January 27
Easily and in abundance you can reach wickedness; level is its road, and it dwells close by. But before virtue the gods have set sweat: long and steep is the path — yet for the one who stands at the top, it becomes easy.
Works and Days (freely rendered)
Listening mode
Easily and in abundance you can reach wickedness; level is its road, and it dwells close by. But before virtue the gods have set sweat: long and steep is the path — yet for the one who stands at the top, it becomes easy.
Some things you now manage without having to think. You tell someone kindly that you disagree, or you let a slight pass instead of paying it back. There was a time when this took an effort of will every time. Today you barely notice that you decided anything at all.
That is a fine thing, but it has a strange consequence. From the inside, this ease feels exactly like another kind: like the silence you fell into the habit of because disagreeing was tiring, or the giving in that you take for equanimity. Both happen without effort. Both seem natural to you.
The difference lies not in the moment itself but in what came before it. One ease grew out of many laborious repetitions, the other out of your avoiding them. In both cases you remember only vaguely how it came about.
The difference may only become noticeable when the situation shifts slightly: when your kind disagreement is suddenly directed at someone who matters a great deal to you, or a slight cuts deeper than usual. Then something is hard for you again, and you recognize the old effort.
