Što više stvari želimo moramo više toga raditi da bi došli do tih stvari ili se boriti da ih zadržimo. A to znači da onda manje uživamo u životu i osjećamo se manje slobodnima.
“What’s left to be prized? This, I think—to limit our action or inaction to only what’s in keeping with the needs of our own preparation . . . it’s what the exertions of education and teaching are all about—here is the thing to be prized! If you hold this firmly, you’ll stop trying to get yourself all the other things. . . . If you don’t, you won’t be free, self-sufficient, or liberated from passion, but necessarily full of envy, jealousy, and suspicion for any who have the power to take them, and you’ll plot against those who do have what you prize. . . . But by having some self-respect for your own mind and prizing it, you will please yourself and be in better harmony with your fellow human beings, and more in tune with the gods—praising everything they have set in order and allotted you.”
—MARCUS AURELIUS, MEDITATIONS, 6.16.2b–4a
Warren Buffet živi u istoj kući koju je kupio 1958.godine iako je jedan od najbogatijih ljudi. Košarkaš Kawhi Leonard vozi auto koje je kupio kao tinejdžer iako zarađuje milione mjesečno. Zašto? Nije zato što su škrti. Zato što stvari koje su njima bitne nisu skupe.
Ljudi poput njih dvojice to rade svjesno jer žele da njihov životnu stil ne ovisi o njihovim financijama. Ako bi sutra sve izgubili oni bi opet bili sretni jer im je prioritet na stvarima koje nisu skupe.
*Moj osvrt na dnevne savjete za stoicizam iz knjige The Daily Stoic od Ryan Holidaya.