Stoical Takeaways

[Speaker to Animals]

After reading this book (recommend), I thought I would leave a few takeaway points if anyone is interested.

The goal of stoicism is to achieve tranquility in your life; to actually appreciate positive emotions in their proper perspective and to minimize or eradicate negative emotions.

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One should divide their activities into three categories:

[1]Things over which you possess no control
[2]Things over which you possess partial control.
[3]Things over which you possess total control.

One should not worry about things in category (1) since one has no control over them. Worry about those things is a waste of your time and tranquility. A lot of our grief is derived from us worrying about these types of things. We have no reason to worry about that which we cannot control or influence.

One should internalize their goals with respect to items in category (2). Example given was for an aspiring author. Instead of making her goal to get her novel published, her goal should be to submit her novel to x number of publishers, etc. Internalized goals are goals that are achievable and under your control.

One is totally responsible for items in category (3). You control if you show up to work on time every day workday. You control whether you spend your time productively and advance yourself through good performance.

Although not specifically stated that I can recall, I think I would add to this section.. One should endeavor to increase their domain of control by shifting items in category (2) to category (3), and by looking for novel strategies to shift some items in category (1) to category (2). All you need to do is find a way to exert *some* influence over something to shift it into the second category. Then you can focus on achievable (internal) goals regarding that issue in such a way that you can increase your influence over it.

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One should not be attached to worldly things. They can be taken from you at any moment. Enjoy luxuries and pleasures while you have the opportunity, don't become become addicted to them. The devotion to the acquirement of wealth, possessions, power, and pleasures is to live like an animal. It's not that you shouldn't seek those things when doing so is good, but that you should not be attached to them. Losing them should not affect your tranquility.

The principle of hedonic adaptationstates that your general happiness is not at all tied to wealth, power, or even pleasure. Studies have shown that lottery winners, for example, are generally no happier years later than before they won their fortunes, and oftentimes they are far less happy than they were. This happens because we get used to the new state of living and take our increased luxuries for granted. Once that happens, we just fall back to our baseline happiness.

Happiness comes from the ability to enjoy what you have. If you cannot even be content with what you have now, what makes you think having more things will make you happier? Your problem is not with the amount of luxuries you enjoy but with your ability to enjoy what you do have. Adding more things won't change that. You have to focus on learning to appreciate what you have and not take anything for granted.

One way to overcome hedonic adaptation is a practice called negative visualization. Negative visualization entails your basically imagining the loss of all the good things you have in your life. It sound brutal, but it is shown to make people happier, and to live lives with far less regret. The example given was a father who imagines losing his beloved daughter. Critics might argue that him being willing to accept the loss of his daughter entails him not appreciating her. But a stoic would argue quite the opposite. Consider the father who does not employ negative visualization. He takes his daughter's existence in his life for granted. Thus he might opt to work late instead of go to an outing with her, etc. If his daughter does God forbid die, he could be left with regret that he didn't spend more time with her and that he took her for granted. The stoical father on the other hand is always mindful that he could lose his daughter. If his daughter passes, he won't have to face her loss with the added pain of regret in his inability to appreciate her in his life while he had the chance. No day was taken for granted. Consider the impact of hedonic adaptation on our current political climate the grievance industry therein.


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These are a few of the larger points addressed in the book. I didn't do the arguments justice with such a short post, but I think some of you might gain much from this book if you check it out. Hopefully this will interest you in it.

[Speaker to Animals]

A weird guy has a decent explanation of the technique.

[Okeefenokee]

I've been wanting to read more about stoicism for a while. A lot of that sounds like how I try to look at things.

[Speaker to Animals]

I've been wanting to read more about stoicism for a while. A lot of that sounds like how I try to look at things.

LOL. You're already stoic, dude. You'd like the book, but you'd be screaming, "that's what I've been saying! Fire up the dune buggy!"

[de officiis]

I've had Epictetus on my bookshelf for 14 years. Here are some free online resources

The Golden Sayings of Epictetus

The Discourses of Epictetus

The Enchiridion

See also: The Stoic Warrior's Triad

Prayer of Epictetus:

Use me henceforward, O God, as thou wilt;
I am of one mind with thee. I am thine.
I ask exemption from nothing that seems
good in thy sight. Where thou wilt, lead me;
in what raiment thou wilt, clothe me.

Compare: Matthew 6:25-34

[Speaker to Animals]

He leaned heavily on Epictetus in that book. The other primary sources were Seneca and Musonius Rufus.

Seneca wrote this to Polybius on grief:

"Nature requires from us some sorrow, while more than this is the result of vanity. But never will I demand of you that you should not grieve at all. ... Let your tears flow, but let them also cease, let deepest sighs be drawn from your breast, but let them also find an end."

That's beautiful.

[Xenophon]

I just picked up a book by Epictetus. We're all turning to Stoicism, it seems.

[de officiis]

He leaned heavily on Epictetus in that book. The other primary sources were Seneca and Musonius Rufus.

Seneca wrote this to Polybius on grief:

"Nature requires from us some sorrow, while more than this is the result of vanity. But never will I demand of you that you should not grieve at all. ... Let your tears flow, but let them also cease, let deepest sighs be drawn from your breast, but let them also find an end."

That's beautiful.

There's also the story about the guy who broke his leg. That's quite a tale.

[Okeefenokee]

I've been wanting to read more about stoicism for a while. A lot of that sounds like how I try to look at things.

LOL. You're already stoic, dude. You'd like the book, but you'd be screaming, "that's what I've been saying! Fire up the dune buggy!"

Thanks for saying that. I put it on my wishlist.

I was sitting on the porch the other day looking at the sod we'd laid down. The ol' lady was talking about her ideas about what we could do once I'm working, and we're making more than Army money. I told her I wanted to be careful about changing things once our income changes. I don't want to be another one of those people who come into the wealth they've dreamed about, only to find out it isn't what they imagined.

I'm still not comfortable with it. I feel like I'm still a house painter, but when workers come to the door and tell me I have a nice house, it puts me in a weird place. I got up the other day thinking someone was knocking on the door, but it was just a framer hammering on a house being built next door. Never in the years I spent working in construction did it ever cross my mind that I would live in one of them one day.

I learned that Texas house painters suck ass. Told Dad about them painting the fucking hinges, and he said the ones he worked with thought he was fucking with them when he told them what standards they had to meet in Georgia.

[heydaralon]

Seneca was also sort of full of shit. He had a lot of interesting stuff to say, but most of his work has an dual obsequious political message to whatever emperor who was in power. Consolation to Marcia, on the Good Life, Polybius etc are all carefully crafted to curry favor. Polybius was the most egregious one, where he was basically writing an open letter, praising Claudius in a transparently pathetic way, in the hopes of ending his Corsican (I think) exile. I would take everything Seneca wrote with a grain of salt. Even Seneca's appearance is slightly fraudulent. Until the 19th century, the bust associated with Seneca was a gaunt wise looking old man with a scruffy beard. The real bust was discovered, and it was a fat bald old man similar looking to Varys on GoT. Again, I'm not completely writing the man off, but he was not the ascetic sage he is sometimes made out to be. He spent his career as an apologist for emperor excesses, including Nero's, and padded his pockets like the most mindless venal Senators of the time. Personally, my favorite Seneca essay is De Ira (On Anger).