at anything. I can see it in the pursuits I’ve started and let die out. If the price is to exclude everything else to reach mastery, I’ve come to realize that I won’t pay that price. There are precious few who keep going, which is why there are so very few masters of any craft.

      But there’s hope. If the goal of life is Arete and reaching personal excellence, then the journey never truly ends. Perhaps writing for self-realization is part of the journey that eventually we break through to reach for something more. The only certainty is that the creative journey continues, and so long as the blog posts reach you, you’ll know that I’m still pushing through what Steven Pressfield called the Resistance to find out what’s on the other side.

      There’s a reckoning coming. When we keep pushing ahead it’s inevitable that we’ll face more and more resistance. For us to keep going with the work that calls to us is audacious, and some might say self-serving. This too is recognized as resistance. There comes a point in our lives where we tell our quiet-quitting self that the work means more now. We may still end this trivial pursuit and go on to some other distraction. Just not today.

    • The Rhythm of Routine

      “Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.” ― Will Durant, The History of Philosophy

      We get into a rhythm of routine in our lives. When we travel frequently this becomes our rhythm. When we hike or sail or play pickle ball every free moment we’re in a rhythm of routine. And when we do nothing but stare at a computer monitor all day we’re most definitely in a rhythm of routine. We find a rhythm that works for us and we dance with it for as long as we feel the beat in our souls.

      We’re just past two weeks into a new year as this is published. It’s a good chance to review progress thus far and ask ourselves, are we getting where we thought we’d go when we rounded the corner on last year? Does that rhythm of routine feel right or do we need to change the playlist? Are the weekends filling up with joyful pursuits, or are we stumbling through to Monday? Does the work feel right or are we looking towards Friday?

      We are reminded now and then that we need the right dance partner or we never quite feel the rhythm enough to dance with it. Sure, we can dance by ourselves, but what’s the fun in that? Any adventure in life is better together. With the right partner, we become accountable, and push each other just enough to go that much farther into the world. And surely, the right partner also keeps us from charging off the cliff when we get ahead of ourselves.

      Looking at my own daily habit tracker, I see a pattern very similar to last year’s habit track. Some things I defined as absolutely essential to the rhythm I want to be dancing in aren’t being checked frequently, if at all. Some are tracking nicely to firmly establish themselves as part of my identity. Nothing speaks more clearly than the truth staring back at you in black and white. We must measure our progress, that we may reconcile our beliefs with our behavior.

      Indeed we are what we repeatedly do. Does the rhythm of our routine feel right for us to reach personal excellence? The answer lies in progress—incremental or in big leaps forward. Are we getting there, or settling into a routine of excuses and complacency? We can reset ourselves at any time, really. Why not now?

    • On Magnanimity

      I left some money on the table yesterday. Money I’d earned a few times over, but which felt unfair to take given the rules of engagement we have in my work. I left it open for magnanimity for the recipients, but the only one being magnanimous was me. Does that make me a schmuck or honorable? What’s a little money when honor is at stake?

      I tell my children jokingly that we’re the donor class. We donate to everything, we pay taxes that billionaires don’t pay, we do the fundraisers to raise money and round up with our own cash to hit the charity’s target. We rise up to meet the moment at hand, and push the scarcity mindset aside. We’re either in this together or we’re a pack of wolves fighting for every scrap for ourselves. How do we want to live in this world?

      And so I aspire to magnanimity. I try to pay more than my share, I quietly support others on their path to greatness, and I generally let my actions do the talking (this blog post a notable exception). Isn’t that the very definition of having a generous spirit?

      magnanimity (n.)
      mid-14c., “loftiness of thought or purpose, greatness of mind or heart, habit of feeling and acting worthily under all circumstances,” from Old French magnanimité “high-mindedness, generosity of spirit,” from Latin magnanimitatem (nominative magnanimitas) “greatness of soul, high-mindedness,” from magnanimus “having a great soul,” from magnus “great” (from PIE root *meg- “great”) + animus “mind, soul, spirit” (see animus).
      Probably a loan-translation of Greek megalopsykhos “high-souled, generous” (Aristotle) or megathymus “great-hearted.” The narrower sense of “superiority to petty resentments or jealousies, generous disregard of injuries” (by 1771).

      To reach excellence (Areté), we must live excellently. That includes generosity of spirit and having a great soul. This isn’t showmanship, it’s a personal standard for living a great life in the time we have. When we rise up and lead by example, then the rest of society sees the way and may just rise up to a higher standard themselves.

      A personal code of conduct based on magnanimity sometimes has a price to pay, but in turn pays dividends with a far higher return. The more we live this way, the more momentum we have in our lives as we’re surrounded by like-minded souls. That truly is reaching excellence.

    • Worthy of Becoming

      “What makes a man beautiful? Isn’t it being an excellent man? And so, if you wish to be beautiful, young man, work at this, the acquisition of human excellence. But what is this? Observe who you praise, when you praise many people without partiality: do you praise the fair or the unfair? ‘The fair.’ Do you praise the moderate or the immoderate? ‘The moderate.’ And the temperate or the intemperate? ‘The temperate.’ Therefore, you know if you make yourself a person like those who you praise, you will know that you will make yourself beautiful: but so long as you neglect these things, you must be ugly, even though you arrange all you can to appear beautiful.” — Epictetus, The Discourses

      We all aspire to something. Beauty. Power. Wealth. Fame. What we might become prods us along, becoming our why. This blog was born out of a desire to be a better writer, to express through a keyboard all the things I’d deferred in favor of other aspirations. That I stick with it is telling, for it betrays who I wish to become with every post.

      There’s been a steady improvement in the writer (perhaps also the writing) as change is documented, great works are read, routines are attempted. That he remains imperfect speaks to how far he had to go. He rarely speaks in the third person so this must be a very serious point. Or tongue-in-cheek. One never knows with this writer… and by that I mean one always knows.

      The thing is, the progress is there when we go look for it, when we have an aspiration worthy of pursuit. When we pass that magical ten thousand hour milestone, we believe we might just be mastering something but have learned just enough to realize we’ve got so very far to go. We never master anything, we only pursue excellence from a higher plane. But isn’t the view that much better? Just look at how far we’ve climbed!

      Any hiker will tell us this is a false summit. It feels like we’ve arrived but soon realize that it isn’t the summit at all, simply a small rise before we descend again to begin the next ascent. This can be crushing for the undisciplined, or simply a part of the climb for those who are more resilient. The trick is to stop looking around and start climbing again. Just good enough isn’t what we aspired to when we began this journey.

      Since we can’t possibly climb every summit in a lifetime, we must choose what we’ll aspire to master and what we’ll choose to be average or poor at. We ought to choose to fail at the things that won’t matter in the end that we may put all of our energy into developing within ourselves that which is truly beautiful. Arete—personal excellence, is our true summit, and thus worthy of the climb.

    • Forever Working Towards Arete

      “Homer’s epic poems brought into focus a notion of arete, or excellence in life, that was at the center of the Greek understanding of human being…. Excellence in the Greek sense involves neither the Christian notion of humility and love nor the Roman ideal of stoic adherence to one’s duty. Instead, excellence in the Homeric world depends crucially on one’s sense of gratitude and wonder. …. the Greek word arete is etymologically related to the Greek verb “to pray” (araomai). It follows that Homer’s basic account of human excellence involves the necessity of being in an appropriate relationship to whatever is understood to be sacred in the culture.” — Hubert Drefus, All Things Shining

      My first memory of hearing the word arete was when a history professor I was quite fond of suggested we use it as the name of a new rowing shell our crew had acquired. The Greek word for excellence seemed as worthy a name as any to aspire to, and so I proposed it. The rowing coach, never one to embrace such things, chose a different name. And it turned out that we never did quite achieve excellence, settling somewhere into better than average. I wonder if we’d chosen it we might have been inclined to be so? One can’t very well name a rowing shell Arete and finish in the middle of the pack.

      What’s become clear to me over the years since that first encounter with arete is that it’s been my objective ever since. We reach, fall short, move a step closer and reach again. That’s how we move forward towards something greater than our previous self. Living with a sense of gratitude and wonder, embracing that which is sacred, and working towards excellence is a blueprint for a lifetime.

      We can’t control everything in life. Surely things happen along the way that may be chocked up to luck, timing or serendipity. But certainly, what we aspire to makes all the difference in how full our lives turn out to be.

    • The Incremental Path

      What might we accomplish in our brief time here should we apply ourselves towards it? Is accomplishing itself a worthy pursuit, or is experiencing the better path to walk down? I believe in fully experiencing life, but without setting a course and working diligently towards a calling who are we but sheep waiting to be sheared?

      I wrote about this of reaching for excellence recently, and perhaps write about it too frequently. But a blog is a sorting place of ideas and observations, shared experiences and insights. Since that post, I’ve added some additional habits to the daily accountability list in my pursuit of my own personal brand of Arete. I’m incrementally further along in that time, yet the path to excellence is long. Who says how far down the path I can reach? Does it doesn’t matter as long as we’re progressing down the one that matters most to us?

      Ars longa, vita brevis (Art is long, life is short)

      Don’t look now, but we’re already 2.5% through the year. What was it we wrote down as our resolution for the year? How’s that going for you? Isn’t it fair to ask? Creating that cadence of accountability is the only way to stay on the path. There are few big leaps forward on the journey to excellence, the path is incremental. And what we do next matters more than what we did yesterday.

      Looking back on what I’d set as milestones for this year, I can see that the milestones have mattered in my daily action. Maybe you don’t always feel like brushing your teeth but chances are you do it every day anyway. We know what matters most, but most beat themselves up if they break a streak of working out or don’t lose ten pounds in the first week of a diet. Would you stop brushing your teeth if you missed a day? No! You’d brush them as soon as you got up the next morning! Similarly, getting back on track is all that matters on this incremental path to excellence.

      Even the masters fall short of excellence. Who are we to expect it of ourselves? But when you turn around and see how far you’ve come, you recognize that the path takes you so much further than you’d have come otherwise. And the experiences you have along the way are richer for the pursuit.

    • Eudaimonia: The Act of Living Well

      There’s an ancient Greek word, frequently associated with Aristotle, called eudaimonia. Aristotle meant it as living virtuously. It’s best translated in modern English not as “happiness”, but as “flourishing” or “living well”. Let’s face it, chasing happiness is a fools game (for happiness is an evasive and subjective pursuit, and without purpose, empty), but pursuing eudaimonia—living well—is a lifestyle choice. And it begins with knowing what living well means to you.

      The spirit of eudaimonia, going back to Aristotle, is to make the most of yourself in your short time here. That making the most of yourself business is what you and I have been chasing for a long time, isn’t it? To live virtuously, to flourish in the art of living, to learn and grow and travel and build something better of yourself. To be fit and vibrant and sharp as a tack. To be articulate and passionate and the eager student in this master class of living.

      We are all in the pursuit of eudaimonia, we just don’t use that particular word to describe our objective. Maybe we should. There’s another Greek word, Arete, meaning excellence, that comes to mind. If Arete is the ultimate goal, eudaimonia is the path to get us closer to it. We may never reach the former, but we can certainly flourish and live well and strive to maximize our potential. And isn’t that the point of living in the first place?