Hi. Section 11 of Schopenhauer's Counsels and Maxims deals with how we should make
plans and how we should react to the failure of our plans. Here's what Schopenhauer writes.
"Give mature and repeated consideration to any plan before
you proceed to carry it out; and even after you have thoroughly turned it over in your mind,
make some concession to the incompetency of human judgment; for it may always happen
that circumstances which cannot be investigated or foreseen, will come in and upset the whole of your
calculation. This is a reflection that will always influence the negative side of the balance—a
kind of warning to refrain from unnecessary action in matters of importance—quieta non movere."
So the first lesson here seems to be that all of our plans may be upset by chance,
by unforeseen circumstances, and we should take this into account in our planning,
including our planning for the most important things. Schopenhauer continues:
"But having once made up your mind and begun your work, you must let it run its course and
abide the result—not worry yourself by fresh reflections on what is already accomplished,
or by a renewal of your scruples on the score of possible danger:
free your mind from the subject altogether, and refuse to go into it again,
secure in the thought that you gave it mature attention at the proper time.
This is the same advice as is given by an Italian proverb—legala bene e poi lascia la andare—which
Goethe has translated thus: See well to your girths, and then ride on boldly."
Okay. The Italian I make out to be something like: "Tie it up well and then let it go." In
other words, don't second-guess yourself. You take the, you engage in planning and
calculation at the appropriate time and then proceed with the plan when the time for action
comes. Don't get caught up in a whirlpool of self, self-doubt and second guessing.
"And if, notwithstanding that, you fail, it is because human affairs are the sport of chance and
error. Socrates, the wisest of men, needed the warning voice of his good genius, or daimonion,
to enable him to do what was right in regard to his own personal affairs, or at any rate,
to avoid mistakes; which argues that the human intellect is incompetent for the purpose."
Interesting observation, right. Socrates relied upon a divine advisor to secure his
correct behavior, to avoid grievous mistakes, which suggests that Socrates' unaided reason
would be completely unable to do so. And we can take that as a lesson: if the wisest man requires
divine help to do well, we can't expect to on our own power achieve great success and and wisdom.
"There is a saying—which is reported to have originated with one of the Popes—that
when misfortune happens to us, the blame of it, at least in some degree, attaches to ourselves.
If this is not true absolutely and in every instance, it is certainly true in the great
majority of cases. It even looks as if this truth had a great deal to do with the effort people make
as far as possible to conceal their misfortunes, and to put the best face they can upon them,
for fear lest their misfortunes may show how much they are to blame."
So in this final passage it looks like Schopenhower is telling us that,
with this anonymous quote, allegedly from a Pope, that when things do go wrong for us, we bear at
least part of the blame. And that this is somewhat testified to by the fact that people try to avoid
letting other people know that they are suffering and in misfortune. This is a kind of odd advice
from a 21st century perspective. It strikes me as something we might not hear with great pleasure.
Although thinking about it now I think to the degree it advises us to avoid avoid completely
externalizing the causes of our misery and our misfortune and our unhappiness, it certainly helps
us to avoid a complete loss of agency and blaming others, which I think is is an external directed
kind of reaction which is very unhealthy and which leads to further unhappiness of a different kind.
So that is Schopenhauer's thoughts on planning and reaction to failure from section 11 of
Counsels and Maxims. We'll look at section 12 next. Thanks for watching today; goodbye.