The Seven Follies of the Common Man - Part I

By: Joe Pagano
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:41:50
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What sets the exceptional man apart from the common man is the way in which he approaches most day-to-day dealings. The exceptional man knows that no good deed goes unnoticed nor does it go unreturned. Just as night must follow day, good must follow good, truth must follow truth, and justice must follow justice. This is something that the common man simply does not understand for he is plagued by the seven follies. What are the seven follies and why the to-do about this concept?

Simply put the follies are greed, lust, envy, selfishness, hate, spite, and unforgiveness. In this article, I will talk about the first four of these, and in the sequel, I will discuss the other three. These follies find themselves wrapped in pithy statements and knee-jerk aphorisms that guide the common man to pitfall after pitfall. In spite of what Gordon Gecko said in his famous Wall Street the movie “Greed is good” speech, greed, like the other follies, only hampers man’s progress toward the achievement of loftier goals. You see folks, despite how many times you may have been told this, you are only here on this terrestrial plane for a short while. Life is not eternal—at least not mortal life. Yet some people act as though they have claimed a stake to immortality. How foolish! We must be charitable while we are here, and greed only hampers our desire to give and help others.

Lust is another foolish vice. And not just sexual lust, but lust for anything. The flesh fights the spirit particularly as pertains to this folly. Why do we lust after things that cannot bring us anything but fleeting pleasure or whimsical happiness? Yet lust for one thing or another will often be the source of a man’s ruination: sexual lust ruins many marriages, monetary lust corrupts many people’s business integrity, dietary lust destroys a person’s health, and drug or alcohol lust undermines the spiritual temple of the body. As humans, we need to fight these lust-spawned impulses so that our well-being is not undermined; lust is a vice that severely impinges upon our sense of self and only contributes to our self-destruction. Avoid it.

Envy comes in many forms: the green-eyed monster often parades around as spite toward others and evil wishing for our fellow human kind. Jealousy, the close sister of envy, is another ten-eyed monster that is ever full of negative energy and foolhardy desires. This vice will utterly corrupt man’s nature, leading to all kinds of unhappiness. Whenever you are envious of someone, you can never be content with what you have, and you will never be cognizant of the blessings you already have. Everyone—and I mean everyone—has problems and sorus that you never know about. Be careful when you wish that you had what someone else has or want to be someone else. You cannot see that person from the inside and you cannot see the future of that person. How many times have you seen tragedy befall someone that you thought had everything. Be careful with this vice as it always seems to ricochet back to you, opening an ugly Pandora’s box. You never know what is inside this horrible container of maladies.

Selfishness, the common vice of youngsters, is just as common in adults. We can pardon a baby for its selfish desire to have all needs met at a given instant, but it’s much harder to pardon this offence in people past the age of maturity. However, we see this trait in many people from all walks of life and from all types of backgrounds. The technological boom of our country over the past fifty years has increased our prosperity. As a result, this revolution has spawned all kinds of gadgets and high-tech products that beckon our attention. Every kid today has a cell phone and parents are burdened by bills and expenses that were unheard of only a generation ago. But technology is a two-edged sword, both prospering us and at the same time hampering our personal growth.

You see, people’s selfishness has increased as their need to acquire these high-tech products grows to epic proportions. Because so many are tempted to have the latest cell phone, the latest flat panel television, the latest miniature computer or laptop, on and on and on...there starts a never ending acquisitive chain reaction which leads to self-centered and selfish thinking. Man is and never will be satisfied with material possessions. If this were so, the need to acquire more and more would be nonexistent. Yet this is not the case. Selfishness prohibits a man from growing spiritually and from obtaining true happiness in this world. Start sharing, caring, and giving and watch how quickly your life changes. Technological gadgets are temporary, yet love fostered through unselfish acts is eternal. Stay tuned for Part II...

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