Philosophy, at its best, is not some airy-fairy meditation on the meaning of life. It is a set of rules for living. The ancient Stoics understood this better than most. Epictetus gave us the Enchiridion, interpreted as a literal ‘handbook’ of reminders you have to keep rereading because your monkey brain keeps forgetting.

Another well-known Stoic, Seneca, confessed that he never came home from the Roman forum with quite the same moral character he had when he left. Something always became unsettled. He needed the quiet of his study to recompose himself.

A truck driver has no such luxury. The road does the recomposing for you, whether you like it or not. And it does it with the subtlety of a 20-crate dolly sliding off a wet foot-control ramp.

Epictetus’ idea of reason was based on the divine, active, and ruling faculty within human beings that allows them to distinguish between what is under their control and what is not.

Truck driving, however, is a lesson in the fact that you don’t control anything.

Learning by doing, I discovered, is a form of torture. I can drive the truck, but the merchandising side of things has bruised my ego black and blue. Here are the many lessons I hadn’t properly absorbed from the manual.

Lesson One: RTFM (Read the f***ing manual).

My boss gave me written instructions. I read them but only noticed the bits I was worried about. It was crystal clear I needed to follow them, but for whatever reason I forgot to put the fuel cap on properly and not to overfill the tank. The word ‘diesel’ on the cap must be upright. It makes perfect sense in hindsight, when you’re standing in a puddle of the stuff wondering why the universe hates you. Ever the Stoic, it gave me the opportunity to learn how to use the spill kit.

Lesson Two: Fuel cards are not souvenirs.

While we’re on the topic of fuel, after using the fuel card put it back in its slot. Do not leave it in your trousers and put it through the wash. If you do, the universe will arrange for you to discover this fact at the most inconvenient servo in Central NSW.

Lesson Three: If it has a light, turn it off.

Turn off the load ramp at the end of the shift. If you don’t, the battery goes flat and your truck won’t start. And at 3am, not only will your boss hate you, but their spouse will, too.

Lesson Four: Time is not elastic.

Start earlier than you think. You’re always late. And if you’re early, that spare hour will be devoured by the massive stuff-up at your next delivery.

Lesson Five: Physics doesn’t negotiate.

Trucks are actually subject to the laws of physics. If the truck is full of stock on dollies and you forget to put the cargo barrier back up, your stock will spill out the back and all over the ground. This will take up that extra hour you gave yourself by being early. Rule: never, ever move the truck – not even one millimetre – without putting the cargo barrier back up. It’ll happen when you’re breaching a curfew at 3am and the whole world will hear it. Later, you’ll need a Bex and a cup of tea as you relive the experience in your dreams, hoping the neighbours don’t complain about you, you idiot.

Lesson Six: Caffeine is not optional.

Never skip your coffee to save time. If you had your coffee, you probably wouldn’t be picking the stock off the ground.

Lesson Seven: Water awakens the deus ex machina.

The waterproof foot controls on your loading ramp are not waterproof. If you let the foot controls of your loading ramp get wet, a demon will enter the controls. Then, instead of the ramp going up, it will randomly tilt forward, sending both your dollies with 40 crates crashing to the ground. It doesn’t really matter if they miss the 2026 model Land Rover parked nearby, you’ll have recurring nightmares about it anyway.

If it happens in the dark during a curfew, it’s actually worse than your stock spilling out the back of the truck when you’re driving it one millimetre without the cargo barrier up. Then you can only hear it. When you’re standing on the loading ramp with your dollies and watching that long, slow accident unfold, you will relive over and over again in a form of silent horror movie.

While we’re on the subject of water, your expensive water vessel from the camping store is not leak-proof. If you put it in your hi-vis bag with your hi-vis hoodie, your hi-vis hoodie will get wet just when the temperature drops below ten degrees. Use your old rusty thermos and stop falling for modern gimmicks.

Lesson Eight: Turn-offs are non-negotiable.

If you miss a turn-off, turn around and go back. The path you’re on now will take longer, the road will be rougher, and you will end up with your stock all over the back of the truck. Because you were too lazy to turn around on the grounds that ‘an extra ten minutes won’t matter’. It does. And it will snowball.

Lesson Nine: Lateness snowballs.

Once you are late, you have set in motion an inevitable journey of epic lateness. The next dock and every dock hence will have a semi-trailer unloading at it. If you have a gun store crew, it’ll be done in 30 minutes. If you have someone in charge who thinks they are a boss (those big gates give little people power), then it could take an hour or more.

And to make matters worse, it will happen at the place that has two docks but one is closed because they need to park their cars somewhere, right? Either that or one of the store persons has a ‘safe, sane, consensual’ tattoo and they top not bottom. One guess where the truck driver fits in that game.

Lesson Ten. Days off aren’t really days off.

If you have a day off and go back to your non-truckie routine, you’ll know about it next shift.

You’ll be bouncing around at the full speed limit to keep time with your spotlights melting the bitumen for miles ahead. You’ll feel like you are invincible and with a little luck, you’ll see those kangaroos before you hit them. (Don’t pretend that trucks can hit roos with gleeful abandon. They always wreck something.)

And just as you are enjoying your well-lit front row seat to the birth of the universe, an approaching truck’s spotlights will destroy your retina and any sense of self-confidence.

Now you are in a spaceship, careening through a vortex as your low beam achieves complete yin-yang with your high beam. You’ll be looking for the white line on the left of the road but then you realise you’re in Central NSW and you get nothing.

The reflectors on the guideposts flashing by and the oncoming lights refracting off the bugs on your windscreen are not you achieving warp speed. It’s your brain thinking it’s bedtime because you’ve effectually switched off the lights. That’s when the roo will appear in front of you.

Achieving Zen

Truck driving is philosophy in action because the rules above are not suggestions. They are immutable laws of reason enforced by physics, logistics, and the occasional demon in the ramp controls. You don’t get to debate them over a flat white and a copy of Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations. You get yelled at by the store owner who lost money because they couldn’t sell the stock you delivered ten minutes before closing.

Your stock is probably on consignment, too, which means your boss will get reamed. It’s like a big funnel jamming responsibility down your throat. The worst thing is that soon you’ll be taking back all that late stock because it’s out of date. And the extra task of removing the unwanted stock means you’ll be late. Again.

The truck reminds you constantly of its logic, whether you choose to follow the rules or not.

This is Zen in the most Australian sense of the word.

Zen isn’t about escaping to a misty mountain monastery or chasing some distant enlightenment. Its point is brutally simple: to wake up to reality exactly as it is, right here, right now, and to live from that clarity in ordinary life.

You already have what you need, you just keep clouding it with ego, distraction, and wishful thinking. Traditional Zen uses sitting meditation and paradoxical koans to jolt you into presence. Truck driving does it more honestly and with far less mercy.

The spilled stock, the dead battery, the demon ramp, and the snowballing lateness are your koans. They don’t politely remind you like Epictetus. They smack you the moment you drift.

Chop wood, carry water, or, in truckie language, load the dolly, secure the cargo barrier, and don’t skip the coffee. True Zen shows up in how you handle the mundane with full attention, humility, and a light touch (or at least fewer nightmares). The road doesn’t care about your excuses. It recomposes you on the spot.

Epictetus would be proud. Seneca would be relieved he didn’t have to drive home from the forum in a prime mover.

And the next time you see a truckie staring into the middle distance at the servo, don’t assume he’s daydreaming. He’s probably just recomposing himself after another lesson he didn’t ask for but definitely won’t forget.

Note: This is a satirical take on the ‘art of truck driving’. It is not based on real events.

Dr Michael de Percy @FlaneurPolitiq is the Spectator Australia’s Canberra Press Gallery Correspondent. If you would like to support his writing, or read more of Michael, please visit his website.