When we talk about avoiding distractions, we are assuming that we have clear goals and plans to achieve them. If we keep pursuing those goals assiduously, we are on the right track, but if we get sidetracked, it is because we are getting distracted.
Seneca addressed this subject in the 1st Letter to Lucilius, in which he deplores the human tendency to waste time on things of little importance. The more time we waste on distractions, the less time we will have left for fulfilling our life’s purpose.
The 1st Letter enumerates what Seneca regards as important, namely, studying philosophy, meditating and cultivating virtue. Seneca calls readers to steer away from distractions and devote their time and energies to the above-mentioned essentials.
Seneca regarded “distraction” and “waste” as synonymous; he also condemned inactivity, not as laziness, but as distraction that consumes time that we could have employed productively.
Stoicism rarely uses the terms “good” and “bad” because it refrains from rigid moral formulations. It prefers to categorize bad habits as “distractions” that lead to a “disorderly lifestyle.”
Seneca’s call for a philosophical lifestyle
Like his philosophical predecessors Zeno of Citium (334-262 BC) and Cleanthes (330-230 BC), Seneca abhorred waste and disorder. He viewed them as distorting factors of the logos (reason) that rules the universe and as impediments to human happiness.
For Seneca, peace of mind constituted the key benefit from philosophy. Distractions are obstacles, he argued, that we need to remove or circumvent. If we allow distractions to eat up our time, our thoughts will become disorderly and anxious, making it impossible to achieve peace of mind.
How can we avoid distractions? Seneca recommended us to study philosophy and regularly pass review to our actions. If we just keep going without thinking, chances are that we’ll get sidetracked. The best approach, Seneca said, is to devote some time daily to assess “how we’ve lived and what we’ve done.”
Curiously enough, Seneca provides examples of distractions that easily connect to our own century. When he condemns the time wasted on gossip and worthless entertainment, we can easily connect those with the time wasted nowadays on social media and playing video-games.
Seneca regards a philosophical lifestyle and distractions as mutually exclusive. It’s either one or the other. Effective people tend to engage in reading, meditation and deep conversations, while ineffective people keep wasting their time in all possible ways.
Distractions inflict damage in the short term and in the long term, Seneca explains. In the short term, they prevent us from doing the right thing and enjoying the related benefits; and in the long term, they’ll create habits that drive us away from the truth.
Seneca’s insights and Johannes Vermeer
The life of the great Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675) is a compelling example of how to avoid distractions. I do not know of any other artist who would spend a whole year working on a painting until he got every detail perfect.
Vermeer achieved his mastery by keeping distractions away and working assiduously on his craft. I find it remarkable that he would maintain a high level of quality in all his paintings, each of them taking him about one year of work.
I doubt that Vermeer had read Seneca’s Letters to Lucilius, but somehow, he embraced a lifestyle close to Stoicism. In his late teens, he made the decision of becoming an artist, and at age twenty-one, he joined the Guild of Saint Luke in Delft.
As of that moment, Vermeer kept distractions at bay, and in this manner, he was able in the next decades to churn out one masterpiece after another, thirty-four in total.
Not only did Vermeer discard activities that would prevent him from practising his skills, but he stayed almost all his life in the same town, in Delft to be precise.
Seneca: The benefits of avoiding distractions
All his paintings revolve around daily life in Delft. Interiors and exteriors, landscapes and houses, portraits of young and old people, all of them living close to his home.
Vermeer’s paintings such as “The Girl with a Pearl Earring” and “The Geographer” show an attention to detail that very few artists in history have been able to equal; no wonder, since how many artists are willing to devote one year to producing just a couple of paintings?
In the mid-seventeenth century, Delft’s economy had started to decline, but Vermeer did not flinch in his determination to produce high-quality paintings.
Vermeer adopted a modest lifestyle that enabled him to keep going in the direction he had chosen. He couldn’t afford to buy luxuries for his wife, Catharina Bolnes, and children, but like a Stoic philosopher, he chose to adapt himself to the constraints.
His commitment to avoiding distractions enabled Vermeer to keep a calm, orderly mind that is mirrored by his paintings. His paintings depict rational human purpose, devoid of anxiety and worry.
Noise, confusion and contradictions are totally absent from Vermeer’s aesthetic universe. One can only perceive quietness, balance and a sharp focus. Seneca would have been pleased to know that Vermeer had adopted the Stoic recipe for happiness.
If you are interested in putting rational ideas into practice in all kinds of situations, I recommend my book “The philosophy of builders.”
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