Seneca: The rational soul's chronic diseases are…

Vice rarely announces itself as vice. Greed may call itself security; vanity may call itself standards; ambition may call itself responsibility. The warning sign is disproportion. A modest advantage begins to command excessive time, dishonesty, or neglect of people who matter. When desire becomes urgent, judgment narrows around it. Today, notice one thing you are pursuing with unusual intensity: praise, money, productivity, control, or being right. Ask what it is costing in attention, sleep, generosity, or peace. Then choose a limit that restores proportion. You might stop working at a set time, decline an unnecessary comparison, or share credit without calculating the return. Reason does not eliminate desire; it puts desire back in service of a life that is whole.