It’s a common question: “What do you do?” Less common, but in every New Age first meeting: “Who are you?”
Now the question for you: Can you say who you are without some reference to what you do? “Sure,” you say. “I can refer to how I think, what I think, when I think, for example. I can say I’m an optimist, a worrywart, a logical kind of person. I don’t have to refer to what I do.”
Good. But let me tell you a story as Seneca relates it. Seems there was this old guy, ninety-years-old plus. He worked for Caligula—not an easy guy to work for—as some sort of administrator. Picture this; it’s Rome between 37 and 41 AD (Oh! for those for whom Anno Domini must be replaced by CE, 2019 – 37 and 2019 – 41, or between 1,982 and 1,978 years ago). Caligula has this old guy working for him, efficiently working for him, according to Seneca. The old guy, Sextus Turannius, was minding the business of the Empire and the Emperor when Caligula just up and fires him. Ancient downsizing, I guess. So, what do you think Sextus Turannius did? Did he simply retire? Did he take a job as a greeter at Walmart? No, Sextus had his family and slaves lay him out as a corpse while he was still alive. His entire household mourned because of the unemployment. Strangely (I say "strangely" because of his history of cruelty and sadism), Caligula acquiesced and rehired Sextus. We don’t know how long Sextus continued to work. We do know that his employer, the Emperor, went into very permanent retirement in the year 41 when Cassius Chaerea and some of the Praetorian Guard killed him.
But I digress. Sextus Turannius didn’t want to give up his job because, it seems, it gave his life meaning. I mean, why else pretend to be dead with all the trappings of a funeral just because you lose your job at age 90 plus? So, Seneca makes some interesting points about people who keep working, and working, and working simply because they don’t know what to do with themselves when they retire. This is what Seneca writes in “On the Shortness of Life”:
“Can it be such a pleasure to die in harness? Many are convinced that it is, and their eagerness to work outlasts their capacity for it. They struggle against physical infirmity, and they consider old age a hardship for no other reason than that it removes them from active life. The law does not draft a soldier after his fiftieth year nor require a senator’s attendance after his sixtieth; it is harder for men to obtain release from themselves than from the law.” *
Now, if you aren’t near retirement age, you might wonder how this applies to you. Ordinarily, I would leave you surmising, giving you, as I often do, a point of departure for your own deep thoughts. But, I feel like saying what I think is “the obvious.” Those questions I posed at the beginning about who you are and what you do apply here. Apparently, Sextus Turannius couldn’t separate who he was from what he did. His doing was his being and losing the doing was losing being.
Probably all of us rely somewhat on what we do as a ready definition of who we are. You’ve asked that “what do you do” question numerous times. Would it be strange for you, in meeting another person, to ask and say, “Who are you? And by that I just don’t mean your name. I want to know the ‘real you,’ not the occupation, not the musical, literary, or artistic talent you exhibit. I want to know who you are without all those activities. I want to know the essence of you.”
Of course, you’re not going to ask and say that at a party lest you end up drinking and snacking alone in a corner. But, risking my own ostracization and banishment to the room’s darkest corner next to the ficus, I have to ask about your own response to the question about who you are.
Hadas, Moses. Trans. The Stoic Philosophy of Seneca: Essays and Letters. New York. W. W. Norton Company, 1958. p. 73.
Now the question for you: Can you say who you are without some reference to what you do? “Sure,” you say. “I can refer to how I think, what I think, when I think, for example. I can say I’m an optimist, a worrywart, a logical kind of person. I don’t have to refer to what I do.”
Good. But let me tell you a story as Seneca relates it. Seems there was this old guy, ninety-years-old plus. He worked for Caligula—not an easy guy to work for—as some sort of administrator. Picture this; it’s Rome between 37 and 41 AD (Oh! for those for whom Anno Domini must be replaced by CE, 2019 – 37 and 2019 – 41, or between 1,982 and 1,978 years ago). Caligula has this old guy working for him, efficiently working for him, according to Seneca. The old guy, Sextus Turannius, was minding the business of the Empire and the Emperor when Caligula just up and fires him. Ancient downsizing, I guess. So, what do you think Sextus Turannius did? Did he simply retire? Did he take a job as a greeter at Walmart? No, Sextus had his family and slaves lay him out as a corpse while he was still alive. His entire household mourned because of the unemployment. Strangely (I say "strangely" because of his history of cruelty and sadism), Caligula acquiesced and rehired Sextus. We don’t know how long Sextus continued to work. We do know that his employer, the Emperor, went into very permanent retirement in the year 41 when Cassius Chaerea and some of the Praetorian Guard killed him.
But I digress. Sextus Turannius didn’t want to give up his job because, it seems, it gave his life meaning. I mean, why else pretend to be dead with all the trappings of a funeral just because you lose your job at age 90 plus? So, Seneca makes some interesting points about people who keep working, and working, and working simply because they don’t know what to do with themselves when they retire. This is what Seneca writes in “On the Shortness of Life”:
“Can it be such a pleasure to die in harness? Many are convinced that it is, and their eagerness to work outlasts their capacity for it. They struggle against physical infirmity, and they consider old age a hardship for no other reason than that it removes them from active life. The law does not draft a soldier after his fiftieth year nor require a senator’s attendance after his sixtieth; it is harder for men to obtain release from themselves than from the law.” *
Now, if you aren’t near retirement age, you might wonder how this applies to you. Ordinarily, I would leave you surmising, giving you, as I often do, a point of departure for your own deep thoughts. But, I feel like saying what I think is “the obvious.” Those questions I posed at the beginning about who you are and what you do apply here. Apparently, Sextus Turannius couldn’t separate who he was from what he did. His doing was his being and losing the doing was losing being.
Probably all of us rely somewhat on what we do as a ready definition of who we are. You’ve asked that “what do you do” question numerous times. Would it be strange for you, in meeting another person, to ask and say, “Who are you? And by that I just don’t mean your name. I want to know the ‘real you,’ not the occupation, not the musical, literary, or artistic talent you exhibit. I want to know who you are without all those activities. I want to know the essence of you.”
Of course, you’re not going to ask and say that at a party lest you end up drinking and snacking alone in a corner. But, risking my own ostracization and banishment to the room’s darkest corner next to the ficus, I have to ask about your own response to the question about who you are.
Hadas, Moses. Trans. The Stoic Philosophy of Seneca: Essays and Letters. New York. W. W. Norton Company, 1958. p. 73.
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