Discipline Is Destiny: The Power of Self-Control by Ryan Holiday

Author:Ryan Holiday [Holiday, Ryan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Profile Books
Published: 2022-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

* Of course, for some people and some things, the appropriate amount is none. See “Quit Being a Slave.”

Fight the Provocation

Arthur Ashe’s father was working one day as a driver for William Thalhimer, a wealthy Jewish man in Richmond, Virginia, who owned a chain of department stores. Taking his boss across town to see about a piece of real estate he wanted to buy, Arthur Ashe Sr. was given a firsthand look at the kind of discrimination that Jews also faced in the un-Reconstructed South in the 1950s.

Throughout the negotiation, Thalhimer was insulted, condescended to, and bullied by a man who seemed to be particularly disgusted at the thought of doing business with a Jew. Quietly enduring it, Thalhimer completed the transaction and he and Ashe Sr. got back in the car to drive home.

Why? Ashe couldn’t help but ask. Why did you put up with all that?

“I came out here to purchase that piece of land,” Thalhimer explained. “I got the piece of land. It belongs to me now, not to him. That man can go on cursing me as long as he likes. I have that land.”

Of course, he had wanted to slam his fist in the man’s face, but that would have given the anti-Semite exactly what he wanted, right? To not have to do business with a Jew? And where would that have left Thalhimer? Without the land he wanted. Quite possibly in jail.

With the distance afforded by the passage of time, we can appreciate both the injustice of what occurred and marvel at the quiet dignity and self-control exhibited by Thalhimer in this moment. Certainly Ashe Sr., a black man in the segregated South, would have acutely appreciated both things. In fact, his son, Arthur Ashe Jr., would note that it was this experience that shaped his father as a provider and inspired him, during segregation, to always be pragmatic as well as patient and self-contained. Ashe Sr. didn’t care what people said about him or did to him. What mattered was supporting his family and setting his two sons up for success in a world that seemed very much intent on them not being successful. Racists be damned, Arthur Ashe Sr. was going to get that land.

Obviously, it would be wonderful if this didn’t have to happen. If no one was ever subjected to slurs or discrimination, if everyone were kind to us, if we were never deprived, judged, assaulted, or treated shabbily. But that is not life.

There is a story about Cato the Younger, the great-grandson of the frugal Roman Cato the Elder, who was visiting the baths in Rome one day, when he was bumped and then struck in one of those random encounters that seem to combust into a full-on fight when you come across somebody who is just having a bad day. But once the scuffle had broken up and Cato could collect himself, he simply refused to accept an apology from the offender, though not in the way one might expect.

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