Echoed Vocation II: A Call to Moderation

A series of posts about virtue, autism, vocation, and the teaching of history.

My first exploration of the echoing of vocation between my students and my children suggested ways in which the latter demonstrate exceptional courage. For this second exploration, which will consider the call to moderation, their example for me is more problematic—like the virtue itself.

II. Moderation

If you meet my daughter Kathleen, you will find her polite and friendly. She may ask you a bit about yourself; she may want to know your full name, your birthday, your family members (and she will remember these). But she also wants you to know her. She won’t offer you the same information about herself; rather, she will introduce you, rather formally, to Morgan or Ammy or, if we have a bit of time, someone who shares your own name. These will be the names of a doll-sized, green stuffed back rest (sometimes called a “husband pillow”), an exceptionally bright pink teddy bear holding a heart, or a small plastic object—one of her “ladies,” little toys that usually come in sets with a woodland creature.

You’ll know that these things are important to her because when you see her, she’ll be carrying a large duffel bag, a backpack, and possibly a third bag, all stuffed with a cargo of similar things. She’ll vary how much she carries depending on the occasion: on a walk, perhaps just the backpack and a couple of items in hand; at an outdoor festival, she may pull a wagon filled with bags of her ladies and cuddlies. The sight is more noticeable still because she is 22 years old.

Most people show exceptional generosity of spirit when meeting Kathleen. They’ll greet the items presented, admire them, even make eye contact with them. But they must wonder about the sheer volume of toys. She carries over 4,000 ladies and many cuddlies. It is a grand operation.

I find these interactions difficult, however, because they make me feel so overindulgent and make her look so acquisitive. It feels as though both of us are immoderate—I as enabling parent, and she as spoiled child. Am I really concerned for her virtue, though, or am I simply embarrassed for myself? And how does this concern echo my teaching of vocation?

Moderation, or temperance, is a classical virtue that I address in the classroom and with my children alike. It is not as straightforward as it may first appear: is moderation the ability to resist desire, or is it the shaping of desire? For instance, am I more moderate if I am fighting my desires to indulge excessive eating or drinking, or am I more moderate if I shape my desire so well that I do not wish to overindulge in the first place? Of course, these two expressions of moderation may work together, and both can constitute a call.

One of the easiest approaches to moderation in the history classroom is a short excursus on ancient Greek schools of thought that seek self-rule in the sense of self-control: Epicureans, Stoics, and Cynics. Each presents a version of the happy self as being uncontrolled by things it regards as incidental: desire, fate, wealth. Therefore, in each case the virtue of moderation is important, albeit with different emphases. For example, in eating and drinking, the Epicurean “pleasure principle” suggests that we avoid both excess and privation. It is easy to transition from such examples to moderation in the lives of my students around social media, time, and balancing sports and study.

Self-control is one way of exploring this virtue, but another way is through the enforcement of moderation, such as in the utopian projects of the 19th century. These projects regarded various forms of excess as a basic human problem and attempted to solve it by engineering communities that held it in check. Whether concerning money, social standing, or sex, the utopians critiqued their world and tried to fix it—and none succeeded. I ask my students, can we legislate moderation?

In parenting, I find that the questions about moderation become even more complex. Like his sister, my son Peter loves to collect toys, mostly toy trains, although he tends to take only a few of them (or none) around with him. They may be less visible than Kathleen’s, but they tend to be more expensive, often not produced for a US market, often of an older vintage. Concerning one of these recent purchases, he told me, “When I want a thing, I wrap my heart around it, and when I don’t get it, it tears me in two.”

How does moderation apply to such a heartfelt connection to things? Certainly, I want both Kathleen and Peter to learn about waiting and working for something, and I want them not to be consumed by their possessions. But their relationship with their things is not like mine. The ladies are not just plastic objects; each has a personality, and they help Kathleen process the emotions that she finds so challenging to navigate. Peter’s trains are not a costly whim; the way they move gives him focus and comfort.

As with courage, my children teach me moderation in their own, unique ways. Why do Peter’s expensive trains not bother me as much as Kathleen’s bags stuffed with less expensive things? Perhaps my concern is not their call to moderation but my own self-image, my own respectability. In an ironic twist, I may be the one who is immoderate here, precisely in my desire for social approbation, an indifferent thing.

The echoed vocation I hear from my children is that I am called to moderate my awareness of how others perceive me. Moreover, they show me how easily I can veer into immoderate judgment of others: Look at that car I think; look at that house, look at those clothes. My children call me to moderation in my need for approval, and at the same time in my disapproval of others.

The complexity of this echo should come as no real surprise. Ancient Greek and more recent utopian debates about the nature of moderation show us the vagaries of the virtue. We may agree that we need to practice moderation but disagree about what we need to moderate. Ultimately, the call of moderation is a call to self-examination, for each of us knows the things that consume us personally. Moderation is best judged from the inside. Only Kathleen knows how much her ladies and cuddlies help her process the world around her. Only Peter knows how toys that move give him peace and focus. The more I understand this, the more I realize that the ladies and the trains serve a purpose and are not simply acquisitions.

Ultimately, the call of moderation is a call to self-examination, for each of us knows the things that consume us personally. Moderation is best judged from the inside.

Moderation calls us to seek freedom from being consumed by our consumption. Its echo reminds us that we do not know what others need and that we should be moderate in our judgments. I’m still hoping that Kathleen will carry fewer things around, and I’m still hoping that Peter will slow his train collecting. But they teach me moderation in my need for social approval, and they call me to deeper understanding of their (and others’) needs. The call to moderation may cut to the heart, but it also binds us together.

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Martin Holt Dotterweich serves as director of the King Institute for Faith and Culture at King University in Bristol, Tennessee, where he is also professor of history. He is a NetVUE Faculty Fellow, having been a member of the 2019 cohort of NetVUE’s Teaching Vocational Exploration seminar, and he contributed to the forthcoming Scholarly Resources volume Called Beyond Ourselves. His work calls him to an emphasis on vocation both in the classroom and the community; his children continue to shape his understanding of vocation. For other posts by Martin, click here.