Slow Havamal: 20

[kylec]

In the 20th verse, we’re cautioned that if he isn’t careful, a gluttonous man will harm himself by eating too much, and that wise men will make fun of the fool for his belly.

It’s important for me to remember that even while I get so much richness from these verses as allegory, they are also useful as straightforward, literal advice. An allegorical reading reveals more about the reader, while the literal words, pre-inference, are all I can really be sure of. Did the poet intend these verses purely as folk advice? Did he embed his own meanings in the metaphors? Or intend for them to be open-ended so that readers could find their own? We’ll never know, but my stance is that we all make our own meanings, even of literal words, and if I can benefit in an unintended way, what’s wrong with that?

This verse comes to me on the week that I started counting calories in order to cut weight for an upcoming competition. Part of what I learned is that I’m normally pretty gluttonous. My 2,000 calorie per day limit has me feeling like I’m starving. I don’t know my standard intake, but it must be at least 3,000-3,500 on an uneventful day. I’m certainly having to learn to not eat to my own detriment, even though my “diet” is more calories than some people eat by choice every day.

Just as the previous series of verses could literally be a useful warning against drunkenness, there is value in knowing how much we eat, and making sure the the energy we intake is fairly equal to the energy we spend. If we’re eating someone else’s food, at a feast for example, it’s rude and burdensome to pig out. If it’s or own food, we’ll blow through our money, or in Norse times, blow through our stores before they can be replenished in the spring. Assuming we had excess, it could have been stored for a cold day, or better yet: shared.

OK, back to my metaphors! If thee’s more to be gained than dietary advice, then what is Odin talking about? Food is literally stored energy. So to be gluttonous means to take in more energy than can be used. This leads to a harmful accumulation, whether fat or anything else. This accumulation may grow to be conspicuous, and earn us the laughter of the wise. It’s probably a good idea to have stores of dry goods and emergency supplies for potential disruption due to weather, manmade disaster, etc. But to be a prepper who has many years’ worth that will never be used unless there is an apocalyptic event would be to have stored more than is necessary. It’s not available for others to use, and will never be used by the owner. Maybe if they can’t mange to hide it, and an event does occur, their neighbors will kindly liberate them of the burden.

Conspicuous accumulation can refer to food, bullets, cars, china sets, home décor, homes, shoes, purses, and just about anything else. Since energy is not just stored in goods but spent in movement, I could also argue that any unnecessary services are a waste of others’ energy so the buyer can store their own. There are good reason to hire out, and supporting the local economy even when you don’t absolutely need those services is valid. Then there are useless entourages, or bloated staff.

Why do the wise scorn the fool for having a belly? In 21st century America, that’s fat-shaming! It’s important to recall my earlier definition of wisdom: an integrated system of experiences that provides a map for navigating the territory of our lives. The wise laugh at the fool because he’s taken on complexity without integration. He is rich in noise, poor in signal. This could mean he has a ton of disconnected trivial knowledge that would make him good at Jeopardy, or that he gives a superficial reading to vast numbers of books without taking the time to actually integrate all their lessons. I’m guilty of both. He may rush through experiences in general, a whirlwind tour without a close look. Or dabble widely in different systems without learning any one to a degree of high competency.

The belly is bloated complexity. Complexity is beneficial when it’s well-integrated. On the other hand, a glance at American in 2021 reveals a society that is incredibly complex, tightly coupled, but rife with difficulties. We have the most advanced technologies available to us for next to nothing, and the average person knows how to do so little. If the phone in a given pocket fails, that person cannot communicate, but they also can’t navigate, track their calories in an app, look at any of their 1 million photos, log into their bank account (or anything that requires two-factor authentication), buy things, access good recipes for their 400 pounds of rice and beans, or read this blog entry. Meanwhile, the wise man has the few things he needs, reasonably decoupled from points of failure. His energy is always available to use. The more fat a body stores, the more calories it takes to maintain the new body weight, and the more cumbersome it becomes.

I’ve noticed that, given limited calories, it’s best to spread out what I eat so that each component has more time to settle in my stomach and allow me to feel more full. In this metaphor, that means taking what we need in digestible chunks and integrating it into our wisdom before rushing into the next thing. There are times to feast and fatten. There are also times to pare down. It’s when we forget one side of the equation that we run into the problems of the extremes.