Sloth III
Tonight, I continue my reflections on sloth.
In my last two posts, I’ve explored how sloths manifest itself in two ways: through a deficiency of activity and through an excess of activity. Tonight I’d like to explore the inner motivations for such outward actions.
Sloth stems from the soul unwilling to face itself; the corrupt or inordinate desires of the soul would rather run rampant than be tamed by the gaze of introspection and the rod of discipline. The slothful soul may be aware that his desires are controlling him, but instead of taking measures to rein these desires in, he ignores the problem, either through distracting himself though excess activity or through empty despair.
Why? Knowing that there is a problem allows an individual to takes steps towards amending the problem. Why doesn’t the self-aware sloth act to moderate his desires?
Perhaps it is a sense of powerlessness. Aware of his faults, the slothful person feels powerless to resolve them, Breaking habits and forming new ones is an incredibly difficult task. Aristotle can know the character of a person by his habits. These habits of immoderate desires have become so ingrained into the individual that they have become part of his character—his identity. To change these habits would be to change his character—his life. Such a task is more than just setting your clock a little earlier in the morning or getting a membership at the gym. We’re talking about breaking habits that have formed over a lifetime of passivity.
With this feeling of powerlessness can result in either an attitude of apathy or a sense of despair.
An attitude of apathy can manifest itself through the soul, showing itself by the individual saying “This is who I am, this is who I’m going to be.” He does his best to live in spite of his faults, but harbors so guilt whenever he fails. The apathetic sloth understands that he is enslaved to his passions, yet doesn’t either doesn’t care or ignores it through activity.
In contrast, a sense of despair could take hold of the individual, crushing the soul with ponderous pessimism. The despairing sloth is crushed by the weight of his vices. While he wants to be free from his vice and restrain his desires, he feels that he cannot. He is held captive by his own inordinate self. He is a sinner in need of a Savior.
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Aegis 