Good Will Warfare

Your studious Heretic has been reading the works of the original blogger, Joseph Addison. With the assistance of Richard Steele, Addison published a series of daily essays in London almost exactly 300 years ago under the title of The Spectator. His medium was rag paper and hand pressed ink, but the intent was roughly the same as today’s laptop legions.

Addison’s writing collided with modern life for me most recently due to an email from an old friend. The subject line read, “They have me on the radio.” My friend is a former Marine who served a tour of duty in Iraq. He and his wife participated in StoryCorps, a project that sends mobile recording studios around the U.S. and assists people in recording their personal stories. His local NPR affiliate selected about three minutes of their 40 minute interview and broadcast it. You can listen to it here. In it, he talks about what his wife calls “good will warfare.” The Iraqis were solidly neutral in their behavior towards the Marines. My friend made it a personal challenge to get an Iraqi to smile or wave at him as he drove by. He figured that for that one moment he had gotten them into a better mood, perhaps even to the point of feeling friendliness.

This might sound naive, except for the solid science behind it. Scientists studying facial expressions have found that people who put on an angry expression that they don’t actually feel experience the same physiological changes as someone who is truly angry. Their muscles tense, certain stress related chemicals pour into their bloodstream, and parts of their brains associated with anger light up on a brain scan. The same goes for smiling. We can fake it and actually feel better. My friend was on to something.

India is home to a multitude of laughing societies. These people gather in parks and laugh. They fake it until they make it. I saw a documentary on the human face hosted by John Cleese of Monty Python fame where he visited one of these societies. A group of fifty or more people stood together in a public park with Mr. Cleese and started a round of the phoniest laughter you might imagine. Soon they were all convulsing with real laughter. They claim great emotional and physical benefits from the practice. Science backs them up, finding benefits for the heart, reductions in stress hormones, and boosted immune response.

This brings me back to Joseph Addison. Specifically, this brings me to Spectator number CCCCXLVII, Saturday, August 9, 1712. I quote:

“…..I would recommend to every one that admirable precept which Pythagoras is said to have given to his disciples, and which that philosopher must have drawn from that observation I have enlarged upon, Optimum vitae genus eligito, nam consuetudo faciet jucundissimum. ‘Pitch upon that course of life which is the most excellent, and custom will render it the most delightful.’ Men whose circumstances will permit them to choose their own way of life, are inexcusable, if they do not pursue that which their judgement tells them is the most laudable. The voice of reason is more to be regarded than the bent of any present inclination, since by the rule above mentioned, inclination will at length come over to reason, though we can never force reason to comply with inclination.”

I would disagree with Addison on the very last clause, being more a follower of David Hume, who wrote that “reason is the slave of desire.” Nevertheless, we can make choices, and by incorporating a practice into our routine, we can fight the good fight of reason over impulse. Habit, as Addison writes, can shape our desires.

Which brings me back to my Marine friend on patrol in Baghdad. He made a point of friendly engagement with fearful and hostile people in an extremely dangerous environment. He was, in a small way, improving his odds. In this, reason, virtue, and delight coincide.

I won’t belabor the point, but will allow my readers to extrapolate this into their own lives.