VI. Know Yourself Before You Commit

Self-assessment precedes action. Seneca asks Serenus to look honestly at his own strengths.

Before you throw yourself into any kind of work, examine yourself honestly. Most people overestimate what they are suited for.

One person is gifted at speaking but has no stomach for the public scrutiny that comes with it. Another is brilliant but too proud to navigate the compromises that any institution requires. Another cannot control their temper and breaks into damaging speech at the smallest provocation. Another cannot resist making sharp jokes at the wrong moments. For all of these people, the work they dream of would destroy them, and quieter work would serve them better.

Do not force the mind into work it is not made for. It is useless to fight your own nature. The teacher Isocrates once took a student named Ephorus who wanted to argue cases in court, recognized that his talent was for history and chronicle, and redirected him. The result was one of the great historical writers of the ancient world. The court lost nothing. The world gained something.

Think clearly about what you actually have the strength to carry. A load that is too heavy does not simply slow you down; it crushes you. Some tasks are not hard in themselves but generate so much additional work, so many obligations and complications, that the original task becomes the least of it. Be careful about what you agree to carry.

Do not begin what you cannot finish, or cannot at least honestly hope to finish. Never take on something you cannot withdraw from, because the things you cannot leave will eventually leave you no room to breathe.