One of the bitter ironies of the watch addict is that he seeks a “manly watch” with “bold wrist presence,” yet much of his behavior as it pertains to his hobby is similar to that of a thirteen-year-old girl crying effusively as she leafs through her journals and scrapbooks in which she chronicles her “lost loves” and tries to mend her “broken heart” with the excessive self-regard one would expect from a thirteen-year-old. However, the watch addict, a man somewhere between his thirties and sixties, perhaps even older, is going down the same rabbit hole of melodrama as the thirteen-year-old. When he does a watch unboxing on his YouTube channel and trembles with tears running down his cheeks with anticipation, or does a YouTube rant about the regrets for all the prized watches that he “let get away” and left him with irreparable heartbreak, or stands before his YouTube watchers like a five-star-general as he announces with maniacal self-regard his “plans” to create his “ultimate collection,” or agonizes over the black and orange strap on his diver and goes back and forth over and over because he “loves both but can’t decide,” he probably doesn’t know that he is committing an act of colossal folly: He is embodying the Maudlin Man.
To understand the Maudlin Man and the folly he partakes in, we are well advised to consult Jeffrey Rosen’s book The Pursuit of Happiness. Rosen discovers that major American thinkers such as Benjamin Franklin draw their wisdom from Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations, which state that the soul must be “tranquilized by restraint and consistency.” In such a state, the soul “neither pines away in distress, nor is broken down by fear, nor consumed with a thirst of longing in pursuit of some ambition, nor maudlin in the exuberance of meaningless eagerness–he is the wise man of whom we are in quest, he is the happy man.”
There is much to unpack here. Perhaps the best way to do so is to divide man into two types: Restrained Man and Maudlin Man. Restrained Man is the type we should aspire to be. He is tranquilized by his own restraint, consistency, and self-agency and does not pine after things that cause him distress, anxiety, and FOMO.
Just reading the above words makes the addict inside me rebel. As a watch addict, I enjoy pining after watches and being caught in the melodrama of distress, FOMO, and desire for watches as shiny new objects my greedy little fingers can get a hold of. Wrap your head around that: I’m addicted to the very maudlin drama of my watch hobby. To be the Maudlin Man, therefore, is to be addicted to addiction.
But what Cicero is arguing is this: This melodramatic state that causes us to froth at the mouth for the things we desire is a form of “meaningless eagerness.”
Again, my inner addict rebels. It rages and counterargues, “Cicero, watches are my hobby. The very point of this hobby is that it is a benign and meaningless pastime that gives me enjoyment and relaxation.”
Of course, I am in denial. As I write this, I have a very beautiful diver watch with a wave-blue dial to be delivered from Singapore today from a DHL carrier. I’ve tracked the package six times since five this morning, and I couldn’t sleep last night because I agonized over whether I should keep it on the stock bracelet, put a sedate black Divecore on it, or put a loud orange Divecore on it. The stress is almost causing me to have a nervous breakdown.
I’m acting just like Maudlin Man. I’m experiencing effulgent emotions over something that is basically meaningless. As a result, I’m investing way too much energy and emotion toward my “watch situation,” and as a result, I am showing a lack of contact with reality.
Cicero’s point is that when we lack self-possession because we are in the maudlin state, we cannot be happy. Happiness is the byproduct of having self-agency and self-control.
I wince at Cicero’s words. Do I even want self-control? Do I not enjoy the drama of a watch strap “dilemma”? Do I not enjoy being an exuberant man-child?
Cicero would argue otherwise. He would argue that the “pleasures” I experience from my maudlin indulgences are at the root of my unhappiness. To understand Cicero’s argument better, let us look at the entire quotation:
Therefore the man, whoever he is, whose soul is tranquilized by restraint and consistency and who is at peace with himself, so that he neither pines away in distress, nor is broken down by fear, nor consumed with a thirst of longing in pursuit of some ambition, nor maudlin in the exuberance of meaningless eagerness–he is the wise man of whom we are in quest, he is the happy man.
My inner pessimist, which I call Glum, scoffs at Cicero’s words of wisdom and gives me a litany of my failures, which prove me unworthy of Cicero’s portrait of a happy man. Glum says to me the following:
“Regarding restraint, your appetites for tacos, spaghetti, garlic bread, homemade sourdough loaves stuffed with kalamata olives, semi-sweet chocolate chunk peanut butter cookies, chocolate cake, and pineapple cheesecake are so monstrous, you don’t have a chance in hell of exercising restraint when it comes to your appetites. Your very self is defined by your excesses, so good luck talking about restraint and moderation. You’re doomed.”
“Regarding ambition, it is only repeated failure of many decades, not humility, that abates your grandiose designs and fantasies of being famous and ubiquitous on television as a talking head whose opinions everyone greedily consumes as if your every word is a delicious morsel to be savored. So don’t go around bragging about your modesty and humble aspirations. Old age and an eye for the inevitability of your failure are your only salves, so you have no bragging rights.”
“Regarding maudlin exuberance and meaningless eagerness, you are the worst violator of these infractions, gushing with lame euphoria as you curate your watch collection to your YouTube viewers. Your entire enterprise of incorporating the wisdom of the Stoics and other classical thinkers is the biggest joke I’ve ever heard of and may qualify you for a life in comedy.”
My rebuttal to Glum is this. “With your keen insight into my wretched being, you have helped me see the very depth of my pathology. So thank you, Glum, you have helped me with an unflinching diagnosis of my spiritual dissolution, and thanks to you, this accurate diagnosis marks the beginning of my long road to recovery.”
I am grateful that I am both honest and smart enough to offer rebuttals to Glum, but having an intellectual grasp of what I should do and actually doing it are two vastly different things. For now, I have a clear grasp of Cicero’s notion of Maudlin Man. The seeds have been planted. I now hope that with those seeds, a counter self can grow that will put the Maudlin Man inside of me out of business.
Cinemorphosis 
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