Rule #382: The Sisyphus Rule
Life is hard.
Life is unfair.
Life is wonderful.
When Zeus enchanted the rock that King Sisyphus was condemned to push, he knew the king was doomed to an eternity of frustration. It was a punishment designed to crush him with despair.
I think about Sisyphus a lot as I’ve gotten older. Much of life amounts to little more than boulder pushing—work, chores, eat, sleep, repeat. So much of our existence is filled not with grand achievements but with the mundane tasks of simply getting through the day.
The weight of that boulder becomes even clearer when life calls us to be caregivers for loved ones with diseases that only deteriorate—slowly, relentlessly, fatally. Caregivers live under the unreasonable expectation of showing up every day to push that rock, knowing it will roll back down again. Each visit without improvement, each slow decline, can feel like a soul-crushing, Sisyphean existence.
And yet, I think about that king, endlessly pushing, endlessly thinking about what he was doing.
And I think he was happy.
Albert Camus thought so too in The Myth of Sisyphus. He saw Sisyphus as a happy man, not because the rock wasn’t heavy, but because he found meaning in the act of pushing. Camus even compared it to love. He wrote: “There is no noble love but that which recognizes itself to be both short-lived and exceptional.”
I read that line over 40 years ago, and it has stayed with me. To truly love someone requires effort, and when that effort is exceptional, it is by definition fleeting. As I watch my wife and sister-in-law fight every day against their mother’s Lewy body dementia, I see that kind of noble love in action. Every day they push the rock. Every day they show up. Every day their love is exceptional.
It is hard—unbelievably hard. But it is also beautiful. I saw it in my sister Donna, who cared for our parents at the end of their lives. The love she showed during that time defined her. It revealed the best of what we are as human beings: loving beings.
In truth, caregiving changes the caregiver more than the patient. It shapes us. It makes us stronger. It makes us better.
King Sisyphus, after all, was punished not for weakness but for defiance. He was a fighter, an SOB who once tried to cheat death by putting death in chains. That’s why the gods cursed him. In many ways, caregivers are the same—SOBs fighting to chain up death for as long as they can.
The fight may be hopeless, but it is noble. Like Rocky Balboa standing against Apollo Creed, you know you’ll eventually lose, but you keep swinging anyway. I’ve seen Rocky 8,000 times, and every time I still cheer for him. He doesn’t win, but I never feel sad. Rocky was happy in the fight.
So are Sandy and Bobbi. Their fight against that enormous boulder may be unwinnable, but in their struggle, they reveal a deeper victory—the victory of love, of spirit, of refusing to let fear or indignity win without a fight.
I write these rules as a map for my children, and I know someday you will find yourselves in the role of caregiver. I hope it isn’t for me, but if it is—or if it’s for someone else you love—I need you to remember this: there is nobility and honor in the struggle. Even when the days feel darkest, you are still living out the purest form of love.
And like Sisyphus, like Rocky, you can be happy in the fight.
I love you both, and I am proud of you.
Love, Dad