The Lesson of the Moth

"People have a hard time letting go of their suffering.  Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar." ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

Do you know anyone who seemingly prefers to complain about everything rather than do something about it?  Is that person you?  Perhaps a greater enemy to our personal growth than complacency and apathy is inertia.  Most people who suffer from inertia, or the condition of being stuck, do not realize it. 

Today, I would like to share the lesson of the moth with you in hopes it will awaken a sense of self-awareness that may be the beginning of the end of inertia in your life:

I was talking to a moth the other evening.  He was trying to break into an electric light bulb and fry himself on the wire.

'Why do fellows pull this stunt?' I asked him.  'Because it is a conventional thing for moths?  Or why, if that had been an uncovered candle, instead of an electric light bulb, you would now be a small, unsightly cinder.  Have you no sense?'

'Plenty of it.'  he answered, 'but at times we get tired of using it.  We get bored with the routine and crave beauty and excitement.  Fire is beautiful and we know that if we get too close it will kill us,

But what does it matter?

It is better to be happy for a moment and be burned up with beauty than to live a long time and be bored all the while.  So we wad all our life up into one little roll, and then we shoot the roll.

That's what life is for.

It is better to be a part of beauty for one instant and then cease to exist, than to exist forever and never be a part of beauty.  Our attitude toward life is Come easy, go easy.

We're like human beings used to be before they became too civilized to enjoy themselves.'

And before I could argue him out of his philosophy, he went and immolated himself on a patented cigar lighter.

I do not agree with him.  Myself, I would rather have half the happiness and twice the longevity.  But at the same time, I wished there was something I wanted as badly as he wanted to fry himself.

I certainly do not suggest risking your life for a brief moment of beauty but I believe the lesson of the moth tells us that there is self-fulfillment and even self-actualization in placing our energy into our passion, rather than in routine, ritual and "longevity." 

I believe, for the moth, the beauty, or meaning, was actually found in the pursuit of it rather than in the end result... 

The moth was not seeking death but seeking life...

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Source:  Bennis, Warren & Nanus Burt. Leaders: Strategies For Taking Charge. Harper: New York, 1985, 1997.

Comments

[Oz]

The moth story immediately reminds of the movie Gattaca where the protagonist takes on the identity of a person with better genes in order to be able to pilot a ship. In piloting the ship and following his dream, he defies his society where jobs are allocated based on genetic makeup and probability. However, at the same time he is potentially endangering the lives of his crew members.

It's difficult to judge his actions. The society itself is backwards because its citizens serve their jobs more so than people. People are much more than their jobs! The protagonist wanted the freedom to do as he pleased, to follow his passion. But at the same time, he was a slave to his passion, and in doing so, potentially endangered his fellow crew members.

For the moth and the protagonist, life was more about fulfilling their own passions rather than being alive. Their drives were for a fleeting glow of their familiar passion and there was no peace in their inner-lives because of it. They could not breathe, think, enjoy, or love because of that lack of peace. There are many ways to live a life, and to throw it up in a spark seems such a waste if there was more to live for.

Perhaps there wasn't much else to live for.

[The Financial Philosopher]

Oz:

I do not disagree with your interpretation of this lesson.

The lesson of the moth potentially brings to mind the struggle between two self-defeating extremes: 1) Debilitating inertia and 2)Self-destructive behavior for the sake of selfish and narrow objective.

I interpret the lesson as somewhere in the middle: Seek purpose and meaning in life; play to win rather than play to "not lose;" and move toward something you want to live for rather than something would "die for."

As always, moderation and simplicity are key!

[Charles]

Here is an argument that we humans are poor predictors of what makes us happy, which can lead to poor decision making:

http://scienceblogs.com/purepedantry/2008/04/happiness_prediction_and_an_in.php

This is the basic argument by Daniel Gilbert:

"Gilbert is the author of Stumbling on Happiness, which I highly recommend picking up if you have time. It is not a self-help book instructing people on how to be happy. Rather he expands the argument that people are fundamentally bad at predicting what will make them happy. Their poor predictions result in strategic errors in decision making."

If we resist the urge to jump into the flame, we may realize a few years later that that brief moment of ecstasy would have been a bad decision. Experiencing that moment of ecstasy may prevent us from experiencing many more moments of ecstasy that are less terminal.

Additional food for thought:

What we think will make us happy today, will probably not make us happy tomorrow.

What makes one person happy, probably will not bring happiness to someone else.

Charles

[The Financial Philosopher]

Charles:

I also agree with your comment and I will absolutely look at the Gilbert link.

When I first read the lesson of the moth, I interpreted the moth's behavior as impulsive and self-destructive.

The final line from the narrator of the lesson, "I wished there was something I wanted as badly as he wanted to fry himself," is what moved me to post the lesson.

I find myself somewhere between the narrator and the moth: I will remove inertia by persistently seeking purpose and meaning in my life yet I will remain mindful of the pitfalls of foolish impulses and false rewards that are often led by a poor sense of self-awareness.

Your final thought that says, "What makes one person happy, probably will not bring happiness to someone else," strikes at the core of most people's life challenges, whether they know it or not. I'm convinced that neither the narrator nor the moth exibit good self-awareness traits.

Thanks for joining the discussion and provoking more thought! I hope you will add more thoughts and references to other thoughts again as you have done today...

Kent

[David]

For some reason (maybe my limited frame of personal reference), everything here seems to remind me of something I've seen or read in a movie or a book.

The moment of fiery death that the moth seeks reminds me of scenes from the movie, "Point Break", in which the head of the surfers/bankrobbers gang (played by Patrick Swayze) is constantly seeking a way to live on the edge, or die in a moment of beauty and exhilaration.

Kent's comments on moderation and simplicity, and finding purpose in life, reminded me of Holden Caulfield's teacher telling him, "The mark of an immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one."

And Charles' comments on our inability to predict our own happiness brings to mind a scene from the movie Metropolitan, when one character says about his parents' generation, "they wanted to be happy, but of course the last way to be happy is to make it your objective in life".

[The Financial Philosopher]

David:

I believe you tie everything together well. Thanks!