A Life Worth Living: Meditations on God, Death and Stoicism
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A Life Worth Living: Meditations on God, Death and Stoicism
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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781789043051 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Collective Ink |
| Publication date: | 01/31/2020 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 192 |
| File size: | 416 KB |
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CHAPTER 1
The IDEA Method: Stoic Counsel
The condition and characteristic of a philosopher is that he looks to himself for all help or harm.
- Epictetus [Enchiridion, 48]
Make your rules of life brief, yet so as to embrace the fundamentals; recurrence to them will then suffice to remove all vexation, and send you back without fretting to the duties to which you must return.
- Marcus Aurelius [Meditations, Book Four, 3]
Epictetus was born a slave. Marcus Aurelius became an emperor. Both were Stoics, and adhered to the same root principles of self-discipline, broadly sharing an understanding of the human condition. Here, I present, in skeletal outline, a simple program of personal governance derived from Roman Stoicism as espoused by Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius. What I have dubbed "The IDEA Method" is my attempt to resuscitate a few central tenets of Stoic counsel and to explain and defend their efficacy for responding rationally and effectively to the many vicissitudes and challenges endemic to the human condition. I hope to breathe a bit of new life into a Stoic analysis of self-disciplinary propriety that served the needs of a slave, an emperor, and innumerable lives lived between those two material extremes.
Epictetus spent much of his early life as another man's property and, apparently, sustained a permanent disability resulting from punishment inflicted upon him by his owner. He nonetheless managed to become an influential and highly regarded instructor in the art of living well and maintaining equanimity irrespective of circumstance. Roman culture was influenced, in many respects, by the Stoic worldview and its practical counsel regarding rational and skillful management of common trials. Marcus Aurelius later carried Stoicism to the pinnacle of Roman power, becoming Emperor in the middle of the second century CE. His Meditations, intended primarily as a journal for his own reflection and personal edification, was posthumously published and has served as a reliable source of inspiration with its simple instructions for maintaining dignified calm and living a rationally disciplined life. Emperor and slave, it seems, drew strength from the same wellspring.
It is my contention that Stoic counsel may serve just as effectively today as it did nearly two thousand years ago. Material and scientific advancements notwithstanding, the human condition has not changed a great deal during the millennia separating our era from Roman antiquity. We must still make our way within a world that lies almost entirely beyond our control. We must still face death, deprivation, and bodily frailty, as well as events and persons that do not conform to common hopes and expectations. We are still relatively small, and the world is still large and mostly heedless of our concerns. How may one hope to pursue "the good life" in the face of such challenges? What is the starting place from which Stoic counsel offers guidance?
I: Identify the Real Issue
Our troubles often stem from the fact that we desire what we do not have, or are averse to what befalls us. We must recognize the emotional and psychological centrality of our ability to deal rationally with desire and aversion. Failure of proper self-regulation in this arena is a common source of much of our distress and dissatisfaction. Epictetus reminds his students to:
Remember that desire demands the attainment of that of which you are desirous; and aversion demands the avoidance of that to which you are averse; that he who fails of the object of his desires is disappointed; and he who incurs the object of his aversion is wretched. [Enchiridion, 2]
When we are dissatisfied, it is typically a poor "fit" between our desires and the unfolding of events that causes our distress. We want what is not so. The facts, in and of themselves, are neither good nor bad, but one's attitude toward the facts may cause them to appear fearsome. Epictetus contends:
Men are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of things ... When, therefore, we are hindered, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never blame anyone but ourselves; that is, our own judgments. [Enchiridion, 5]
Perturbation results from our evaluation of conditions or states of affairs with which we are confronted. Desire and aversion color our encounter with "things" as they are.
Sometimes our dissatisfaction arises in response to conditions that are not especially subtle or complex. What, for example, is typically the problem presented by a broken leg? This is (at least in most instances) a diagnostically straightforward matter. The injury causes pain and various forms of temporary disability to which the injured party is generally averse. Although a variety of psychological, spiritual, or even philosophical concerns may, in some cases, arise from the injury and surrounding circumstances (e.g. it is perceived as punishment for some prior moral transgression, or as yet another absurdity confirming the meaninglessness of life, etc.), typically the unpleasantness is efficiently dissipated with time and proper medical attention. If this were the only sort of problem that people experienced, then the market for practical philosophy, as well as most other forms of talk therapy, counselling, and consultation would be far smaller than it is – and philosophical practitioners would be of relatively little use.
Much of our distress, both individually and collectively, is not amenable to medical intervention, and time does not appear actually to heal all wounds or solve all problems (unless, of course, all problems are, as Stalin quipped, solved by death – and who wants to wait for that "solution"?). One common type of challenge may involve, for instance, an extremely annoying colleague or supervisor with whom one's job requires one to interact on a daily basis. Distress may result from an absence of love or any semblance of affection in one's marriage, and it may be clear to both parties that they dislike being married to each other. In each case, desire and expectation are at loggerheads with one's actual experience of conditions as they stand.
In other circumstances, of course, the real issue may be more difficult to identify or to articulate. A failure of rigorous, careful introspection can occlude the true origin and etiology of our displeasure. When we do not know our own minds and proclivities, we may be unable to discover why sleep does not come easily, or why a career no longer seems fulfilling, or why the general sense of dissatisfaction will not lift, or anxiety will not pass into peace and calm. If the Stoics are right, the "something" that is wrong will, upon careful introspection, prove to be a matter of our attitudes, beliefs, desires, aversions – in short, a matter of dysfunctional ideas (broadly construed). It is, therefore, advisable, the Stoics teach us, to "turn inward" and investigate the objects of our desire and aversion if we are to find the real source of our discontent.
D: Distinguish "Internals" from "Externals"
Very little of the world is ours to control. We do not have the power to govern, merely by the exertion of our will, any of the following: the past, the laws of nature, other people (their beliefs, desires, behavior, etc.), political matters, social trends, economic phenomena, the condition of our bodies, and just about everything else that does not directly conform to our decisions, desires, mental efforts – in short, everything that we cannot directly produce by simply deciding or willing that it shall be so. If, on the contrary, one's will can, without assistance or mediation, create a certain state of affairs or cause something to happen, then that state of affairs is directly within one's control. Such matters are, in Epictetan terms, "properly our own affairs." Let us refer to those events and phenomena that directly conform to the agent's will as "internals" and all those that do not as "externals." Epictetan counsel is founded upon this crucial distinction:
There are things which are within our power, and there are things which are beyond our power. Within our power are opinion, aim, desire, aversion, and, in one word, whatever affairs are our own. Beyond our power are body, property, reputation, office, and, in one word, whatever are not properly our own affairs. [Enchiridion, I]
In any circumstance, given any form of distress or unease, it is essential that the distressed person, the sufferer, correctly identify those elements of the circumstance that lie beyond his control (the externals) and distinguish them from those that are within his power (the internals). Failure to correctly distinguish internals from externals, and regulate desire accordingly, virtually ensures frustration, anxiety, and distress. Consider, for example, a marriage that has ceased to satisfy one or both spouses. The husband's desires, aversions, expectations and, to a large extent at least, his behavior are his to control. His wife's desires, aversions, beliefs, attitudes, and behavior are not. Certainly, he may speak to his wife and engage in other forms of interaction by which he might sway her opinion and causally influence her feelings and subsequent behavior, but note that only his attitudes directly conform to his will, while hers require her cooperation, and other intermediate factors (e.g. some means of communication). In such a case, the wise husband will understand that self-improvement, as a man and a spouse, lies within his direct power, whereas the improvement or alteration of his wife's internal and external condition does not. Psychological and emotional dependence upon states of affairs conforming to antecedent hopes or expectations leaves the agent's well-being at the mercy of an often-recalcitrant world. Obviously, the same principle applies mutatis mutandis with respect to the wife's relationship to her husband's thoughts and actions (or, for that matter, to her child, coworker, sibling, etc.). With respect to interpersonal relations in general, Marcus Aurelius' Meditations provides the following reminder:
You will not easily find a man coming to grief through indifference to the workings of another's soul; but for those who pay no heed to the motions of their own, unhappiness is their sure reward. [Book Two, 8]
The wise seek to know their own minds so that they may better govern themselves, and do not pin their contentment to winning the hearts and minds of others. The Stoic sage does not make demands on the external world, but instead develops self-discipline so as to deal reasonably with the world as it presents itself.
E: Exert Effort Only Where it can be Effective
It is unwise, unhealthy, and wasteful to expend energy trying to control or to change circumstances that lie beyond one's control and one's ability to enact change. When we bend our efforts on conditions lying beyond our control, we invite disappointment and discontent. Externals may conform to our preexisting hopes, but if this occurs, it occurs fortuitously and we cannot depend upon sustained good fortune. Attachments to external objects of desire and aversion open the door to dissatisfaction. Our loved ones, for example, will be taken from us – either when they die, when we die, or due to some event that separates us prior to death. Our bodies and our health will eventually fail, as none of us is immortal. Our accumulated material wealth and goods will be separated from us and, in the long run, will cease even to pass into the hands of those whom we have chosen to receive them. Who today possesses the wealth of Croesus? Who possesses the fruits of Alexander's conquests? Wealth and power are ephemeral. Fame, for those few who attain it, lasts but a moment. Our names will cease to be remembered or uttered. For most of us, this will happen fairly soon after we depart this world. Even the "immortals," however, will eventually be forgotten. Who will remember today's celebrities a thousand years from now? Who will be left to remember them when the human race has passed away and the inexorable law of entropy has rendered the universe uninhabitable? In the long, long run, we all face the same future of extinction and disappearance without a trace. In his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius nicely articulates the point:
Our mental powers should enable us to perceive the swiftness with which all things vanish away: their bodies in the world of space, and their remembrance in the world of time. [Book Two, 12]
It is, therefore, unhealthy to become attached to anything or any state of affairs that belongs to the external world's dispensations – for such things do not truly belong to us and will be lost to us eventually.
The wise understand this and do not waste time and effort trying to command anything that does not answer to their commands. They do not desire that external states of affairs should be one way as opposed to another. Instead, they focus their desire only on objects that they can direct by the force of their will alone. The administration of the external world is not up to us, but each rational agent has the power to administer his own desires, aversions, and attitudes about the world and its unfolding. Those whose desires and aversions attach only to matters that lie within their control do not see their desires go unsatisfied and do not experience anything to which they are averse. One who desires something that he has the power to produce simply produces it. One who is only averse to that which he has the direct power to avoid simply avoids the undesirable by the force of his own will. If, for example, one is averse to becoming a liar, and one has properly disciplined oneself in matters of honesty, then one simply does not lie and, thereby, unerringly avoids the object of aversion. One who desires a tranquil mind, and disciplines himself to maintain tranquility irrespective of circumstance, thereby attains what he desires and can fail to obtain it only through inadequate self-control. As Epictetus reminds us in "Concerning Naso":
So, in our own case, we take it to be the work of one who studies philosophy to bring his will into harmony with events; so that none of the things which happen may happen against our inclination, nor those which do not happen be desired by us. Hence they who have settled this point have it in their power never to be disappointed in what they seek, nor to incur what they shun; but to lead their own lives without sorrow, fear, or perturbation, and in society to preserve all the natural or acquired relations of son, father, brother, citizen, husband, wife, neighbor, fellow traveler, ruler, or subject. Something like this is what we take to be the work of a philosopher. [Discourses, p. 122]
The practical philosopher points the way to a sustained equanimity that, for the disciplined practitioner, survives the slings and arrows of fortune.
A: Accept the Rest – Amor Fati
The world is as it is and is not as it otherwise might have been. When we resist or reject the world as it stands and struggle against it, the world always has its way. This is so because the external world is not ours to control and need not respond to our demands or conform to our desires. We should, therefore, make no attempt to command anything but ourselves. All else is best embraced as an expression of what the Stoics regarded as God's will or, for those skeptical of intelligent design or guidance, manifestations of the natural laws that allow for a habitable world. Epictetus calls our attention to the benefits of a well-regulated attitude concerning external conditions:
Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen and your life will be serene. [Enchiridion, 8]
It is this attitude – this amor fati – that, centuries later, Nietzsche regarded as the primary expression of the noble character. In Ecce Homo, under the heading "Why I Am So Clever," he states:
My formula for what is great in mankind is amor fati: not to wish for anything other than that which is; whether behind, ahead, or for all eternity. Not just to put up with the inevitable – much less to hide it from oneself, for all idealism is lying to oneself in the face of the necessary – but to love it. [II, 10]
Nietzsche himself was not exactly a Stoic, and the Stoics did not explicitly use the expression "amor fati," but their respective worldviews dovetail nicely on at least this one bit of counsel concerning the nature of a good life. The wise have no complaint against the universe. They have learned to love the world as it is, and have embraced their fate within the grand, unfolding evolution all around them. It is, as Nietzsche might say, noble to love one's life and the chance to experience challenges as they arise. We see in Nietzsche's remark an echo of Epictetus' advice to his students:
Fix your desire and aversion on riches or poverty; the one will be disappointed, the other incurred. Fix them on health, power, honors, your country, friends, children – in short, on anything beyond the control of your will – you will be unfortunate. But fix them on Zeus, on the gods; give yourself up to these; let these govern; let your powers be ranged on the same side with these, and how can you be troubled any longer? But if, poor wretch, you envy, and pity, and are jealous, and tremble, and never cease a single day from complaining of yourself and the gods, why do you boast of your education? [Discourses, p. 135]
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "A Life Worth Living"
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Copyright © 2018 William Ferraiolo.
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Table of Contents
Introduction, 1,
The IDEA Method: Stoic Counsel, 3,
Stoic Anxiolytics, 14,
Stoic Simplicity: The Pursuit of Virtue, 25,
Stoic "Harm" as Degradation, 35,
Free Will, Determinism, and Stoic Counsel, 37,
God or Atoms: Stoic Counsel With or Without Zeus, 47,
Stoic Counsel for Interpersonal Relations, 58,
Death: A Propitious Misfortune, 68,
Roman Buddha, 77,
Chigurh's Coin: Karma and Chance in No Country,
for Old Men, 99,
Eternal Selves and The Problem of Evil, 112,
Resistance Is Futile: Stoic Counsel About "Externals", 122,
The Humble Agnostic Shrugs, 130,
Hilbert's Hotel, the Multiverse, and Design, 140,
Divine Fiat and Blind Obedience, 151,
Stoic Suicide: Death Before Dishonor, 161,
References, 171,