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May 6 - May 8, 2023
• If, despite not having pursued wealth, we find ourselves wealthy, we should enjoy our affluence; it was the Cynics, not the Stoics, who advocated asceticism. But although we should enjoy wealth, we should not cling to it; indeed, even as we enjoy it, we should contemplate its loss.
3.
• We are social creatures; we will be miserable if we try to cut off contact with other people. Therefore, if what we seek is tranquility, we should form and maintain relations with others.
4.
The Stoics spent a considerable amount of time devising techniques for taking the pain out of our relationships with other people. In particular, they came up with techniques for dealing with the insults of others
5.
• To conquer our insatiability, the Stoics advise us to engage in negative visualization.
6.
we should sometimes cause things to be worse than they would otherwise be; Seneca advises us to “practice poverty,” and Musonius advises us voluntarily to forgo opportunities for pleasure and comfort.
7.
• To curb our tendency to worry about things beyond our control, the Stoics advise us to perform a kind of triage with respect to the elements of our life and sort them into those we have no control over, those we have complete control over, and those we have some but not complete control over.
8.
• When we spend time dealing with things over which we have some but not complete control, we should be careful to internalize our goals. My goal in playing tennis, for example, should be not to win the match but to play the best match possible.
9.
• We should be fatalistic with respect to the external world: We should realize that what has happened to us in the past and what is happening to us at this very moment are beyond our control, so it is foolish to get upset about these things.
10.
The Stoics used their reasoning ability to discover this pattern of living.
These individuals can, I think, resolve their predicament by abandoning the Stoic justification of Stoicism in favor of a justification that makes use of scientific discoveries that were unavailable to the Stoics.
IF SOMEONE ASKED ME why Stoicism works, I would not tell a story about Zeus (or God). Instead, I would talk about evolutionary theory, according to which we humans came to exist as the result of an interesting series of biological accidents.
Stoicism, understood properly, is a cure for a disease. The disease in question is the anxiety, grief, fear, and various other negative emotions that plague humans and prevent them from experiencing a joyful existence. By practicing Stoic techniques, we can cure the disease and thereby gain tranquility.
I had to cobble together a brand of Stoicism from clues scattered throughout the writings of the Roman Stoics. The resulting version of Stoicism, although derived from the ancient Stoics, is therefore unlike the Stoicism advocated by any particular Stoic.
What I have attempted to do is develop a brand of Stoicism that is useful to myself and, possibly, to those around me, and to accomplish this goal I have tailored the philosophy to our circumstances.
Those wishing to read the Stoics would do well to start with the essays of Seneca, especially, “On the Happy Life,” “On Tranquility of Mind,” and “On the Shortness of Life.”
Seneca’s letters to Lucilius also merit attention.
Musonius Rufus is worth reading for his practical advice on daily living.
Readers wishing to sample Epictetus are encouraged to start with his Handbook (also known as his Manual or Encheiridion).
Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations is also both accessible and readily available. Reading the Meditations can be a bit frustrating, though, inasmuch as it is a collection of disconnected (except for the Stoic theme) and sometimes repetitious observations.
