Resilience: The Art of Remaining Unshaken
· By Julien Poulin
Life is frustrating. Cars break down. Kids get sick. Software crashes. People are rude.
Franklin’s eleventh virtue, Tranquillity, is the operating system for dealing with this reality.
Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
— Benjamin Franklin
We modernize this as Resilience.
Depending on the Unavoidable
Notice Franklin’s phrasing: "accidents common or unavoidable."
He suggests that most of what upsets us is completely predictable. It is common for there to be traffic. It is unavoidable that dishes will break. To be angry at these things is like being angry that it is raining. It is a refusal to accept the terms of existence.
Resilience is the acceptance of friction. It is the understanding that "shit happens," and that your internal peace should not be dependent on external perfection.
The Stoic Connection
This is the most explicitly Stoic of the virtues. Epictetus taught that we cannot control what happens to us, only how we respond.
When you lose your temper at a "trifle" (a small thing), you are giving that thing power over you. You are saying, "This misplaced set of keys is more powerful than my peace of mind."
That is a bad trade.
The Modern Trifles
What are our modern trifles?
- Slow WiFi.
- A rude comment online.
- Being left on "read."
- The barista getting your order wrong.
These are micr-stressors. If you let each one puncture your skin, you will bleed out by noon. Resilience is the armor that lets them bounce off.
The goal is to be a rock, not a leaf. The wind blows, but the rock stays put.
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