Bread, Circuses, and Career Changes: The Roman Recipe for a Full Life

In the austere marble visions of ancient Rome, a full life was conceived as a mosaic of many parts, each tessera contributing its own brilliance to the greater whole. The ideal citizen of the Republic was expected to begin as a soldier, honing body and spirit on the battlefield. This was no mere martial posturing; it was a rite of passage, a crucible through which courage and discipline were forged. The next phase called for the role of merchant or entrepreneur, extracting profit from the unruly seas of commerce and learning the art of negotiation and resourcefulness. Finally, when wisdom had been chiseled by the hand of experience, the citizen would ascend to politics—a domain for the wrinkled and worldly, where philosophical musings and rhetorical flourishes danced uneasily with power plays and poison-tipped daggers. This triptych of soldier, merchant, and statesman was no accidental sequence; it was a deliberate strategy, a life philosophy that embraced the full spectrum of human potential.

Today, this Roman ideal has largely been abandoned. The modern world, with its slavish devotion to specialization, insists we pick a single path early, as though existence were a factory floor and we mere cogs designed to spin in one predefined direction. "Find your niche," they say, as if life were a branding exercise, and deviation were tantamount to chaos. Yet the Romans knew better: they understood that the richness of life lies in its variety, that the human spirit thrives when it traverses the entire terrain of existence rather than settling for a corner of it.

Hedy Lamarr, the luminous Austrian actress turned inventor, was a living rebuke to the tyranny of singular identity. Born Hedwig Kiesler, she escaped the suffocating embrace of an arms-dealing husband whose social circle included the odious likes of Mussolini and Hitler. Landing in Hollywood, she became "the most beautiful woman in the world," though her beauty proved both gift and prison. Typecast as an exotic siren, she spent her evenings tinkering with blueprints. Together with composer George Antheil, she co-invented a frequency-hopping technology that would eventually underpin Wi-Fi, GPS, and Bluetooth. Lamarr was no less an uomo universale than the Romans themselves, living as though existence were a stage for perpetual reinvention.

Benjamin Franklin, though not Roman, would have felt perfectly at home in their marble halls. Printer, inventor, diplomat, and professional epigrammatist, Franklin was the ultimate generalist, a man who seemed to regard curiosity as his birthright. He wrote constitutions in one hand and tinkered with bifocals in the other, a polymath who believed the human mind should be as well-stocked as a library. Franklin’s most profound act of rebellion against the narrowness of life? Refusing to accept that one should ever stop learning or experimenting, even if it meant flying kites in thunderstorms with a grin that practically dared lightning to strike.

Then there was Elizabeth I, whose life was a masterpiece of versatility. Stateswoman, propagandist, linguist, and patron of the arts, Elizabeth was a woman whose mind wielded power as deftly as her hand ruled England. She rejected marriage not out of prudishness but as an assertion of sovereignty, transforming her unmarried state into a symbol of divine authority. Her reign was an exercise in living multiple lives simultaneously: monarch, muse, strategist, and master performer, all coalescing into a single, indomitable figure.

Winston Churchill, too, belongs in this pantheon of many-lifed individuals. As a young man, he fought wars, penned dispatches, and burned through cigars as though daring mortality to keep pace. Later, he would lead a nation through its darkest hours, all while writing histories so grandiose they’d earn him a Nobel Prize. His canvas wasn’t limited to politics or war; he painted, both literally and metaphorically, with broad, bold strokes. Churchill understood that life, if lived properly, is not a straight line but a baroque tapestry, chaotic yet profoundly beautiful.

Even the modern sage Naval Ravikant nods to this ancient wisdom. "A rational person can find peace by cultivating multiple perspectives," he advises, as though channeling Cicero himself. To explore broadly, to embrace the breadth of human experience, is to honor the richness of existence.

For over 21 years, my life has been defined by my work as a web designer. It’s a career that has been challenging and creative, demanding constant problem-solving and adaptability. But over time, I began to feel the quiet discomfort of limitation. A single thread can’t make a tapestry, and I realized there were so many other parts of myself waiting to be explored.

This realization has led me to rediscover pursuits that bring joy and a deeper sense of fulfillment. Sitting at the piano, my fingers finding their way across the keys, feels like opening a door to a world I’d forgotten. Learning Muay Thai has given me a fresh kind of discipline, a way to push myself in entirely new ways. Writing has become a space to reflect and create, and revisiting old languages reminds me how much there still is to learn and connect with. Each of these pursuits adds a new layer to my life, filling in gaps I hadn’t even known were there.

I think often of my father, a man whose life was truly varied. He wasn’t just good at one thing—he was endlessly curious and capable. He built businesses, restored classic cars, flew microlights, played the guitar, wrote poetry, and collected antiques with an expert’s eye. He lived fully, as if each day presented an opportunity to discover or create something new. His life was a testament to how much can be achieved when you refuse to let yourself be defined by a single role or pursuit.

When I think about how I want my children to remember me, it’s this fullness of life I hope they’ll see. I want them to know that their father tried everything, pursued what excited him, and embraced the possibilities that life offered. I want them to feel inspired not to follow a specific path but to forge their own, knowing they, too, can live a life of many chapters, each one richer than the last.

Let us be soldiers and statesmen, dreamers and dabblers, poets and pragmatists. For the fullest life is not one that follows a straight and narrow path but one that revels in the twists, turns, and glorious detours.