The Quiet Anger of Being Understanding
Why the people who empathize and excuse everyone end up resenting them, and what the Stoics really asked of us.
Welcome! If you’ve read the Stoics for a while, you’ve probably become good at understanding people. You know that whoever wronged you acted out of ignorance, out of their nature, out of their childhood trauma. We empathize. We tolerate them. And yet you’re angrier than a student of Marcus should be. This essay is about that anger- where it comes from, and how to stay generous and understanding without being milked dry. If you missed the last edition on Your Self-Respect Has to Be Greater Than Your Desire to Be Loved, you can catch up right here.
“When you have done a good act and another has received it, why do you still look for a third thing besides, as fools do: a reputation for it, or a return?” - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.73
A colleague asked me to cover for her because she had a sick child.
I helped her out of the goodness of my heart, even though it cost me my off days. But to my surprise, it happened that she just wanted her shifts done.
Then I got sick myself. She covered for me on that day, but the next day she left early, under the assumption that I should cover because she had done so the previous day. And mind you, I was still sick.
We got to argue about it, and she couldn’t bring herself to understand what she had done.
That’s when I knew I should have ended that relationship as soon as I sensed how sketchy she was.
That’s the predicament of the understanding person. You can be understanding of everyone else, but it just so happens that when you make a mistake, nobody considers you anymore or wants to forgive you. So you wonder what type of people you’re living, working or being with. They don’t have your back like you got theirs. You want to go the extra mile for them, but if that’s not reciprocated then is it really worth it?
Surgery has a rule for this that applies to life. Before a living person gives a kidney, the transplant team examines the donor first. Can this body afford the loss? Only then does anyone ask what the recipient needs.
on giving beyond your means
“He who does kindnesses imitates the gods; he who demands repayment imitates the money-lenders.” - Seneca, On Benefits 3.15
The Igbo tell of a famine so long that Tortoise could hear his own body rattle inside his shell. Then word came that the people of the sky had invited the birds to a feast.
Tortoise had no wings. He had a sweet tongue, though, and the birds had soft hearts. They looked at him as an unfortunate creature they had to help, and each one plucked a feather and lent it to him.
On the way up, he announced that guests at such a feast take new names. His would be “All of You.”
When the food was laid out, he asked the hosts whom it was for. “For all of you,” they said. So he ate the best of it while the birds picked at bones.
The birds said very little. One by one, each took back its feather and flew home, and Tortoise stood in the sky with a full belly and no way down.
You become so understanding of people that they end up inconveniencing you or taking things from you- your time, effort, limited opportunities or even resources, leaving you resentful and not even wanting to be in their company anymore, which sucks. This is especially real when you can’t…