Hi, it’s me, Steve. Not a character. I have an essay here that I wrote about the idea of enough, and I thought it would be interesting to read it during a show called, “Enough.” So, here goes.
The word enough fascinates me. Well, I know that a lot of words fascinate me, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that I would name my show after one of those words, but enough is one of those words that seems to open up and offer all sorts of places to perch as we think about the whole array of meanings.
What do we mean by enough? It comes from the Middle English from around the 12th century both as an adjective and as an adverb, so right from the get-go it was a pretty handy word. I don’t know for certain, but I can imagine that folks in 12th century England were talking about enough quite a bit: will we have enough to eat? Did I plant the seeds deep enough? Have I done enough to please God, the king, my family, etc. And while many of us here tonight are not having daily conversations about avoiding starvation, or planting techniques, or the afterlife, it still seems like a relevant word for us today.
It seems like enough is this imaginary line and we can approach from a couple different vantage points. We can have drawn that line and when someone steps over it, we’ve had enough. We’ve been able to tolerate whatever it is until that last inch, the final nerve that is trampled on, our patience is worn thin, our sense of what is right and wrong has been tested one too many times. Enough is enough.
But on the hand, if we are coming from a different side, we want to make sure that we have enough. That we what we need to be complete has been satisfied. We are blessed, we say, we have more than enough. Here, there the line has been crossed but it is plentiful and pleasant.
And on another hand, in the middle of the night we might wake up in a cold sweat wondering if we are enough, if we’ve done enough. In those moments, we are fearful that wherever that invisible line lands, we will come up short.
In the end, it seems like the common element to all of these enoughs is that whoever is drawing the line and wherever they are drawing it, it is mostly invisible and elusive–which seems like a horrible thing. Our boundaries, our needs, and our aspirations are all hidden until we either fail to cross it or we do cross it, or someone else crosses it—and then we get the corresponding emotion.
My wife tells a story that I’m going to co-op and maybe mistell or warp or alter–let’s just say, “I’m taking artistic license”–it will be close enough to the truth and I’m sure she’ll forgive for any of the variations and omissions.
So the story goes like this: one of her young English cousins was at a meal and wanted to let her grandparents know that they had had everything they needed: no more helpings, thank you, not another drop of tea, and instead of saying I’ve had an elegant sufficiency, which was the standard response in the family, it came out that they had an elephant and fish for tea. Not only is this adorable, but the phrase they were trying to say strikes me significant. They hadn’t had enough, or they were all set, or they didn’t say they were good (all things I might have said in that situation.) Instead, they had an elegant sufficiency. Now perhaps some of this is politeness or an attempt to appear refined and sophisticated–both laudable goals–but some of it gets to the heart of the matter. What is enough? Is it just about having the required or adequate amount? A sufficiency gets close to that, but at that meal, it wasn’t just enough, but it was enough in a graceful and stylish manner.
Getting what we need (rather than what we want) can also get wrapped up in how we get want we need. Elegant over desperate. We don’t want to be the fish out of water or the elephant tromping through the china shop. We would like to get what we need without all the fuss.
Which makes me think something else is up there. Why does it matter how we get what we need? Shouldn’t it be enough just to have enough?
As this is our nation’s 250th birthday, I thought I should drop a reference to one of the foundation documents. I don’t know if you need it–but stick with me.
In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson writes that there are some inalienable rights, namely life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I wonder if there is a spectrum that some of things fall on: How much life is enough? How much liberty is enough? How much pursing is enough?
I’m no philosopher, but these seem to be fairly fraught questions: If we have a right to liberty, is it absolute liberty (probably not) but what is enough? How much life (and of what quality) do we have a right to?
The pursuit of happiness–which I never liked the phrasing–to be is about the ability not to be happy (like some Bobby McFerrin song) but rather to strive toward flourishing–being the most complete and developed self. When is flourishing enough, or is it by definition more than enough.
I don’t have a lot of answers, and I feel like I’ve talked enough here. I don’t want to cross over that invisible line,
Am I enough?
Am I doing enough?
Do I have enough?
These are enough questions to keep us moving toward a more fulfilled life.