Why Oh Why Be a Virtuous Guy
“He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how.”
-Frederich Nietzsche
I want to be a good man.
The path towards this virtue is littered with distractions and it can be so easy to veer off course and move away from self fulfillment.
For me, starting with why is a practical way of assessing where I’m at on the trail of life so I know I’m still trekking towards improvement.
Self improvement is a long journey that unwinds in varying degrees after immense effort and practice. When I first started on my why, the fear of dying with regret drove me to seek virtue so that I could experience some contentment.
The resistance against self-improvement is a heavy, uphill climb. The mere thought of this drags across millions of other things I could be doing.
Smartphone notifications remind me of this every minute. According to the productivity software company RescueTime, it is estimated that the average smartphone user spends 3 hours and 15 minutes per day on their phone.
It seems that we can no longer tolerate being bored. The smartphone has essentially eliminated boredom by providing users a quick hit of dopamine without the slightest bit of effort.
Switching my mindset to contentment has eased some of the anxiety that comes with boredom.
Currently, I’m savoring the feelings of contentment the more I practice virtue. It’s practice has successfully shifted my fear of missing out to a boyish curiosity that experiments with practical uses of positive psychology to explore human behavior and potential.
Acting upon this curiosity has biochemical benefits. When we decide to seek out our best selves. Dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine and endorphins are released in the brain and play a role in feeling happiness and contentment.
We all have the option to meditate on and express our best selves. This directly impacts our feelings of happiness, virtue, and enjoyment.
Whatever it is for you, the urge to move in the direction of your choosing needs the “why” in order to sustain your pace. If idle for too long, we become prone to succumbing to distractions and start checking the phone for the latest news, social media likes, or celebrity gossip.
I’m choosing improvement over the infinite opinions of the talking heads featured in my endless news feed.
I’d rather be buried with stories exploring wisdom than being buried with multiple theories of how Cobra Kai season 4 will play out.
Perhaps, like you, I seek greater meaning knowing that our “how” will unfold in its own unique way. We can do this together.
Emerson writes: “The essence of greatness is the perception that virtue is enough.”
Virtuous life over virtual life. I can dig it. Can you?
