The shadows our strengths cast

I'm skeptical of the way we talk about our strengths. We assume strengths are good—that they have no consequences—and we act on that assumption without failing to consider the fallout.

 The CliftonStrengths Finder ranks Connectedness as my top ability of the thirty-four in its arsenal. When a supervisor several years ago was looking at its definition, he made a funny sound. It was the kind of noise associated with ghosts and magic, the one that says, "Wooooohhh" and is drawn out and rising and falling in pitch. The noise that sets a scene for a Halloween story. I laughed and made sure to say, "That's my number one." He laughed, too.

The definition for Connectedness does sound a wee sketch. It's called the "collective unconscious." People like me think that everything happens "for a reason . . . because in your soul, you know that we are all connected . . . part of something larger." I can see that this definition uses common language to describe this strength, but I object to parts of it. Viktor Frankl has convinced me that the "everything happens for a reason" misses the mark. It's ultimately unhelpful. Making meaning in the active sense of every moment, every day, every experience is the healthier, more sustainable activity of the soul. It's an important nuance for me and perhaps a leap I was able to make because I was weary from thinking that everything did happen for a reason as the crocheted pillow at Walmart for $4.99 says.

The CliftonStrengths Finder is not the only personality test that gave me this reading. My therapist had me take one with a different company. It lists Spirituality as my chief strength, but the description maps onto the CliftonStrengths definition of Connectedness. My second strength on my therapist's test is Gratitude.

Recently, my evening Greek reading practice has focused on Epictetus (epic-TE-tus). Ever since I decided to take a step back from writing as an academic to other academics, reading Epictetus has made increasing sense. He's Socrates 2.0 in my opinion, one that many academics would object to without disclaimers. But I'm not writing for them anymore and will pass by the fact that he never wrote anything like Socrates, that he was punished for teaching young people like Socrates, and that he's concerned ultimately with the care of the self and living well like Socrates. Sure, he uses Stoic language and thus a Stoic framework, but he carries the spirit of Socrates more exactly than other writers I've encountered. I even place Musonius Rufus—Epictetus’ teacher—behind Epictetus.

Epictetus 1.6.1

"It's easier to praise providence for every event if one has a perspective of connectedness and gratefulness."

 ‘Nuff said.

 In The Discourses, Arrian records a lecture that begins with the following: "It's easier to praise providence for every event if one has a perspective of connectedness and gratefulness." This is my translation for me, and the critical eye will see that I've borrowed the language of personality tests mentioned above. "Connectedness" is my translation for δύναμιν συνορατικήν, which literally means the "connected-seeing power." Robin Hard translates this as "the capacity to view each particular event in relation to the whole," which I would argue is a great interpretation for the various parts of what δύναμιν συνορατικήν means. When you compare this interpretation to the definition of Connectedness, however, you get the same idea: an ability to see one thing connected to the whole. Connectedness. Those with the Connectedness strength intuitively know that harming others harms ourselves, and when we act contrary to this conviction we pay the price a hundredfold because we see that we acted on a whim and co-opted our strength destructively. It's torturous. It's like we're living out Euripides' version of the Heracles' myth where he's driven mad and kills his entire family thinking that he's fighting the enemy.

True self-care

Our strengths can only remain our strengths when the goal is to care for ourselves so that we can care for others.

The “gratefulness” part of my translation does not make the same hermeneutical leap. It's simply τὸ εὐχάριστον. Eucharist. The name for the Christian tradition of remembering Christ's last supper. Epictetus teaches that connectedness and gratefulness can motor a person through any event in life.

I find myself letting out a deeply held breath. I'm unsure if it's hope or anxiety. My studies on the enneagram, particularly Richard Rohr's version in The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective, has taught me that our chief strength is also our chief weakness. What helps us most in life can harm us most. Comic books echo that truth: superpowers destroy superheroes. I know from experience that my ability to connect can get carried away to its own destruction if given full license, goes unchecked, or operates out of fear rather than love. I think of Achilles at this point whose prowess in fighting helped the Greeks defeat the Trojans but led to his death. His fear of insignificance ruined him. He's a mythological example of the fact that our strengths can only remain our strengths when the goal is to care for ourselves so that we can care for others. We get to use our strengths to love and not to prop up self-interests.

The ripples from misusing our strengths will touch the shorelines of our lives.

 Sunlight is beginning to mark the horizon's eastern rim like an army invincible and inevitable galloping at me. It will crest the hill soon. I see it above the roofs of my neighborhood from my second floor window, a light that’s shining in full power on London. Snow lingers from a storm two days ago, and the hoar frost will sparkle as it’s blown from the barren maple trees. It's quiet except for a crow cawing in some tree north of my window. He's the neighborhood alarm clock that doesn't know it's Saturday. He has no "snooze." I intuitively reach for my coffee when I see it's only 7°F outside. Winter is reluctant to hand over the reins to spring.

 My gaze turns to look at the Epictetus’ book on my desk. It’s a 1918 copy of Shenkl's Epicteti Dissertationes ab Arrionao Digestae (Latin for The Discourses of Epictetus as Recorded by Arrian), and I'm reminded of another connection. This particular text was once the property of "The Estate of Emeritus Professor D. Tarrant." It was given to Bedford College by the estate—presumably at Tarrant's death—and then culled from the library when the librarians apparently felt it was no longer relevant to student learning. Perhaps they have a rule of removing books that aren't being checked out to make room for others.

The inside cover of my copy of Epictetus’ teachings.

It’s evidence of the treasure of buying used books online.

I googled "professor d tarrant" and found that my text once belonged to Dorothy Tarrant, the first female holding the title "Professor of Greek" in the United Kingdom. She taught at Bedford. Wikipedia also informs me that she was elected as the first woman president of the Classical Association and led a wing of the temperance movement. She was born 7 May 1885 in Wandsworth and died of pneumonia on 4 September 1973.

I can feel the strands of this morning meditation extending across the Atlantic Ocean to a library and its owner who survived World War I and World War II. She saw Hitler’s planes and felt their bombs shake the ground. She and I share a love for Greek philosophy that extends back in time some 2,500 years, and she's loaned me her book.

I'm grateful for that connection this morning.