De Brevitate Vitae

So it is: we are not given a short life but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it. - Seneca, On the Shortness of Life

One of  the most powerful works of writing that I have ever come across is the masterpiece by Seneca: On the Shortness of Life. Since I was a little child I found something off about living - the dying. I could also not wrap my head around how people, otherwise particular about demanding proof in the smallest aspects of their lives, were conveniently able to believe that there existed some way of continuing beyond death. As I grew older I started to realize that while there might have been instances of "life beyond death", but absence of scientific reproducibility/replicability combined with people's general fear of the unknown led them to create elaborate narratives that they reminded themselves of multiple times through the day (through chanting, idols, writing etc.) to rid themselves of the fear and enjoy their time before they died - God, I started to guess, again in absence of proof, was a construct that people designed because they wanted something to place their fear of death in while they went about their lives. Now I am even older, but my view on life after death and God has not changed much - yeah there is a chance that both exist (of course you can't prove a negative) - but I don't think so. Bummer, I like living, and so, considering that this life is all I've got, I am always focused on living in the present moment in pursuit of the intentional, purposeful life.

Modern statue of Seneca in Córdoba

Seneca's essay, originally titled De Brevitate Vitae (English: On the Shortness of Life) therefore really appeals to me as an impassioned monologue where one is reminded of the ticking time bomb that life is and the need to live honestly to yourself. Death, of course, remains humanity's greatest obsessions and I'm not surprised that things written in AD c. 49 are as applicable as they were then and will be as applicable in the future (uploading consciousness into computers and other methods of life extension are exactly that: methods of life extension. Life can get long, but infinite? I don't think so). And therefore, if something is bound to finish eventually, it makes sense to be deliberate about that thing's usage.

Further, even more important is the assumption that all of us live with: "I'll be around tomorrow", even though there is all probability that it might not happen - I came across an excellent article on "The odds of you being alive" - no surprise they are low - 1 in 102,685,000.  The thing I like about this article is that the denominator it finally gets to is so large that it does not register with people, it just flies over them, they are not able to imagine it, there is nothing for context that compares, literally. Like I can tell you that you can compare it with the number of atoms in the universe (1080) but then I would need 33000 such universes. And the thing is, the article still has not factored in what could have gone wrong in the process of you being born and getting to the age you are at right now (like accidents or disease), so the probability should be even lower. By this "reasoning" no one of us has any "right" to be alive.

Anyway, coming back to Seneca and On the Shortness of Life, it is one of those books that I have covered in yellow: it has more highlights per page than non highlighted text, almost every sentence, stanza and paragraph I found to be a gem of knowledge and wisdom and could not resist picking up the marker. For example, look at how powerfully the following quote delivers it message:

You are living as if destined to live for ever; your own frailty never occurs to you; you don’t notice how much time has already passed, but squander it as though you had a full and overflowing supply – though all the while that very day which you are devoting to somebody or something may be your last. 

And therefore it is important that whatever it is that one devotes their time on is something they want to devote their time on, as much as possible (yes, I know, we all have bills to pay). Seneca mentions how important is to live in the "now" and not delay things that are of value to us for some time in the future - like some might delay their wish to travel the world when they retire. It is a little ironic that we make grand plans going 20-30 years down the line while are unaware if the next minute might be our last:

How late it is to begin really to live just when life must end! How stupid to forget our mortality, and put off sensible plans to our fiftieth and sixtieth years, aiming to begin life from a point at which few have arrived!

He opines that the central problem behind us being so careless with our time is the fact that it is not obvious how much of it we have left, unlike other assets that can be assigned a numeric value and therefore be understood from a point of view of scarcity by our minds.

People are delighted to accept pensions and gratuities, for which they hire out their labour or their support or their services. But nobody works out the value of time: men use it lavishly as if it cost nothing ... But if each of us could have the tally of his future years set before him, as we can of our past years, how alarmed would be those who saw only a few years ahead, and how carefully would they use them!

Ah! What truth! What wisdom! I myself have been guilty of trifling away my time for some small benefit that I did not even enjoy as long as the time I spent to achieve it. All because we feel we "still" have time. I am just grateful to have somehow got the insight of taking a step back and considering life for what is really is and not what is being pushed on to us by popular society the moment when we are born: that life is a race and you have to constantly keep running, else you will get left behind. They are right in saying that life is a race, but not against people, instead against time, life is a race against time till it catches up with you in the form of your mortality. And it is imperative on us all to make sure until that eventuality we are able to live in a way that frees us us die without regrets.

The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today. You are arranging what lies in Fortune’s control, and abandoning what lies in yours.

In closure I think that On the Shortness of Life is a piece of work that should be mandated reading for all. I definitely recommend it as my top book of all time because the principles contained in it establish the foundation to an honest and purposeful life, it makes the person be honest with themselves and helps building a life that is deliberate and purposeful, whatever the person living the life might decide that purpose to be. I won't lie, I am not immune to the world with all its competitive hedonism and therefore I often come back to this book/essay to "reset" my mind whenever it becomes inundated with all the crap that the world fills in it: need to get ahead of person X, need to get a bigger house by Y year, need to upgrade my car before Z does. It helps me quickly re-calibrate my compass back to the things that really bring me joy; reading and gaining knowledge, staying with my loving family, taking care of my physical and mental fitness and so on.

People are right in saying that life is a race, but not against other people, instead life is a race against time till it catches up with you in the form of your mortality.

Yes, having money and assets is important but so is keeping a peaceful mind and savoring life (and for someone if that means hauling ass in office then more power to them, but for me it does not). Most important though I think is keeping a balance, a balance that you decide as the captain of your journey and On the Shortness of Life makes me do that. Truly a masterpiece.

The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.