June 27
Once you have grown used to simplicity, do not boast of it. If you drink water — do not say at every opportunity: I drink water.
Enchiridion, 47 (freely rendered)
Listening mode
Once you have grown used to simplicity, do not boast of it. If you drink water — do not say at every opportunity: I drink water.
A habit you have had to fight for remains worth talking about for a while. You give up something you used to take for granted, and at first someone asks about it. You explain, and with each explanation the answer grows smoother. Soon you almost know it by heart.
With that, the habit changes imperceptibly. It had become easy precisely because it hardly occupied you any more. As a story, it now needs tending. If you make an exception once, it no longer feels like a small deviation but like a contradiction of what you have told others. And anyone who knows about it pays attention.
The difficulty is that silence, too, can become a pose. If you notice how modestly you are saying nothing just now, the story has merely moved inward.
At some point someone asks you what you actually do differently from other people. You have to think for a moment, and then you name something that would have meant a great deal to you years ago. The other thing only occurs to you on the way home, and it no longer seems worth mentioning.
