Of Stoicism

Three stanzas of American cinquain

Resolve Willpower rules Epictetus describes All aspects of this difficult Virtue

To do The distasteful The disagreeable The painfully and disgusting Virtue

Avoid Burning desire Wisdom knows the difference Twixt what I want and what I need Divine

Thank you Ravyne Hawke for another deeply inspiring prompt:

Write a ‘resolve’ poem. Can be used as a verb or a noun, or both.

Poetry Form — Any Line Length — 15 lines Restrictions — line length

This was the daily prompt for November 17th. Today would have been my Uncle Richard’s 88th birthday. Richard and I had a difficult and complicated relationship (his best friend (other than you, Sandy) Richard Otto described him as having all of the best and all of the worst traits possible) but we loved and respected each other. Everyone in my immediate family hated him, but I will never forget when he stood in for my mother’s favorite uncle at my Bar Mitzvah to present me with a copy of the Old Testament with tears in his eyes.

He taught me many life lessons, including the message of this parable:

A young couple are having marital problems. The wife’s mother takes them to see the Rabbi. The wife speaks first and tells the Rabbi what’s going on and her complaints. The Rabbi says, “You’re right.” Husband says, “but wait you didn’t hear me yet.” Husband tells his side of things, and the Rabbi says, “You’re right.” Then the wife’s mother exclaims, “Wait, you said they’re both right, how can this be,” and the Rabbi says, “You’re right!”

I have quoted that in a few stories, including my only distributed story to date:

Yet, most synchronously with this piece, I included it here way back in January:

When I read Ravyne’s word “resolve,” I immediately thought of willpower and what I learned from Sebastian Purcell, PhD’s article, How To Build Your Willpower According to The Stoics and Aztecs Insight #1: Willpower Isn’t One Thing, It’s Three, which I cited and built my Serenity Prayer piece around.

Dr. Purcell wrote:

For the Stoic tradition, the virtue for willpower doesn’t concern one thing, but three. Epictetus divides the topic of ethical study into three parts as follows:

The first has to do with desires and aversions …. The second, with cases of choice and refusal, and, in general, with duty … the third with the avoidance of error and rashness in judgment (III.2, 2–3).

The full implication of this division goes beyond what concerns us here. But if you remember that all the virtues are interrelated, then you’ll recognize that moderation has to be divided into these three domains.

What Epictetus is saying, effectively, is that

1. one part of willpower concerns the ability to do what is disagreeable,

2. another part concerns willing not to do something, and

3. a final part concerns knowing what you truly want in the first place.

These are, in short, your will-to, will-not-to, and want-to powers.

I then took the serenity prayer’s verse (“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference”) and repurposed it into:

“Gods, please breathe into me the strength to do with serenity that for which I have distaste; the strength to say no to burning desires; and the wisdom to know that my path will lead to what I truly need and serene happiness will ensue.”

Ok now back to my new poem — when I saw 15 lines, and “resolve” being a two-syllable word, I thought of the American cinquain (five lines with a 2/4/6/8/2 syllabic structure) that I learned about from Michael Hall and resolved to create a poem of three such stanzas.

As one final synchronicity, I published this essay this morning:

Tagging now friends with whom I want to share this piece and for participation in the prompt, with apologies to anyone I missed:

Joseph Lieungh| Kira Dawn | William J Spirdione | I. Trudie Palmer | jules | Libby Shively McAvoy | Dr Mehmet Yildiz | Karen Madej | Dr. Preeti Singh | Maria Rattray | Claire Kelly | Katrina Bos | Amy Marley | Stuart Englander | Diana C. | Anthi Psomiadou | Maxwell Jordan | Kim Petersen | Thief | Jean Carfantan |Michael Hall | Somsubhra Banerjee| Camille Grady | Holly Kellums | Rebecca Romanelli | Carrie. A. Kelly | Carolyn F. Chryst, Ph.D. | Frank Ontario | Carol Price | Tree Langdon | Melanie J. | Dr. Fatima Imam | Ane | Reverie | Danna Z | JS Adam | Agnes Laurens

In Rama I create, with soul-energy surging through my body, inspiring me and breathing wind into my sails,

Marcus (Gregory Maidman)