1. Stoic phase: My Stoic phase ended 2 years ago after lasting about 3 years. This extract from Epictetus’s “Fragments” (1-2AD) exemplifies my problems with Stoicism, particularly that it can encourage people to be victims.pic.twitter.com/oCBOWes6TV
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3. However, as I found, the Stoical insistence of “doing your duty” even if it is not reciprocated is actually a recipe for people to take advantage and use you—particularly in the contemporary world where the idea of strict social obligations has broken down.
4. Nobody knows what their “duty” is anymore. In the corporate environment, applied Stoicism is a recipe for people to take advantage of you. You’ll be regarded as completely peculiar. In the personal world, it’s better to detach from people who damage you.
5. Epictetus was a slave, and his philosophy is almost a more complete slave morality than Christianity. I appreciate that we’re all bound by nature and life and have to accept that. But Epictetus really did make a virtue of necessity.
6. He had so little control over his life that he had to convince himself that all life was this way. Refusal to fight for your side or respect yourself is really foolish, but it’s what Stoics suggest. The best approach is to detach from the malicious. Remove trash.
7. A further problem with Stoicism is that we now have much more control over our environment than we did when Stoicism was formulated. People do take this too far, but science allows us a huge amount of control. Stoicism can easily segue into fatalism.
8. Epictetus also appeals to the wisdom of God/Nature, but we can’t see nature in this way anymore. We moderns can’t see Nature as being purposeful as Epictetus does. As with Lovecraft, we know it’s chaotic and that barely understand it.
9. We can’t go back to the comforting Roman view where Nature had a set purpose that we could adhere to. This undermines Stoicism, because the notion of Nature being ordered in a particular way is key to Stoicism.
10. Marcus Aurelius? Why did write his books. Was it because he thought that the Stoical doctrines would make for a docile population? Why has Stoicism been sold as a lifestyle brand (like Hygge) over the last few years? Why is it in CBT?
11. Stoicism is quite a good doctrine to teach to slaves...”Don’t complain. Accept your lot. Be kind to people who hit you.” It is, in a sense, the source of ressentiment. On the other hand, it has useful techniques to deal with pain. But my experience was the ultimately...
12. ...the self-abnegation turns in on you and eats you. You have to strike out and strike back. Stoicism can teach you to do this without caring, but actually following Sotical advice makes you small-souled and a self-hater.
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