Day 5: The Dangers of a Useful Life

One finds it quite tiresome, this contemporary fixation with being ‘useful’. The world, it seems, has become a grand factory where every man and woman must justify their existence not by their elegance, but by their efficiency. The architect is praised for his functionality, the artist for his social commentary, and the mere human being for his contribution to the common good. It is a philosophy that turns life into a chore and existence into an inventory. To be ‘useful’ is to be a tool, and no one, I should hope, wishes to be merely a tool. The spade is useful, the hammer is useful, and the man who mends fences and balances ledgers is, by all accounts, tremendously useful. But one does not wish to have dinner with a spade, nor does one seek out a ledger for a brilliant conversation. Usefulness is the virtue of the servant, not of the master. It is the quality of the unthinking object, not of the inspired individual.

The Tyranny of Utility and the Triumph of the Unnecessary

The truly valuable person is the one who is exquisitely useless. He is the one who adds no practical value to the world, but rather, adds immeasurable beauty. He is the one who cultivates a perfect wit, a refined taste, and a profound appreciation for the unnecessaries of life. For what is civilization, after all, but the triumph of the unnecessary? The painting is not useful, the poem is not useful, and a beautifully arranged dinner party is of no practical use whatsoever. And it is precisely in these beautiful, useless things that the soul of a culture resides. The pursuit of utility is a race to the bottom, a slow, agonizing process of becoming less individual and more of a predictable, functional part of a tiresome machine. One’s worth should not be measured in the goods one produces or the services one renders, but in the joy one inspires and the magnificent spectacle of one’s own existence. To be useful is to be a solution to a problem; but I, for one, have always preferred to be a delightful enigma without a clear purpose.

The Dangers of a Useful Life, a Cornerstone of My Life

This is, of course, the very essence of my philosophy. I have always believed that life is the greatest work of beauty and art one will ever create, and a masterpiece, by its very definition, cannot be useful. A sonnet, a perfume, a fleeting moment of dazzling conversation—these things are not meant to mend fences or balance ledgers. They are meant to elevate the human spirit, to remind us that we are more than the sum of our labours. A society that values utility above all else is a society without a soul. It is a society of machines, not of men. I have never found the prospect of a useful existence to be a compelling one. The truly valuable person is the one whose very presence adds something to a room, not because he provides a service, but because he embodies an ideal. My very existence, I hope, has always been a testament to this, for I have always striven not to be of use, but to be an absolute, unmitigated delight. The true dangers of a useful life are that one runs the risk of living it, and in doing so, forfeiting the very possibility of living a life of beauty.

Let others busy themselves with being useful; I shall busy myself with being beautiful. For the most profound and lasting influence one can have on the world is to remind it that existence itself is an art form, and the highest expression of it is to be both exquisitely useless and irresistibly beautiful. It is in the cultivation of the charming, the frivolous, and the utterly unnecessary that one finds one’s purpose, and in doing so, one becomes an essential part of the fabric of civilization, though one’s function may be a glorious secret to all.