Frequestly Asked Questions (and answers) about Stoic philosophy
It is common for those new to Stoicism to ask what it has to say for a variety of situations: how to get along with family members, how to find a romantic partner, how to cope with the death of a loved one, how to deal with an abusive boss, and any number of other (often serious) problems. To respond to these questions, one needs to step back and think about exactly what kind of answer is being sought, what kinds of answers Stoicism (or any other philosophy) might give, and to whom the advice might apply.
Epictetus’s Discourse 1.15 provides a response that can be applied to most such problems:
When someone consulted Epictetus as to how he could persuade his brother to cease being angry with him, he replied, Philosophy does not profess to secure for man any external possession. Otherwise it would be undertaking something that lies outside its proper subject-matter. For as wood is the material of the carpenter, bronze that of the statuary, just so each man’s own life is the subject-matter of the art of living.—Well, what about my brother’s life?—That again is the subject-matter of his own art of living, but with respect to your art of living it comes under the category of externals, like a farm, like health, like good repute. Philosophy promises none of these things, but rather, “In every circumstance I will keep the governing principle in a state of accord with nature.”—Whose governing principle?—”His in whom I am.”—How, then, shall I keep my brother from being angry at me?—Bring him to me and I will tell him, but I have nothing to say to you on the subject of his anger.
If the person asking for advice is looking for specific instructions on things to do, what is being asked for is outside the scope of Stoicism. Addressing most such problems involves other skills, and such skills are no more part of Stoicism than things like carpentry or playing the guitar. Even in situations where the quandary is purely moral, where the courses of action and consequences appear clear and moral theories will have concrete answers, Stoicism rarely has an answer that applies to everyone: the proper course of action depends on the situation and character of the individual whose action it is. See Epictetus’s Discourse I.2 and Cicero’s On Duties I.110-114.
This does not mean that Stoicism isn’t relevant to these problems; it would be hard to claim that it is an “art if living” if it did not apply. However, it applies in a kind of general way. A physician and athletic trainer that specializes in general health and fitness may not have any good advice on how to pitch a fastball or shoot a free throw, but being strong and healthy is an important part of most sports. Similarly, various skills emphasized by the Stoics are applicable to most of life’s problems, but provides explicit instructions for few of them.
What, then, of the advice that Stoicism does have to offer, the elements that are with its scope? Epictetus’s Discourse 1.15 continues:
And when the man who was consulting him said. What I seek to know is this, how, even if my brother refuses to be reconciled with me, I may yet be in accord with nature, Epictetus replied: Nothing great comes into being all at once; why, not even does the bunch of grapes, or a fig. If you say to me now, “I want a fig,” I shall answer, “That requires time.” Let the tree blossom first, then put forth its fruit, and finally let the fruit ripen. Now although the fruit of even a fig-tree is not brought to perfection all at once and in a single hour, would you still seek to secure the fruit of a man’s mind in so short a while and so easily? Do not expect it, not even if I should tell you so myself.
It is difficult for Stoic philosophy to immediately help someone in a crisis and attempting it is generally misguided, and even mean-spirited, a bit like offering physical conditioning advice to someone who has already started running a marathon, or suggesting swimming lessons to someone who is drowning.
Stoicism itself may not be directly helpful to a beginner facing a crisis, but this does not imply that any given Stoic will be unhelpful; indeed, being helpful is an essential element of Stoicism, and Stoic writing has many exhortations to being helpful to those in distress. The details of how and when it is appropriate for any given person to help any other person vary greatly, depending on the roles, situation, and character of each; and the relationship between them. Seneca’s On Benefits provides an extensive discussion.
One way in which a Stoic might be helpful is through direct assistance with the actual problem, either by giving advice or providing resources or other assistance solving the problem. In this case, Stoicism itself will not directly provide the Stoic with the means to be helpful, but any given Stoic has a great many potentially helpful skills and other resources that are not themselves part of Stoicism. It does not matter that the aspects of the problem are “externals” from the point of view of the person being helps, and so in one sense “indifferent” according to Stoic philosophy: it is often still appropriate for the Stoic to offer help in this way. See Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations 5.36, Seneca’s Of Clemency 2.6, or Cicero’s On Duties I.22:
men, too, are born for the sake of men, that they may be able mutually to help one another; in this direction we ought to follow Nature as our guide, to contribute to the general good by an interchange of acts of kindness, by giving and receiving, and thus by our skill, our industry, and our talents to cement human society more closely together, man to man.
In other circumstances, rather than help with the problem itself, the appropriate thing for the Stoic to do is help the person with the problem cope with it. The simplest approach to helping a person cope with a difficult problem may simply to be a sympathetic listener. Epictetus’s Enchiridion 16 states:
When you see someone weeping in sorrow, either because a child has gone on a journey, or because he has lost his property, beware that you be not carried away by the impression that the man is in the midst of external ills, but straightway keep before you this thought: “It is not what has happened that distresses this man (for it does not distress another), but his judgement about it.” Do not, however, hesitate to sympathize with him so far as words go, and, if occasion offers, even to groan with him; but be careful not to groan also in the centre of your being.
The practice of Stoic philosophy is a skill, and to be effective the Stoic view needs not only understood and agreed with, but also internalized. Before attempting to help another by teaching Stoic philosophy, the Stoic needs to consider the likelihood that they will, in the current emotional circumstances, be successful in not only explaining the Stoic view but also convincing the one seeking help that these views are correct; and then that the person seeking help will internalize the view to a degree that it will be of help.
Familiarity with Stoic practices can, however, provide inspiration in the application of peer counseling methods that have no particular association with Stoicism. Asking open-ended, nonjudgmental questions can help a person think through their problems, and some Stoic exercises are suggestive of constructive questions to ask. For example, a lecture on the importance of roles in Epictetus is not likely to be helpful, but it might be helpful to ask a person in an ethical dilemma what they perceive as being their roles, and inquire (without appearing critical or judgmental) what their opinions are of what duties are associated with those roles.
If the person who comes to the Stoic with a problem is him or herself already a student of Stoicism, then reminders of philosophical beliefs or practices that that person already accepts and has experience with can be helpful. Here, the role of the Stoic advisor here is not one of teacher, but coach: someone to give reminders of arguments already accepted and advice on application, rather than someone to convince or introduce new ideas.
If the person with the problem does not already know and agree with the relevant Stoic positions, then this approach is not a good one. However, there are many other sources of coping strategies, including those originating in other formal philosophical schools, psychotherapy, religions, and informal folk wisdom. In these cases, the Stoics encouraged helping the person with the problem apply whatever coping skills they have, whatever their source, even if they disagree with the Stoic position. (See Origen’s account of Chrysippus in Contra Celcum 8.51, and this blog post by John Sellars.)
In either case, such coaching requires significant skill and care. When a person is in emotional turmoil, it is important to avoid making them feel defensive, either about their philosophy or their own competence at practicing it. If Alice the Advanced Stoic were trying to help Bob the Buddhist, and Alice said something to Bob that make him feel defensive, then the attempt to help has just added insult to injury. Alice has made a mistake. On the other hand, if Alice helped remind Bob with the coping strategies he already accepts from Buddhism, and thereby helped him get himself together, then she has done well.
Stoic training can be divided into three topics or spheres of study: that of desire and aversion (sometimes called the “discipline of desire”), that of impulse (sometimes called the “discipline of action”) and that of assent.
The first two disciplines are intended to prepare the student of Stoicism to address the two kinds of answers to this question: the discipline of action is intended to help the student to make good decisions to act well in situations others find problematic (whether pleasant or unpleasant); while the discipline of desire is (in part) intended to make it easy to cope with problems they would otherwise find challenging.
From Epictetus’s Discourse 3.2 (Oldfather’s translation), speaking of the discipline of desire:
Among these the most important and especially pressing is that which has to do with the stronger emotions; for a strong emotion does not arise except a desire fails to attain its object, or an aversion falls into what it would avoid. This is the field of study which introduces to us confusions, tumults, misfortunes and calamities; and sorrows, lamentations, envies; and makes us envious and jealous—passions which make it impossible for us even to listen to reason.
In the Stoic’s psychological model, disruptive emotions (πάθος/pathos: “passions”) are always the result of mistaken judgements of things or events as good and bad. There are other emotions as well, emotions that are not the result of a mistaken judgement: initial “gut” reactions (e.g. jump scares), experiences of beauty (e.g. to a sunrise, the night sky, music, etc.), affection (without possessiveness, attachment, or dependency), and religious reverence are all examples of emotions that are not πάθος/pathos. The emotions that are not πάθος/pathos, however, are not disruptive, should not be avoided or prevented, and do not require “coping.”
The primary strategy the Stoics used to prevent disruptive emotions, then, was to avoid making these judgements. As put by Epictetus in Discourse 3.3:
Go out of the house at early dawn, and no matter whom you see or whom you hear, examine him and then answer as you would to a question. What did you see? A handsome man or a handsome woman? Apply your rule. Is it outside the province of the moral purpose, or inside? Outside. Away with it. What did you see? A man in grief over the death of his child? Apply your rule. Death lies outside the province of the moral purpose. Out of the way with it. Did a Consul meet you? Apply your rule. What sort of thing is a consulship? Outside the province of the moral purpose, or inside? Outside. Away with it, too, it does not meet the test; throw it away, it does not concern you. If we had kept doing this and had exercised ourselves from dawn till dark with this principle in mind,—by the gods, something would have been achieved! But as it is, we are caught gaping straightway at every external impression that comes along, and we wake up a little only during the lecture, if indeed we do so even then. After that is over we go out, and if we see a man in grief, we say, “It is all over with him”; if we see a Consul, we say, “Happy man”; if we see an exile, “Poor fellow”; or a poverty-stricken person, “Wretched man, he has nothing with which to get a bite to eat.” These, then, are the vicious judgements which we ought to eradicate; this is the subject upon which we ought to concentrate our efforts. Why, what is weeping and sighing? A judgement. What is misfortune? A judgement. What are strife, disagreement, faultfinding, accusing, impiety, foolishness? They are all judgements, and that, too, judgements about things that lie outside the province of moral purpose, assumed to be good or evil. Let a man but transfer his judgements to matters that lie within the province of the moral purpose, and I guarantee that he will be steadfast, whatever be the state of things about him.
Where Epictetus divides judgements into those concerning “moral purpose” (in this translation) and those outside of it, earlier Stoics divided them into those of virtue and vice, and those of externals. Being virtuous or vicious is the same thing as having one’s moral purpose in a good or bad state (Discourse 2.23), so Epictetus differs from his predecessors only in preferred terminology, not actual meaning.
Learning to avoid making these mistaken judgements is not just a matter of memorization: it is a skill, and a difficult one. Making these judgements is a habit, and one we reinforce repeatedly in daily life. Making only correct judgements is a skill which requires significant, deliberate practice (doing exercises designed to improve the skill). Only after many thousands of hours of practice at any challenging skill can a person perform well at the most difficult uses of it. As students learn, they become capable of the easiest tasks first, and initially do not appear to make much progress at all at the more difficult ones. It is by regularly applying the skill to at first easy and then incrementally more difficult uses that students become capable of coping with difficult ones.
There are many other relevant exercises as well; see the resources in the resources section.
The skills of how to act in any given situation are generally outside the scope of Stoic philosophy: it does not say what actions are most likely to produce a given result, or predict the consequences (intended or not) of any given course of action. However, it is a part of Stoic philosophy to provide training in how to decide among given courses of action, given an understanding of what the consequences will be.
The “discipline of action” is intended to train the student of Stoicism about καθῆκον/kathêkon, usually translated into English as “appropriate act” or “duty.” From Diogenes Laertius’s Lives and Opinions 7.104-109 (Chapter 60-62) (abridged, omissions indicated by ellipsis):
They also assert, that things indifferent are so spoken of in a twofold manner; firstly, those things are called so, which have no influence in producing either happiness or unhappiness; such for instance, as riches, glory, health, strength, and the like; for it is possible for a man to be happy without any of these things; and also, it is upon the character of the use that is made of them, that happiness or unhappiness depends. In another sense, those things are called indifferent, which do not excite any inclination or aversion, as for instance, the fact of a man’s having an odd or an even number of hairs on his head, or his putting out or drawing back his finger; for it is not in this sense that the things previously mentioned are called indifferent, for they do excite inclination or aversion…
Again, of things indifferent, they call some preferred (προηγμένα), and others rejected (ἀποπροηγμένα)… Those goods then are preferred, which have a value, as in the case of the mental goods, ability, skill, improvement, and the like; and in the case of the corporeal goods, life, health, strength, a good constitution, soundness, beauty; and in the case of external goods, riches, glory, nobility of birth, and the like. Rejected things are, in the case of qualities of the mind, stupidity, unskilfulness, and the like; in the case of circumstances affecting the body, death, disease, weakness, a bad constitution, mutilation, disgrace, and the like; in the case of external circumstances, poverty, want of reputation, ignoble birth, and the like…
Again, they say that that is duty, which is preferred, and which contains in itself reasonable arguments why we should prefer it; as for instance, its corresponding to the nature of life itself; and this argument extends to plants and animals, for even their nature is subject to the obligation of certain duties. And duty (τὸ καθῆκον) had this name given to it by Zeno, in the first instance, its appellation being derived from its coming to, or according to some people, ἀπὸ τοῦ κατά τινας ἥκειν; and its effect is something kindred to the preparations made by nature. Now of the things done according to inclination, some are duties, and some are contrary to duty; and some are neither duties nor contrary to duty. Those are duties, which reason selects to do, as for instance, to honour one’s parents, one’s brothers, one’s country, to gratify one’s friends. Those actions are contrary to duty, which reason does not choose; as for instance, to neglect one’s parents, to be indifferent to one’s brothers, to shirk assisting one’s friends, to be careless about the welfare of one’s country, and so on. Those are neither duties, nor contrary to duty, which reason neither selects to do, nor, on the other hand, repudiates, such actions, for instance, as to pick up straw, to hold a pen, or a comb, or things of that sort.
Again, there are some duties which do not depend on circumstances, and some which do. These do not depend on circumstances, to take care of one’s health, and of the sound state of one’s senses, and the like. Those which do depend on circumstances, are the mutilation of one’s members, the sacrificing of one’s property, and so on. And the case of those actions which are contrary to duty, is similar. Again, of duties, some are always such, and some are not always. What is always a duty, is to live in accordance with virtue; but to ask questions, to give answers, to walk, and the like, are not always duties. And the same statement holds good with respect to acts contrary to duty.
Although it is touched on by most of our surviving sources on Stoic philosophy (e.g. Diogenes Laertius, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca), most of them do not describe it in great depth. The most extensive descriptions we have are in the account of the views of the Stoic Panaetius of Rhodes given by Cicero in On Duties, and Seneca’s On Benefits and On Leisure. Based mostly on these sources, some significant elements of the Stoic view of duties included:
Making decisions according to Stoics guidelines such as these is itself a skill for which there are corresponding exercises. It requires self-awareness and analysis, both of which take time and thought, and are best performed in relaxed, dispassionate situations. Exercises develop this self-understanding ahead of time so that they can be applied when situations arise.
Stoic sages are (maybe hypothetical) people who meet the Stoic ideal. They never judge anything other than their own character (virtue or vice) to be good or bad, and so never experience disruptive emotions. They can get into all the same situations as anyone else can, but they do not need to “cope” with them: they never experience the disruptive emotions, and so have nothing to cope with.
From Epictetus’s Discourse 3.6:
The good man is invincible; naturally, for he enters no contest where he is not superior. “If you want my property in the country,” says he, “take it; take my servants, take my office, take my paltry body. But you will not make my desire fail to get what I will, nor my aversion fall into what I would avoid.” This is the only contest into which the good man enters, one, namely, that is concerned with the things which belong in the province of the moral purpose; how, then, can he help but be invincible?
From Seneca’s On the Firmness of the Wise Man chapter 5:
All injury implies a making less of that which it affects, and no one can sustain an injury without some loss either of his dignity, or of some part of his body, or of some of the things external to ourselves; but the wise man can lose nothing. He has invested everything in himself, has entrusted nothing to fortune, has his property in safety, and is content with virtue, which does not need casual accessories, and therefore can neither be increased or diminished; for virtue, as having attained to the highest position, has no room for addition to herself, and fortune can take nothing away save what she gave. Now fortune does not give virtue; therefore she does not take it away. Virtue is free, inviolable, not to be moved, not to be shaken, and so hardened against misfortunes that she cannot be bent, let alone overcome by them. She looks unfalteringly on while tortures are being prepared for her; she makes no change of countenance, whether misery or pleasure be offered to her. The wise man therefore can lose nothing of whose loss he will be sensible, for he is the property of virtue alone, from whom he never can be taken away. He enjoys all other things at the good pleasure of fortune; but who is grieved at the loss of what is not his own? If, injury can hurt none of those things which are the peculiar property of the wise man, because while his virtue is safe they are safe, then it is impossible that an injury should be done to a wise man. Demetrius, who was surnamed Poliorcetes, took Megara, and the philosopher Stilbo, when asked by him whether he had lost anything, answered, “No, I carry all my property about me.” Yet his inheritance had been given up to pillage, his daughters had been outraged by the enemy, his country had fallen under a foreign dominion, and it was the king, enthroned on high, surrounded by the spears of his victorious troops, who put this question to him; yet he struck the victory out of the king’s hands, and proved that, though the city was taken, he himself was not only unconquered but unharmed, for he bore with him those true goods which no one can lay hands upon. What was being plundered and carried away hither and thither he did not consider to be his own, but to be merely things which come and go at the caprice of fortune; therefore he had not loved them as his own, for the possession of all things which come from without is slippery and insecure.
… “Behold,” says he, “I am here to prove to you that although, under the direction of that destroyer of so many cities, walls may be shaken by the stroke of the ram, lofty towers may be suddenly brought low by galleries and hidden mines, and mounds arise so high as to rival the highest citadel, yet that no siege engines can be discovered which can shake a well-established mind.
This does not mean that sages do not experience emotions at all, only that they never experience emotions that interfere with virtuous action. Indeed, the freedom from disruptive emotions opens the door to elation and joy. From chapter 9:
The wise man escapes all this, since he knows not what it is to live for hope or for fear. Add to this, that no one receives an injury unmoved, but is disturbed by the feeling of it. Now, the man free from mistakes has no disturbance; he is master of himself, enjoying a deep and tranquil repose of mind; for if an injury reaches him it moves and rouses him. But the wise man is without anger, which is caused by the appearance of injury, and he could not be free from anger unless he were also free from injury, which he knows cannot be done to him; hence it is that he is so upright and cheerful, hence he is elate with constant joy.
Sages even experience unpleasant (“negative”) emotions, the impressions they decline to judge good or bad. From chapter 10:
Some other things strike the wise man, though they may not shake his principles, such as bodily pain and weakness, the loss of friends and children, and the ruin of his country in war-time. I do not say that the wise man does not feel these, for we do not ascribe to him the hardness of stone or iron; there is no virtue but is conscious of its own endurance. What then does he? He receives some blows, but when he has received them he rises superior to them, heals them, and brings them to an end; these more trivial things he does not even feel, nor does he make use of his accustomed fortitude in the endurance of evil against them, but either takes no notice of them or considers them to deserve to be laughed at.
and chapter 16:
He (Epicurus) says that injuries may be endured by the wise man, we say that they do not exist for him. Nor is there any reason why you should declare this to be repugnant to nature. We do not deny that it is an unpleasant thing to be beaten or struck, or to lose one of our limbs, but we say that none of these things are injuries. We do not take away from them the feeling of pain, but the name of “injury,” which cannot be received while our virtue is unimpaired.
and chapter 19:
it is not freedom to suffer nothing—we are mistaken—freedom consists in raising one’s mind superior to injuries and becoming a person whose pleasures come from himself alone, in separating oneself from external circumstances that one may not have to lead a disturbed life in fear of the laughter and tongues of all men; for if any man can offer an insult, who is there who cannot? The wise man and the would-be wise man will apply different remedies to this; for it is only those whose philosophical education is incomplete, and who still guide themselves by public opinion, who would suppose that they ought to spend their lives in the midst of insults and injuries; yet all things happen in a more endurable fashion to men who are prepared for them.
The concept of the sage is useful for providing a direction into work, but are regarded is either exceptionally rare, or a theoretical ideal only (depending on what Stoic you are reading). That one might never attain sagehood should not be overly discouraging. From Epictetus’s Discourse 1.2:
Why then, pray, if we are endowed by nature for such greatness, do not all men, or many, become like him? What, do all horses become swift, all dogs keen to follow the scent? What then? Because I have no natural gifts, shall I on that account give up my discipline? Far be it from me! Epictetus will not be better than Socrates; but if only I am not worse, that suffices me. For I shall not be a Milo, either, and yet I do not neglect my body; nor a Croesus, and yet I do not neglect my property; nor, in a word, is there any other field in which we give up the appropriate discipline merely from despair of attaining the highest.