Conquering desire

Conquering desire and accepting that you have enough will allow you to live contentedly.

Not all of John F. Kennedy’s behavior during the Cuban Missile Crisis demonstrated the ideals of stillness. At one point, with American and Soviet forces on the brink of conflict, Kennedy had a rendezvous with a 19-year-old student from Wheaton College at a hotel near the White House. The most powerful man in the world was being led astray by his base desires at a critical time.

But if you think that sounds sordid, take a moment to reflect on how much you’re driven by desire. Most of us fall prey to desire, whether for a beautiful person, power, the latest iPhone or money.

If we’re overly driven by our desires, it becomes harder to achieve true contentedness. That’s because superficial desires, as opposed to those that lead to more noble pursuits, usually come at a cost. The Greek philosopher Epicurus had a good test for distinguishing between the two: any time he felt himself being tugged by a new desire, he asked himself, “How will I feel afterward if I actually get what I want?”

Asking yourself this question will help you focus on the hangover, and not just the taste of the drink; on the sense of guilt, and not just the thrill of the affair.

Once you’ve learned to control your desires, it may be easier to take an important step toward finding stillness: accepting that you have enough.

The writers Kurt Vonnegut and Joseph Heller once attended a party at the palatial home of a billionaire. Vonnegut asked his friend how it felt to know that their host had probably earned more that same day than Heller’s book, Catch-22, had earned in its whole history. Heller replied that he had something the billionaire never would: the knowledge that he had enough.

Heller meant that he was content with what he had achieved. This acceptance of enough can be a beautiful thing, bringing stillness in the form of release from want and comparison to others.

So if you find yourself lusting for more, remind yourself of Heller’s contented embrace of enough. And know that after he said those words, Heller went on to produce six more novels. But he wasn’t doing it to prove anything to himself or to anyone else. When a reporter critically commented that Heller hadn’t written anything as good as his first work, Heller was able to reply with equanimity, “Who has?”