Cicero's short cut to fame and glory
RWL#326
Greetings from the University of New Hampshire! Last night my wife and I went out to see Fling, a local rock band made up of 50-somethings from the community, who played original music that had the sound and humor of the Barenaked Ladies. They played a benefit concert for Womanaid, a local charity that gives grants to women in need. The show was in the wine bar of our town’s little Italian restaurant, Ciao Trattoria (get the red eye pizza!). The room was mostly full of locals - my wife works out with one of the wives of a band member, who happens to be a professor at the business school - but there were other professors in the audience, and in the back were a bunch of the business school professor’s students, which was cute. One of the great things about living in a small town is the sense of community. This was a good example of that. And the show was fun.
I wanted to share a quote from Cicero as the basis of this week’s essay, but I couldn’t find it when I went to look for it, and instead stumbled across this one:
It is true, however, that Socrates nobly declared that the nearest path to glory was by taking the shortcut, so to say, of behaving in such a way as to be the kind of person you would like to be thought to be. If people imagine they can obtain endring glory by deceit and empty exhibitionism and hypocrisy in word and look, they are wildly off the mark. True glory drops roots and also spreads its branches wide, whereas all false claims swiftly wither like frail blossoms, for no pretense can be long lasting. (Cicero, On Obligations)
Cicero is quoting Xenophon’s Socrates, who Xenophon has say,
[I]f you want to be thought good at anything, you must try to be so; that is the quickest, the surest, the best way. You will find on reflection that every kind of virtue named among men is increased by study and practice. Such is the view I take of our duty…
Cicero, via Xenophon, is making a pointed joke: the shortest route to being regarded as praise-worthy is to make yourself praise-worthy. We all want to be lovely, to be the “natural and proper object of love,” as Adam Smith said, but the best way to get there is to put your ass in the chair and do the work. Young people long to be famous, and with social media today, it seems like all you have to do is strike a pose and you could be famous. I think what Cicero would say of such fame is that it is fleeting - easy come, easy go. Instead, it’s better to focus on being worthy, of finding what you are actually meant to do, and working hard to do it better and better every day. If fame and glory come, then it is much more likely to be durable, since it is built on a solid foundation. But if fame and glory do not come, then at least you can rest knowing that you pursued something worthy with your life, and not something as fleeting as people’s attention.
In our Army journey, my wife and I had the chance to live in many different communities, and I was always struck by the amount of talent that was resident in the population. We would go to a new church each time we landed in a new place and there was inevitably someone or a group of people with remarkable musical talent. Music was just something they did on the weekends for church, or maybe they were in a little band, like Fling, but for the rest of the week they just went along doing their thing of being a nurse or a banker or a mom. But I would often think, this person could be famous if life had just been a little bit different.
I do take issue with Cicero’s statement a bit. He seems to imply that if you make yourself worthy of praise, you will eventually be praised. I don’t think that’s true. The Venn diagram of being worthy and being regarded as worthy probably tend to overlap, but life offers no guarantees and is often pretty unfair.
However, I think if you work hard to be worthy and worry more about the praise-worthiness, rather than the praise, you will find some steadfast peace.
I look at the guys in Fling as a good example of what I mean. I’m not a musician, and I’m not even a very knowledgeable critic, but I enjoyed their performance and I think they are a pretty good example of people who could have been famous had life been a little different. My opinion is pop music is mostly populated with above average talent, but the difference between success and fame and playing in a cute-but-obscure venue in a small college town is pretty minimal. I’d put Fling on that left side of the diagram - worthy, but not famous. Good guys who love music, love performing, but no one outside of the area really knows. Maybe they weren’t prepared to make the sacrifices necessary to make that leap because they wanted to do something else with their lives, which is fine and contributes to my estimation of their worthiness. We should all have some art in our lives, as I have said many times. That does not mean art should dominate our lives.
If we are talking music (which we are in this example, but the diagram applies to other aspects of life), in the middle where the two circles overlap, I would put artists that have stood the test of time. For me, that’s Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, and others. I’m an old, so I don’t have strong feelings about a lot of current acts, but Daughter #1, for example, really likes Taylor Swift, who seems to have demonstrated staying power. On the far right, also because I am an old, I immediately thought of the disgraced Milli Vanilli:
Whose music I actually liked (believe it or not) back in the day. At least until we found out that the “singers” were just lip syncing and the whole thing was a fraud.
While Cicero talks about glory, and I am using famous in my example, you could substitute financial compensation and organizational roles instead. I work with a lot of young people (as well as mid-careerists) who are striving to make their mark and rise up through organizations, seeking to be leaders and of course to be well-compensated. My advice to young people is to focus on learning their trade, and on making a real contribution first. The rank and the money will tend to follow, as Cicero says. Not always, because there is a loose joint between performance and recognition, but on average, sustained high performers get recognized or they get poached. The challenge is to be patient and humble as you test your skills and try to grow your abilities. The world is full of business equivalents of Milli Vanilli - Sam Bankman-Fried, and Elizabeth Holmes are a couple of recent, high-profile examples - but you probably have worked with people who claim they are not being recognized for what they are worth, when in fact they haven’t accomplished anything near what they seem to think they should be recognized for. If you find yourself feeling like you are not getting the recognition you deserve, it is a good signal to sit down and do some introspection. Even better, it is a good signal to sit down with a mentor who will give you candid feedback. If it is clear that you have demonstrated accomplishments and your organization is not giving you the recognition you deserve, then it is probably time to move on. But also, just maybe, your self-image does not align with what the rest of the world sees. Maybe you still need to do the work.
Can you imagine living a Milli Vanilli life (in art, or business, or any other pursuit) where, even if you don’t get caught, you know you are not worthy of the praise you are receiving? What a wretched way to live. I love Cicero’s joke - the short-cut to glory is to do the hard stuff, to hammer yourself into the shape of a thing worthy of praise. If you can do that, maybe you will eventually receive praise. But even if you do not get the praise, at least you will still be living a worthy life. To reach the end of your life and be able to reflect that you lived the best life you could, that would give you peace. I think that is far more important than glory. It is what I hope for for myself.
And… that’s it for me! I’m going to find that Cicero quote, or maybe it was Seneca. You know, I think it was actually Seneca. It’s all good, right? That’s what happens when you look in the wrong, long-dead Roman’s book. I’ll figure it out and I’ll be back Wednesday with links. As usual, willing good for all of you! Happy Sunday!
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