When Justice Outruns Wisdom
“I told her I was ready to give up. I wasn’t. I was frustrated.”
I had been frustrated for days. I wanted to move forward with marketing materials for a church event that meant a lot to me. Internal policy kept me from working directly with the communications staff member in charge of layout and production. Instead, everything had to go through an intermediary. Updates were sparse. Visibility was limited. Drafts were slow to appear.
When they finally did, I reacted sharply.
My concern was not imaginary. Materials appeared to have been circulating without my knowledge. Items went to print without final review. A Facebook post went live with the wrong registration link. For an event that may be one of our largest, the margin for error is thin. The stakes seemed real. But urgency has a way of tightening the mind.
Seneca, in On Anger, described anger as a kind of temporary madness. He didn’t mean the problem isn’t real, but that anger narrows our judgment. It’s like focusing so closely on the problem that everything else fades away—the bigger picture, other people’s intentions, and possible solutions. Anger makes us see only one part of reality and ignore the rest. We lose perspective, react to the nearest problem, and forget to look at the bigger system. Sometimes, we think that being intense means we’re right. In those moments, we don’t think less, just more narrowly.
This narrowing can be hard to notice. It can feel like we’re seeing things clearly or being brave. But if we don’t stop to reflect, it can actually distort our view.
That is what happened.
Justice surged. Wisdom lagged.
In an earlier essay, I wrote that wisdom is what organizes the other virtues. Courage without wisdom turns into recklessness. Justice without wisdom becomes rigid. Temperance without wisdom can feel like empty denial. Wisdom isn’t just sitting back. It’s what helps guide the others. When justice moves ahead without wisdom, even good intentions can get off track.
What I experienced at that moment was not a lack of conviction. It was a lapse in ordering. Justice was present. Wisdom had not yet caught up.
The Stoics didn’t say we shouldn’t care. They said we should care wisely. Epictetus made it clear: what we control isn’t the policy, the hierarchy, or the rules. What we control is our ability to choose our response, our tone, and our purpose. In the moment, I exercised choice. But not with full discipline.
The real problem wasn’t about anyone’s personality—it was about the process. When communication has too many steps, confusion increases, responsibility gets unclear, and delays pile up. That’s not an ethical flaw; it’s just how the system works. Good leadership means having the patience to ask better questions: Where is authority clear? Where is it spread out? Are we fixing people or improving the system?
It is easier to press on the person in front of us than to examine the system above us. That dynamic does not stop at a church office. We see it in civic life on a much larger scale. The same pattern echoes in national politics, where urgency can outpace careful sequencing. President Trump often governs through escalation. Tariffs were announced abruptly. Rhetoric intensified before consultation. Policy was framed as a strength because it was forceful. Supporters call it decisiveness. Critics call it volatility.
But reaction is not a strategy. Volatility isn’t simply about making news. It wears down trust in institutions. When policies change quickly, the tone keeps shifting, and decisions seem reactive, people start to doubt whether they can rely on leaders. Markets pause, partnerships get strained, and confidence drops. Good governance needs steadiness. Without it, even strong institutions start to brace rather than grow.
This pattern is not uniquely political. It is human. When something feels obstructed, we escalate. When communication slows, we intensify. When an error appears, we press harder.
Justice demands correction. That part is right. But wisdom governs how correction happens.
People often think restraint is a sign of weakness. It isn’t. It’s actually a form of disciplined strength.
In volunteer environments, especially, pressure language lands heavily. People are not paid to absorb intensity. They are offering time and commitment. When frustration spills into threat, even rhetorical threat, trust narrows. Influence diminishes.
That lesson was immediate for me. The irony is that I wanted excellence. I wanted to be a good steward. The event deserved clear and high-quality work. My instinct to protect it was right, but my approach needed more wisdom.
Seneca warned that anger seeks punishment. Wisdom seeks correction. That distinction matters.
If I were talking to a younger civic leader, I wouldn’t tell them to ignore urgency. I’d tell them to manage it. Take a moment to see the bigger picture. Focus your efforts in the right place. Speak in ways that build influence rather than burn it. One way to do this is to pause for thirty seconds, close your eyes, and breathe when you feel frustrated. Or write down what you really want to achieve before you respond. This short pause helps ease urgency and restore clarity. When you practice this regularly, discipline becomes a habit.
The same thing happens at the national level. When leaders mistake intensity for strength, they might excite their supporters for a while. But leading isn’t about putting on a show. It’s about managing relationships that depend on each other. Words spoken in frustration can affect markets, alliances, and institutions. Announcing a policy without proper planning creates instability, and that instability weakens the very systems leaders want to protect.
Justice without wisdom destabilizes what it seeks to protect.
The Stoics put wisdom above all other virtues for a reason. Courage without wisdom turns into recklessness. Justice without wisdom becomes rigid. Temperance without wisdom can feel like empty denial. Wisdom is what keeps the other virtues working together. I saw a small version of that misalignment in myself.
My frustration made sense. The lack of transparency was real. The system’s inefficiency still needs to be fixed. But my first responsibility was my own actions—my tone, how I communicated, and the order in which I did things. That is the quiet discipline that holds everything together.
We live in a culture that rewards immediacy. Social media amplifies outrage. Cable news extends reaction cycles. Political rhetoric prizes escalation. In that environment, pausing feels unnatural. It feels like weakness.
But history remembers leaders who were patient. Abraham Lincoln, for example, was known for taking his time with tough decisions, listening to different opinions, and thinking things through before acting. His careful approach strengthened and made his choices longer-lasting. Today, we often trade patience for speed, but that usually means we lose out on lasting wisdom. Compared to Lincoln’s steady approach, our rush today shows how little room we leave for careful judgment.
It is not a weakness. It is governance.
At every level, whether in a church, a nonprofit, a city council, or Congress, leadership depends on the ability to feel urgency but without being ruled by it. It means identifying structural weakness without attacking the nearest person. It means pressing for excellence without corroding trust. That is not softness. It is maturity.
Justice matters. It must matter. But justice must be organized by wisdom. Otherwise, it consumes the relationships that make correction possible.
I did not want to give up. I wanted clarity. I wanted protection for the event. I wanted excellence. The lesson was not to care less. It was to govern myself more carefully. Anger will always rise when something important feels threatened. The question is whether judgment rises with it.
And in this moment, personally and nationally, steadiness is strength. Judgment will rise with it.
Wisdom does not silence justice. It steadies it. And right now, both personally and nationally, steadiness is a real strength.
