The Art of Manliness - #537： How to Think Like a Roman Emperor

00:00:00.000 The Art of Manliness Podcast

00:00:30.000 His name is Donald Robertson and he's a Scottish philosopher and cognitive psychotherapist.

00:00:33.740 We begin our conversation discussing the history of Stoicism and the overlooked beliefs the Stoics had.

00:00:38.040 We then discuss the end goal of Stoicism and how it differed from other ancient philosophies like Aristotelian virtue ethics.

00:00:43.700 Donald then explains the Stoic approach to emotions and the common misconceptions people have about Stoicism in that regard.

00:00:49.060 We then dig into Stoic practices taken from Marcus Aurelius and discuss how modern cognitive psychology backs them up.

00:00:54.420 Donald then shares how the Stoics use language and daily meditations to manage their emotional life and how they went about the psychology of goal setting and dealing with success and failure.

00:01:02.500 After the show's over, check out our show notes at aom.is slash Marcus.

00:01:06.560 Donald joins me now via clearcast.io.

00:01:08.520 Donald Robertson, welcome to the show.

00:01:22.520 Thanks very much, Brett. It's a pleasure to be on.

00:01:24.660 So you are a psychologist and a philosopher and the author of the latest book, How to Think Like a Roman Emperor, the Stoic philosophy of Marcus Aurelius.

00:01:33.660 So I know our listeners are familiar with Stoicism, but I'm curious, how did you discover Stoicism?

00:01:39.440 Was your career as a psychologist, is that what led you to Stoicism or was it something else?

00:01:44.600 Well, I'm actually a cognitive behavioral psychotherapist and I kind of got into Stoicism around the same time that I began training in therapy.

00:01:53.260 So really the whole story started when I was a teenager.

00:01:56.620 My father passed away when I was about 13 years old and I was kind of searching for meaning.

00:02:02.160 So I started reading lots of self-help books and stuff like that and I started reading religious texts.

00:02:08.100 I started looking at Christian Gnosticism and the Gnostics were influenced by Plato and the Neoplatonists.

00:02:13.900 So that got me into reading the classics and I went to university and studied philosophy.

00:02:18.560 And I was really searching for a way to bring together my interests in self-improvement and philosophy and kind of understanding the meaning of life and all that kind of stuff.

00:02:27.800 And it was only really after I graduated from philosophy that I stumbled across the Stoics.

00:02:33.020 I went back to read more about Neoplatonism and I found a book about Plotinus, the Neoplatonist, by a French scholar called Pierre Hadot.

00:02:41.800 And Hadot focused on identifying the psychological or spiritual exercises that he found in the classics.

00:02:48.660 And I immediately realized that these were similar to techniques that we use in modern psychotherapy.

00:02:53.640 And I kind of had an epiphany and I realized that the stuff that Hadot was talking about in classical philosophy dovetailed very neatly with modern psychotherapy.

00:03:03.860 So I started researching that area.

00:03:06.360 And so did you start, it was like a crossover with Stoicism into your career as a psychotherapist?

00:03:11.160 Yeah, I mean, cognitive behavioral psychotherapy was originally kind of inspired by Stoic philosophy.

00:03:18.580 Albert Ellis, who developed this thing called Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy or REBT in the 1950s, he was the main precursor or pioneer of modern CBT.

00:03:28.840 And he was originally a psychoanalyst, but he became disillusioned with Freudianism and psychoanalysis.

00:03:34.220 He kind of gave up on it and tried to start again from scratch, which I always think is a really admirable thing for somebody to do in the middle of their career.

00:03:41.700 You know, he thought, I'm going to have to reinvent this.

00:03:43.600 It's not quite working for me.

00:03:45.000 And he'd read the Stoics as a teenager and he started to draw inspiration from Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus in developing this new cognitive approach to psychotherapy.

00:03:55.320 So all cognitive behavioral therapists actually know a famous quote from Epictetus, which we're bound to talk about today, which is, it's not things that upset us, but our opinions about things.

00:04:07.880 And that encapsulates what we call the cognitive theory of emotion.

00:04:11.680 The idea that our emotions are largely, if not exclusively, shaped or determined by certain underlying beliefs.

00:04:18.460 And as soon as we view emotion in that way, it opens up a whole repertoire of therapeutic techniques, because we can start asking people what the beliefs are that underlie their emotions.

00:04:27.440 We can heighten their awareness of those and we can start questioning the evidence for and against the beliefs that shape their emotions.

00:04:33.740 So that allows us to do cognitive therapy.

00:04:36.300 And that was normally introduced to clients in a simple way, just by teaching them that quotation from the Stoic Epictetus.

00:04:43.140 Well, let's talk about Stoicism now.

00:04:44.760 You use Marcus Aurelius to explore Stoic ethics and practices.

00:04:49.620 Before we get to his life, because he was the last of the great Roman Stoics, we're kind of starting at the end there.

00:04:55.820 There's a whole history of Stoicism before that.

00:04:57.980 Can you give us sort of a brief thumbnail history of Stoicism?

00:05:01.900 Like, where did it start?

00:05:03.060 Who were the founders?

00:05:04.480 And all that.

00:05:05.260 Okay, let's compress 500 years of history.

00:05:08.140 You can do it.

00:05:09.160 30 seconds or something, right?

00:05:11.080 Because, well, the first thing is, Stoicism lasted five centuries.

00:05:13.460 It was founded in 301 BC by a Phoenician merchant called Zeno of Citium, who was shipwrecked near Athens.

00:05:22.220 And he studied the different philosophies in Athens at the time.

00:05:25.840 And he was particularly inspired by Socrates.

00:05:28.320 There's a bit of debate about this, but I believe that Stoicism is a Socratic philosophy.

00:05:33.680 It's a kind of resurgence of the original Socratic philosophy.

00:05:37.020 That's how I think many Stoics saw what they were doing.

00:05:39.680 And Zeno founded the school of philosophy, and it continued for many centuries all the way down to Marcus Aurelius.

00:05:47.740 And he'd originally trained as a cynic philosopher, like Diogenes the Cynic, in that tradition.

00:05:52.900 And the Stoic school was very egalitarian.

00:05:56.980 The Stoa poikale is a kind of porch or an arcade where he lectured on the edge of the Agora, the Athenian marketplace, where Socrates had taught before him.

00:06:06.840 So it was out in public.

00:06:08.460 And the Stoics taught men and women and Athenian citizens and foreigners and rich and poor.

00:06:13.740 It was much more open than other schools of philosophy, which had retreated to the gymnasia, kind of like retreating to the ivory towers.

00:06:20.740 So Socrates had taught in the marketplace.

00:06:22.900 The Stoics basically did the same thing.

00:06:24.820 And you could say the very name of Stoicism kind of implies a philosophy of the street, as it were.

00:06:30.020 It took place out in the marketplace, once again, where Socrates had previously taught.

00:06:34.920 And the Stoics' main idea is that virtue, which we'll probably come back to and elaborate on more,

00:06:39.580 but the essence of it is that the goal of life is attaining a kind of moral wisdom that improves our character.

00:06:46.120 And the Stoics call that arate, or it's usually translated as virtue or excellence of character.

00:06:52.700 So the most important thing in life is a sort of self-improvement that strengthens and improves our character.

00:06:58.540 And it's synonymous with a kind of practical or moral wisdom.

00:07:01.880 And so therefore, the Stoics are relatively indifferent to the ups and downs of external fortune, poverty or success, friends and enemies.

00:07:10.740 These things are seen as less important compared to our own strength of character.

00:07:16.200 And how did Stoicism go from Greece to Rome 500 years later?

00:07:21.360 Well, funnily enough, there's a simple explanation for that.

00:07:24.400 There was a succession of leaders who took over the Stoic school.

00:07:29.140 And one of them, a guy called Diogenes of Babylon in 155 BC,

00:07:34.460 went on an ambassadorial mission from Greece to Rome, along with a couple of other philosophers.

00:07:40.480 And he became a kind of celebrity.

00:07:42.180 The Romans thought it was really interesting that he was bringing Greek culture to Rome for the first time

00:07:47.700 and teaching them about this weird philosophy called Stoicism.

00:07:52.040 And of the various philosophers that came to Rome, the Stoics had the biggest impact, in a sense,

00:07:57.340 because the Romans felt that Stoicism really resonated with traditional Roman Republican values.

00:08:03.480 And so Stoicism became trendy at Rome.

00:08:07.140 And shortly after that, a famous Roman statesman in general called Scipio Africanus, or Africanus the Younger,

00:08:14.600 became a follower of Stoicism and a circle, an intellectual circle that surrounded him,

00:08:19.680 called the Scipionic Circle, embraced Stoicism.

00:08:22.960 And then that became a tradition of Roman noblemen, politicians, intellectuals embracing Stoicism,

00:08:28.620 all the way down to Marcus Aurelius.

00:08:30.780 So yeah, Cato, Seneca, other examples of statesmen and philosophers.

00:08:35.200 Well, maybe we can get this in a little bit later, but I imagine,

00:08:38.060 did Stoicism change from when it went from Greece to Rome?

00:08:41.380 It's not set in stone.

00:08:43.380 The Stoic philosophers have been willing to change it, to refine it.

00:08:47.720 No, they argued with each other.

00:08:49.460 There were schisms within the school.

00:08:50.940 So we know that there was a certain amount of flexibility in the school.

00:08:53.820 And it was around for such a long time that, you know, I mean,

00:08:57.000 Psychonarsus is only really around for like, you know, less than 100 years.

00:09:00.960 Stoicism is five centuries.

00:09:02.380 So it had to kind of evolve.

00:09:03.980 And it spread all over the place throughout the empire.

00:09:07.620 But we can't, it's difficult for us to pinpoint exactly how it changed,

00:09:11.100 because hardly any of the early Stoic texts survive.

00:09:14.920 Most of the main texts that we have,

00:09:17.000 all of the main texts really come from the late Roman period,

00:09:20.580 the Roman imperial era, like Seneca and Marcus Aurelius and so on.

00:09:24.560 So we can kind of infer that the earlier Stoics were sort of more interested in logic and stuff.

00:09:31.280 And the later Stoics seem more interested in philosophy as a way of life or ethics.

00:09:36.100 But it's not entirely clear how significant that difference is,

00:09:40.020 because we don't know that much about the early Stoics, unfortunately.

00:09:43.620 So when people think of Stoicism today, they often think about the ethics, right?

00:09:46.660 How to live a good life.

00:09:47.980 But there was, as you said, there was Stoic logic,

00:09:50.940 there was Stoic metaphysics, a Stoic theology.

00:09:53.460 I'm curious, did those things, like the metaphysics of Stoics,

00:09:56.700 or their theology, if you want to call it that,

00:09:58.600 did that influence their ethics?

00:10:00.440 Yeah, it did.

00:10:01.580 And, you know, like, I mean, we should say that the Stoics thought of their curriculum,

00:10:06.620 like their philosophy is consisting of these three chunks,

00:10:09.660 like physics, ethics, and logic.

00:10:11.800 And they thought of them as being closely interconnected in a number of ways.

00:10:16.540 And again, we know more about Stoic ethics,

00:10:18.940 because the books that survive are mainly dealing with that aspect of Stoicism.

00:10:23.340 And our knowledge of physics in Stoicism is a bit more fragmentary.

00:10:27.120 Stoic logic, we only really know a few fragments about from other authors, really.

00:10:32.500 But let's take the physics for a start.

00:10:34.620 The essence of it really is that Stoics were pantheists.

00:10:37.400 And that means that they believed that the whole universe,

00:10:41.080 the universe in its totality, is sacred and divine.

00:10:45.000 So it's a kind of more naturalistic conception of God.

00:10:48.700 God isn't this kind of guy sitting in a cloud,

00:10:51.260 or this mysterious metaphysical being in another realm.

00:10:55.080 You know, God is just the universe considered as a whole.

00:10:58.180 And so they refer to that as nature,

00:11:00.300 which is also synonymous for them with Zeus.

00:11:03.020 Zeus is just the kind of personification of nature as a whole.

00:11:06.020 And so Stoicism was this kind of strange, materialistic, pantheistic,

00:11:10.860 kind of slightly mystical philosophy.

00:11:13.480 But one of the implications of that is that the Stoics,

00:11:16.060 particularly Marcus Aurelius,

00:11:17.720 think that one of the big risks that we run in life

00:11:20.320 is becoming alienated or isolated from the bigger picture.

00:11:25.280 So one of the goals of Stoicism is to develop a greater sense of oneness

00:11:29.600 with the universe as a whole,

00:11:31.720 and a greater sense of kinship or oneness with the rest of humanity.

00:11:35.180 And so they think that kind of underlies our moral and our spiritual development.

00:11:40.120 It's linked in with this metaphysical vision that the reality for us

00:11:44.520 and what's sacred is the totality considered as a whole.

00:11:48.040 There's parallels there to like Eastern philosophies like Buddhism.

00:11:51.260 Oh yeah, totally.

00:11:52.240 I mean, from a modern perspective,

00:11:54.120 Stoicism and other Hellenistic philosophies,

00:11:56.700 you know, appear like yoga or Buddhism or something like that,

00:12:00.000 or other mystical religions from the East.

00:12:02.440 Although we can also see differences between these different traditions.

00:12:07.360 And then in terms of logic, funnily enough, having said that,

00:12:10.280 the Stoics were way ahead of their time.

00:12:13.180 They developed a kind of propositional logic,

00:12:15.560 which was only really rediscovered in the late 19th century

00:12:19.020 by people like Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein, for example.

00:12:22.460 So like modern logic is very indebted to the Stoics.

00:12:26.200 It's really a resurgence of something they discovered nearly two and a half thousand years ago.

00:12:30.920 But for them, logic was broader than what we think of as formal logic today.

00:12:35.600 So it included doing the kind of logical,

00:12:39.000 something a precursor of what we think of as formal or propositional logic today.

00:12:43.800 But it also encompassed thinking about the nature of language and reasoning in a wider sense.

00:12:50.640 It also encompassed the use of language and rhetoric

00:12:53.260 and understanding the relationship between thought and reality, for instance.

00:12:57.460 So the way that that intersects with ethics

00:12:59.720 is that the Stoics thought it was important to apply logic to everyday problems,

00:13:04.860 not just use it in a kind of abstract sense.

00:13:07.340 So they would practice thinking rationally and logically

00:13:10.120 about moral problems that they faced on a day-to-day basis.

00:13:14.340 So in a sense, Stoicism is also a philosophy

00:13:16.600 that's about thinking clearly and rationally about everyday life

00:13:20.480 and embracing a sort of realism and objectivity

00:13:23.640 and a sense of the bigger picture in our thinking.

00:13:26.680 And we'll get into the intersection of language and the ethics here in a bit,

00:13:29.940 because I thought that was an interesting section you had in the book.

00:13:31.700 Well, let's talk about the ethics.

00:13:32.600 So you mentioned earlier the telos, right, or telos,

00:13:37.180 as Aristotle would say of Stoic ethics,

00:13:39.420 is erite, or virtue, or excellence.

00:13:42.800 I mean, so I mentioned Aristotle.

00:13:44.480 Was the Stoic concept of virtue,

00:13:46.540 was it similar to Aristotelian virtue, or was it different?

00:13:50.140 Well, from our perspective, we might see them as kind of similar,

00:13:53.060 but in the ancient world,

00:13:53.900 they were viewed as fundamentally competing philosophies.

00:13:57.540 One of the cool things about ancient philosophy

00:13:59.340 is that people thought of different schools of philosophy

00:14:03.600 as representing fundamentally different

00:14:05.420 different kind of perennial attitudes towards the meaning of life.

00:14:10.160 So Aristotle, for instance, thought that the goal,

00:14:13.660 or it seems this is what Aristotle taught anyway,

00:14:15.880 certainly his students taught this.

00:14:17.820 The Aristotelian school thought that the goal of life

00:14:20.160 was to have a kind of combination

00:14:21.900 of internal and external goods.

00:14:25.120 So by internal goods, we mean strength of character,

00:14:27.480 wisdom, virtue, and so on.

00:14:29.320 But they also thought it was important to have friends

00:14:31.180 and wealth and material possessions and stuff like that.

00:14:35.440 And the Stoics question that,

00:14:37.120 but they question it in a kind of subtle way.

00:14:39.520 So for Stoics, external stuff is important,

00:14:42.220 but it's not essential to the goal of life.

00:14:45.280 So somebody can attain complete fulfillment in life,

00:14:48.220 according to the Stoics,

00:14:49.600 even if they're surrounded by enemies,

00:14:51.980 they're sickly and persecuted,

00:14:54.200 and they're living in poverty.

00:14:55.740 For instance, Socrates,

00:14:57.760 who was persecuted politically and executed

00:14:59.920 and lived in poverty.

00:15:02.180 So the Stoics would say,

00:15:03.040 well, giving him money and more friends

00:15:04.720 and greater reputation

00:15:06.040 wouldn't necessarily make Socrates' life better.

00:15:09.920 In a sense, what made him a great man

00:15:12.180 and what made his life so fulfilling

00:15:13.700 was that he faced all these disadvantages

00:15:15.880 and he engaged them with strength of character and wisdom.

00:15:20.120 And how did the Stoics figure out

00:15:22.140 what was good or virtuous

00:15:24.100 or what was bad or vice, right?

00:15:26.280 So Aristotle had his, you know,

00:15:27.520 sort of idea of using the golden mean

00:15:29.580 to sort of figure out like

00:15:30.440 the right thing to do at the right time

00:15:32.000 for the right reason.

00:15:33.320 So it was kind of situational in a way.

00:15:35.060 Was the Stoic, was it a little more,

00:15:36.860 I don't know what's the right word,

00:15:37.780 not situational,

00:15:38.580 but like sort of more of a platonic ideal

00:15:40.300 that Socrates talked about?

00:15:42.680 I mean, for the Stoics,

00:15:44.240 there's two aspects to it.

00:15:45.440 In one sense, it's much simpler.

00:15:47.840 In another sense, it's more complex.

00:15:49.880 So for the Stoics, very simply,

00:15:52.060 the most important thing in any situation

00:15:54.520 is to act with wisdom and justice

00:15:56.680 or to, you know, to act with virtue,

00:15:58.940 moral, practical wisdom as they understand it.

00:16:01.160 So our character, our intentions

00:16:03.580 are the most important thing in any situation.

00:16:06.140 And then whether we succeed or fail

00:16:08.240 and whatever fate befalls us

00:16:09.840 is relatively trivial by comparison.

00:16:12.900 But what it actually means

00:16:15.100 to act with wisdom and justice

00:16:16.880 might vary from situation to situation.

00:16:19.900 And different Stoics may actually disagree

00:16:21.620 with each other

00:16:22.520 about what would constitute justice

00:16:24.960 in different situations.

00:16:26.800 So they would say, look, you know,

00:16:27.920 it may be that sometimes

00:16:28.720 we can't say for certain

00:16:29.980 whether it's virtuous

00:16:30.900 to give money to a beggar

00:16:33.320 in the street or not.

00:16:34.620 You know, because there's things about it

00:16:35.740 that we might be uncertain

00:16:37.340 about the outcome, for example.

00:16:39.580 You know, there are elements

00:16:40.560 of judgments of probability and so on.

00:16:42.680 It's a complex question.

00:16:44.300 There's not what kind of

00:16:44.980 one-size-fits-all answer, maybe.

00:16:46.860 But the key thing is

00:16:47.860 that we're acting with the intention

00:16:49.480 fundamentally to do good.

00:16:51.220 And that's the overriding concern

00:16:53.540 for Stoics.

00:16:54.680 And how we apply that in practice

00:16:56.300 is something that might be up for debate.

00:16:59.760 So you mentioned earlier that

00:17:00.680 so Aristotle, his idea of the good life,

00:17:03.040 of flourishing life, eudaimonia,

00:17:04.380 was a combination of internal factors

00:17:06.700 and external factors, right?

00:17:08.000 For Aristotle, the idea was

00:17:09.340 to become like this Greek gentleman,

00:17:11.020 which required you to have health,

00:17:12.560 wealth, reputation, etc.

00:17:14.640 The Stoics, contrary to, I think,

00:17:16.680 popular belief,

00:17:17.620 like they weren't against those things.

00:17:19.760 They just treated them differently.

00:17:22.540 How did they approach

00:17:24.320 those sort of external things of life?

00:17:26.920 Well, the best explanation for us,

00:17:28.780 in a way, is in Socrates,

00:17:30.420 in the dialogues that we have

00:17:32.540 from Xenophon and Plato.

00:17:34.320 In Socrates, we kind of get more arguments

00:17:36.480 for some of these ideas,

00:17:38.140 which we see the Stoics then

00:17:39.440 putting into practice, as it were.

00:17:41.940 So, and the Stoics are influenced

00:17:43.800 by these arguments provided by Socrates

00:17:45.420 and other earlier philosophers.

00:17:46.620 So, in one of the dialogues

00:17:47.820 called the Euthydemus,

00:17:49.440 Socrates argues that, look,

00:17:51.140 people think that wealth

00:17:52.740 and friends and health

00:17:54.700 and all these kind of external things

00:17:56.080 constitute good fortune,

00:17:57.680 like they're good things.

00:17:59.200 But Socrates says, look,

00:18:00.500 all of these things could be used badly

00:18:02.660 by a foolish person

00:18:03.940 or a vicious, a bad person.

00:18:06.480 You know, money, for example,

00:18:07.640 is an easy example.

00:18:09.060 So, in the hands of a wise and good person,

00:18:11.660 money can be used philanthropically

00:18:13.320 to do good and wise, prudent things.

00:18:15.960 But in the hands of a foolish person,

00:18:18.220 money can be used to do

00:18:19.820 lots of foolish and terrible things.

00:18:22.260 So, these external goods

00:18:24.000 are actually not really

00:18:25.060 intrinsically good in themselves.

00:18:27.440 They just offer us practical advantages

00:18:29.920 or opportunities

00:18:31.360 to exercise more control

00:18:33.240 over our environment.

00:18:34.820 And that could be done well

00:18:35.920 or it could be done badly.

00:18:37.540 And so Socrates concludes from that

00:18:39.140 that the only truly good thing

00:18:40.680 is wisdom itself

00:18:41.820 because that determines

00:18:43.060 whether we use other things well

00:18:44.840 or whether we use them badly.

00:18:46.780 So, these external things

00:18:47.620 are indifference, right?

00:18:48.900 And there's preferred indifference.

00:18:50.900 So, that's like health, money, etc.

00:18:53.080 And there's like, you know,

00:18:54.140 unpreferred or dispreferred indifference.

00:18:56.340 So, that'd be things like

00:18:56.920 sickness or poverty.

00:18:58.900 Yeah.

00:18:59.100 So, you don't want sickness or poverty,

00:19:00.580 but you're not going to get upset

00:19:01.660 if that happens.

00:19:02.580 Or you want health and wealth,

00:19:04.520 you'd prefer that,

00:19:05.220 but you're not going to, you know,

00:19:06.860 spend all your time and energy

00:19:08.020 going after it.

00:19:09.040 And also, it's variable.

00:19:10.780 Like, it's reasonable

00:19:12.280 to pursue the preferred things

00:19:14.220 and avoid the dispreferred things.

00:19:16.300 So, it's reasonable to pursue wealth

00:19:17.680 and avoid poverty

00:19:18.840 within certain limits,

00:19:20.640 according to the Stoics.

00:19:22.040 So, you know,

00:19:22.780 the limitless pursuit of wealth

00:19:24.320 would be irrational,

00:19:25.340 according to them.

00:19:26.660 And, you know,

00:19:27.540 sometimes enduring poverty

00:19:29.700 might actually strengthen

00:19:31.000 our character.

00:19:31.820 It might be a good thing.

00:19:33.160 And likewise, we avoid pain.

00:19:35.260 It's reasonable to do that.

00:19:36.560 But sometimes enduring pain

00:19:37.920 and discomfort

00:19:38.580 might be good for our health.

00:19:40.580 It might strengthen us,

00:19:41.700 like taking cold showers

00:19:42.860 and things like that

00:19:43.840 might be something that people do

00:19:45.100 because they think it's beneficial.

00:19:46.740 Or undergoing surgery

00:19:47.880 might be painful,

00:19:48.760 but we do it

00:19:49.480 because it's beneficial for us.

00:19:51.300 So, the Stoics would say

00:19:52.320 it's kind of variable

00:19:53.540 and we need to use reason

00:19:54.900 to judge when something's preferred

00:19:57.080 and when it's dispreferred,

00:19:58.420 although we can make

00:19:59.080 sort of broad generalizations

00:20:00.300 about them.

00:20:01.500 So, a large part of Stoic ethics

00:20:03.180 is about managing emotions,

00:20:05.980 desires,

00:20:06.900 one of those emotions,

00:20:08.200 anger, worry, etc.

00:20:10.480 How did the Stoic,

00:20:11.540 and this is kind of where

00:20:12.040 that intersection with your work

00:20:13.700 as a psychotherapist comes in,

00:20:15.480 what was the Stoic approach

00:20:16.980 to emotions

00:20:17.800 and what are some of the

00:20:18.660 misconceptions people have

00:20:20.040 about Stoics and emotions?

00:20:21.920 Well, I guess the main misconception

00:20:23.220 is that people think

00:20:24.220 Stoics are unemotional

00:20:25.300 and I should probably explain,

00:20:26.840 the easiest way to explain that

00:20:27.980 is, you know,

00:20:29.060 many terms from Greek philosophy

00:20:31.100 degenerated in their meaning

00:20:33.060 over time, right?

00:20:34.060 And we usually denote that

00:20:35.880 by using a capital letter

00:20:37.820 or writing them

00:20:38.860 in lowercase letters.

00:20:40.520 So, Epicureanism

00:20:42.020 with an uppercase E

00:20:43.600 capitalized

00:20:44.960 is a Greek school of philosophy

00:20:46.840 that's kind of nuanced

00:20:48.360 and complex.

00:20:49.780 But to be an Epicurean today

00:20:51.460 with a lowercase E

00:20:52.700 just means like enjoying

00:20:54.100 expensive food and stuff

00:20:55.500 like being a gourmet or whatever.

00:20:57.440 So, it's a much more simplistic,

00:20:58.960 it's almost a caricature

00:20:59.760 of the original idea.

00:21:01.480 And the same is true of Stoicism.

00:21:02.540 When we talk about someone

00:21:03.480 being Stoic today

00:21:04.520 with a lowercase S,

00:21:06.000 we just mean that

00:21:06.680 they're kind of tough-minded,

00:21:08.080 unemotional,

00:21:09.180 they've got a stiff upper lip.

00:21:10.780 And that's, you know,

00:21:12.360 Stoicism with a capital S

00:21:13.500 is, as we've seen already,

00:21:14.840 this big, complex,

00:21:16.500 500-year school of philosophy

00:21:18.260 that embraces physics,

00:21:20.040 ethics, and logic

00:21:20.840 and is much more nuanced

00:21:22.000 in its approach.

00:21:23.380 And actually, being Stoic

00:21:25.040 with a lowercase S

00:21:26.380 not only is a simplification

00:21:28.560 of what Stoicism says

00:21:29.700 about emotions,

00:21:30.220 but it might actually

00:21:31.000 fly in the face

00:21:32.360 sometimes of what

00:21:33.480 the Stoics were advising.

00:21:35.020 So, someone who's trying

00:21:35.880 to be Stoic

00:21:36.660 might try to conceal

00:21:37.880 or suppress painful emotions.

00:21:40.460 And that's against Stoicism.

00:21:42.160 The Stoics believe that

00:21:43.420 the initial involuntary

00:21:45.980 aspect of emotion,

00:21:47.180 which they call

00:21:47.660 propotheiae,

00:21:49.120 the proto-passions

00:21:50.240 or first movements,

00:21:51.860 are indifferent.

00:21:53.260 They're neither good nor bad.

00:21:54.580 And so, we should accept them

00:21:55.660 as natural

00:21:56.440 and kind of embrace them,

00:21:58.040 let them wash over us

00:21:59.000 in a sense.

00:22:00.140 And what they're really

00:22:00.840 concerned with

00:22:01.500 is getting us to change

00:22:02.600 what happens next,

00:22:04.200 the way we respond

00:22:05.440 to our initial

00:22:06.460 emotional reactions.

00:22:08.200 Do we perpetuate them?

00:22:09.880 Do we amplify them?

00:22:11.720 Or do we start to

00:22:12.560 question them

00:22:13.340 and reappraise them?

00:22:14.660 And that's exactly

00:22:15.420 what we do

00:22:15.920 in cognitive therapy.

00:22:17.260 We teach people

00:22:17.920 to accept

00:22:19.380 their automatic

00:22:20.500 thoughts and feelings

00:22:21.700 because they're

00:22:22.880 outside of their

00:22:23.640 direct control

00:22:24.420 to allow themselves

00:22:26.160 to embrace those feelings

00:22:27.380 rather than trying

00:22:28.080 to deny or suppress them,

00:22:29.820 but then to change

00:22:30.740 how they subsequently

00:22:31.760 respond to them.

00:22:32.900 So, you know,

00:22:33.760 when people are depressed

00:22:34.600 or angry,

00:22:35.260 they tend to ruminate,

00:22:36.540 they dwell on negative thoughts

00:22:37.860 and amplify them.

00:22:39.240 But that's under

00:22:39.820 voluntary control.

00:22:40.720 We can stop doing that

00:22:41.820 or change the way

00:22:42.560 that we think about things.

00:22:44.180 And the Stoics,

00:22:44.840 rather than trying

00:22:45.400 to eliminate

00:22:46.120 all negative emotions,

00:22:48.040 want us,

00:22:48.820 first of all,

00:22:49.220 to kind of

00:22:49.700 be indifferent to us

00:22:51.040 and accept

00:22:51.620 these automatic

00:22:52.480 initial reactions.

00:22:53.660 But they also want us

00:22:54.960 to question

00:22:55.700 our unhealthy,

00:22:57.220 irrational,

00:22:57.840 and excessive emotions,

00:22:59.200 such as extreme anger,

00:23:01.120 and replace those

00:23:02.400 with healthy emotions,

00:23:03.760 which they call

00:23:04.500 the eupathiae.

00:23:05.880 So love

00:23:06.720 and joy

00:23:07.980 and variations

00:23:09.060 of those feelings

00:23:09.840 and also even

00:23:10.600 a healthy feeling

00:23:11.560 of shame

00:23:12.240 or aversion.

00:23:13.460 So they think

00:23:13.980 a wise man

00:23:14.680 has a natural feeling

00:23:15.800 of aversion

00:23:16.840 to doing things

00:23:17.760 that are dishonorable

00:23:18.640 or beneath him.

00:23:19.940 So they think

00:23:20.480 even certain painful emotions

00:23:22.060 might be healthy for us

00:23:23.480 and consistent with wisdom.

00:23:25.240 So the ideal for a Stoic

00:23:26.520 isn't to be unemotional,

00:23:28.180 it's to rather replace

00:23:30.200 unhealthy emotions

00:23:31.280 with healthy ones.

00:23:32.540 We're going to take a quick break

00:23:33.180 for your word

00:23:33.620 from our sponsors.

00:23:35.560 And now back to the show.

00:23:37.860 Was there ever an instance

00:23:38.820 where the Stoics would say

00:23:39.620 that maybe anger

00:23:40.640 was useful?

00:23:41.620 Like Aristotle would say

00:23:42.960 anger is not completely

00:23:44.000 useless or bad.

00:23:45.900 As long as you have it

00:23:46.600 in the right place

00:23:47.120 at the right time

00:23:47.780 for the right reason,

00:23:48.680 anger can be productive.

00:23:50.160 Do the Stoics have that idea

00:23:51.220 or were they,

00:23:51.880 they say,

00:23:52.300 yeah,

00:23:52.460 anger just,

00:23:52.980 it's not even useful,

00:23:54.360 don't even go there.

00:23:55.580 Yeah,

00:23:55.740 they disagree with Aristotle.

00:23:57.300 It's really cool actually

00:23:58.400 that we have this debate

00:23:59.440 in the ancient world

00:24:00.300 because even today

00:24:01.040 people still can argue

00:24:01.980 about this a bit.

00:24:03.120 So it's a cool debate,

00:24:04.240 it's an interesting debate.

00:24:05.900 And Seneca wrote

00:24:06.820 a whole book

00:24:07.560 called On Anger.

00:24:08.620 The Stoics were really

00:24:09.580 interested in anger.

00:24:11.180 Today,

00:24:12.160 psychotherapists

00:24:12.740 are mainly interested

00:24:13.760 in depression

00:24:14.700 and anxiety

00:24:15.540 and less so in anger.

00:24:17.580 The Stoics were more

00:24:18.400 interested in anger

00:24:19.240 than any other emotion.

00:24:21.080 Marcus Aurelius

00:24:21.840 talks about it a lot

00:24:23.060 and Seneca

00:24:23.800 has this whole book

00:24:24.820 on it that comes down

00:24:25.580 to us today.

00:24:26.520 And in that book

00:24:27.060 he talks about

00:24:27.800 Aristotle's idea

00:24:28.820 that a certain amount

00:24:29.780 of anger might be useful

00:24:30.840 or healthy

00:24:31.660 and Seneca says,

00:24:33.140 no,

00:24:33.760 he disagrees with that idea.

00:24:35.740 But he disagrees

00:24:36.500 for very subtle reasons

00:24:38.120 which kind of depend

00:24:39.820 on the Stoics'

00:24:40.660 definition of anger.

00:24:42.260 So the Stoics

00:24:42.880 define the emotions

00:24:44.240 cognitively

00:24:45.460 based on the underlying

00:24:47.060 beliefs that shape them.

00:24:48.540 And so the Stoic theory,

00:24:50.600 and we do this

00:24:51.160 in modern cognitive therapy

00:24:52.260 as well,

00:24:53.040 it's the Stoic theory

00:24:53.740 that anger

00:24:54.640 as they define it

00:24:56.600 is based on the belief

00:24:58.980 that someone deserves

00:25:00.400 to be punished

00:25:01.440 or harmed,

00:25:02.960 in other words,

00:25:04.040 for a perceived injury

00:25:05.360 or transgression.

00:25:07.640 And, you know,

00:25:08.160 it's about revenge,

00:25:09.380 basically.

00:25:09.820 Anger fundamentally

00:25:10.860 is the desire for revenge,

00:25:12.580 the Stoics would say.

00:25:13.900 And they would argue

00:25:14.580 that it's never rational

00:25:15.840 to fundamentally

00:25:16.840 want to harm another person.

00:25:18.900 Now, you might punish

00:25:19.980 someone in a more

00:25:20.640 superficial sense

00:25:21.620 if you think

00:25:22.600 it's going to reform them

00:25:23.780 or educate them

00:25:24.740 or be in their interests,

00:25:26.300 but that would be different

00:25:27.060 because there,

00:25:27.960 your fundamental goal

00:25:29.240 is actually to help

00:25:30.380 the other person

00:25:31.140 to educate or improve them.

00:25:33.260 But if your fundamental goal

00:25:34.800 is to try and hurt them,

00:25:36.560 the Stoics would think

00:25:37.180 that's really what anger

00:25:37.960 is about.

00:25:38.540 It's harming someone

00:25:39.340 for the sake of it

00:25:40.120 and it's never rational

00:25:41.320 or justifiable

00:25:42.100 to want to do that.

00:25:43.960 And so they say

00:25:44.760 there might be things

00:25:45.340 that resemble anger,

00:25:46.520 but they don't fit

00:25:47.220 our definition.

00:25:48.580 And Seneca even at one point

00:25:49.660 says, look,

00:25:50.540 people, if someone comes up

00:25:51.740 and punches you in the face,

00:25:52.860 you're going to have,

00:25:53.680 your blood pressure's going to rise

00:25:54.940 and you have this kind of

00:25:56.080 animal-like reaction

00:25:57.280 of anger

00:25:57.960 that's automatic.

00:25:59.440 And Seneca says

00:26:00.020 that's not really anger

00:26:00.880 in the sense

00:26:01.380 that we were talking about.

00:26:02.740 That's an automatic reaction

00:26:04.340 and we treat that

00:26:05.320 as inevitable

00:26:05.880 and natural,

00:26:06.900 but we would then question

00:26:08.620 how we're going to respond next

00:26:10.360 and whether we want

00:26:11.100 to lash out

00:26:11.700 and harm the other person

00:26:12.660 or whether we want

00:26:13.700 to try and understand

00:26:14.960 what's going on

00:26:15.620 and rectify things

00:26:16.620 in a rational way.

00:26:17.640 Okay, so yeah,

00:26:18.780 the Stoics,

00:26:19.400 not against emotion,

00:26:20.720 but they want people

00:26:21.600 to think about it,

00:26:22.620 reason their emotions out.

00:26:25.240 All right,

00:26:25.480 so that's sort of

00:26:26.340 a broad overview

00:26:27.100 of Stoicism.

00:26:28.840 Before we get into specifics,

00:26:30.620 let's talk about Marcus Aurelius

00:26:31.760 because you use him

00:26:33.300 because his book,

00:26:34.120 The Meditations,

00:26:35.260 has all these wonderful insights

00:26:36.440 on Stoic practices

00:26:37.300 that he used

00:26:38.360 to be a Stoic.

00:26:39.400 How did Marcus

00:26:40.300 discover Stoicism?

00:26:42.740 Was he originally,

00:26:43.400 was he like brought up in it

00:26:44.960 or did he discover it

00:26:45.860 later on

00:26:46.240 when he was a young adult?

00:26:47.760 Well, some of this

00:26:48.220 we have to kind of infer.

00:26:49.480 I mean, a lot of people

00:26:50.220 who read the Meditations

00:26:51.520 of Marcus Aurelius

00:26:52.400 don't realize

00:26:54.100 that what he's talking about

00:26:55.660 fits into this

00:26:56.400 bigger philosophical tradition.

00:26:58.440 And what I've discovered

00:26:59.620 is that a lot of people

00:27:00.340 don't realize

00:27:00.880 that we know some things

00:27:02.420 about Marcus's life

00:27:03.420 because of various

00:27:04.680 Roman histories

00:27:05.340 that survive,

00:27:06.660 such as Cassius Dio's

00:27:08.240 or Herodians

00:27:09.200 or the Historia Augusta

00:27:10.480 and other sources.

00:27:11.620 So we know some stuff

00:27:12.280 about Marcus

00:27:12.820 as well as what he tells us

00:27:13.980 in the Meditations.

00:27:15.580 And we know that

00:27:16.480 we're told anyway

00:27:17.520 that he started studying philosophy

00:27:19.100 when he was 12 years old,

00:27:20.800 which is an unusually early age.

00:27:23.200 A Roman youth

00:27:23.660 would probably only

00:27:24.640 get into philosophy

00:27:25.380 when they were about

00:27:25.980 15 years old normally.

00:27:28.140 And Marcus got into it

00:27:29.340 much earlier.

00:27:30.420 And it seems that he

00:27:31.220 initially really embraced

00:27:32.480 philosophy as a lifestyle.

00:27:34.060 He dressed like a philosopher.

00:27:35.620 He slept on a camp bed

00:27:36.920 on the floor

00:27:37.420 like a philosopher.

00:27:38.240 And he began to act

00:27:40.020 like a philosopher.

00:27:41.280 And we don't know

00:27:41.740 what sort of philosophy

00:27:42.480 he got into.

00:27:43.280 It sounds like it was

00:27:44.220 probably either cynicism

00:27:45.520 or stoicism

00:27:46.240 or something along those lines.

00:27:49.080 And then we know

00:27:49.980 that around about 15,

00:27:51.340 he began his formal education

00:27:52.980 in philosophy.

00:27:53.800 We know who his teachers were

00:27:55.220 because he tells us,

00:27:56.620 but the histories

00:27:57.180 also confirm that.

00:27:59.000 And we have studied

00:28:00.500 under some of the most famous

00:28:01.720 and important

00:28:02.680 Stoic teachers of his day.

00:28:04.100 He studied also

00:28:04.840 the Platonic School of Philosophy

00:28:06.300 and Aristotelian philosophy

00:28:08.120 and he read about

00:28:08.920 the Epicurean philosophy

00:28:10.100 as well.

00:28:11.140 So he was a very educated man.

00:28:12.800 But it was only

00:28:13.280 in his early 20s

00:28:14.640 that he really embraced

00:28:17.000 Stoic philosophy

00:28:18.560 as a way of life

00:28:19.720 that he kind of

00:28:20.300 fully converted to it.

00:28:21.580 And was that because

00:28:23.120 of his unique situation?

00:28:24.300 Because what's interesting

00:28:24.820 about Marcus Aurelius,

00:28:26.100 he wasn't born

00:28:27.220 to be the emperor of Rome.

00:28:29.860 He kind of became that

00:28:31.100 through some weird adoptions,

00:28:33.440 right?

00:28:33.720 And like he kind of

00:28:34.460 inherited the throne,

00:28:35.820 the emperor title that way.

00:28:37.960 Yeah, it wasn't really expected.

00:28:40.040 It was Hadrian,

00:28:41.140 the emperor Hadrian

00:28:42.040 that chose Marcus

00:28:43.000 to become a future emperor

00:28:44.960 as part of a kind of

00:28:46.020 long-term succession plan.

00:28:47.440 So there was another

00:28:47.900 emperor between them.

00:28:49.480 Hadrian chose Antoninus

00:28:50.980 to succeed him,

00:28:52.220 who we know as

00:28:52.640 the emperor Antoninus Pius.

00:28:54.700 And he in turn adopted

00:28:56.240 Marcus Aurelius

00:28:57.340 as part of this arrangement

00:28:58.740 made by Hadrian.

00:29:00.140 So Hadrian knew Marcus

00:29:01.240 as a young boy

00:29:02.320 and he originally had

00:29:03.440 other plans for the succession

00:29:04.820 and then really,

00:29:05.900 it was about a year

00:29:06.640 before Hadrian died

00:29:08.040 that he suddenly changed

00:29:09.040 his mind and decided

00:29:10.100 I want Antoninus

00:29:11.320 to succeed me

00:29:12.020 and then Marcus Aurelius

00:29:13.460 to succeed him.

00:29:14.240 This kid,

00:29:15.260 I want this kid

00:29:16.060 to be the future emperor

00:29:17.500 of Rome.

00:29:18.440 And we don't know exactly

00:29:19.740 what convinced Hadrian

00:29:20.940 to do that.

00:29:21.940 All we know is that

00:29:22.920 Marcus said or did

00:29:24.700 something at the

00:29:26.320 court of Hadrian

00:29:27.160 as a small child

00:29:28.320 that earned him

00:29:29.440 the nickname

00:29:30.260 Verissimus,

00:29:31.600 which means

00:29:32.280 the truest,

00:29:33.720 the most true.

00:29:34.920 And it's a play

00:29:35.620 on Marcus's family

00:29:36.520 named Veris,

00:29:37.400 which means true.

00:29:38.820 And Hadrian says,

00:29:39.380 this kid's not just true,

00:29:40.600 he's the truest

00:29:41.300 of them all.

00:29:42.500 And something that

00:29:43.460 this boy did

00:29:44.620 convinced Hadrian

00:29:45.760 that he needed

00:29:46.700 to put him in place

00:29:47.620 as the future emperor

00:29:48.400 of Rome.

00:29:49.400 And I guess,

00:29:50.540 I mean,

00:29:50.940 I don't know if we know this

00:29:51.880 because Marcus didn't

00:29:52.900 write about it or not,

00:29:53.940 but do you think that idea

00:29:55.180 that he knew

00:29:55.720 was going to be

00:29:56.280 an emperor,

00:29:58.120 did that influence,

00:29:59.080 and I imagine that

00:29:59.880 probably spurred him

00:30:01.040 to study Stoicism

00:30:02.260 even more.

00:30:03.400 Maybe he was

00:30:03.800 enamored with the idea

00:30:04.820 of, you know,

00:30:05.160 Socrates,

00:30:05.820 like philosopher kings,

00:30:07.060 right?

00:30:07.320 I think that was part of it,

00:30:08.440 yeah.

00:30:08.860 Like,

00:30:09.120 we know,

00:30:09.980 we're told in the histories

00:30:11.020 that Marcus used to go around

00:30:12.160 quoting Plato's idea

00:30:13.920 that the state

00:30:15.360 will only flourish

00:30:16.260 when philosophers

00:30:16.920 become kings

00:30:17.760 or kings become philosophers,

00:30:19.640 as he put it.

00:30:20.820 And this was one

00:30:21.340 of his favorite sayings.

00:30:23.300 But we,

00:30:23.980 I think maybe,

00:30:25.300 Marcus's main teacher

00:30:26.920 in Stoicism

00:30:27.460 was a guy called

00:30:28.180 Junius Rusticus.

00:30:29.240 He's a very interesting

00:30:29.840 guy in himself.

00:30:31.160 And he was Marcus's

00:30:32.080 right-hand man politically.

00:30:33.820 He was the urban prefect

00:30:35.200 at Rome.

00:30:36.100 So he was like a,

00:30:37.160 kind of like a mayor.

00:30:38.060 He was in charge

00:30:38.840 of the administration

00:30:39.560 in Rome.

00:30:40.680 And so at Rome,

00:30:41.600 Marcus's right-hand man,

00:30:42.700 but he was also

00:30:43.300 his main Stoic mentor.

00:30:45.400 And he also appears

00:30:46.320 to have been a friend

00:30:47.180 of Marcus's mother,

00:30:49.100 Domitia Lucilla.

00:30:50.560 So she was a highly educated,

00:30:52.400 extremely wealthy

00:30:53.600 Roman matriarch.

00:30:55.640 Her husband,

00:30:56.740 Marcus's birth father,

00:30:57.940 had died when Marcus

00:30:59.040 was only about

00:30:59.640 three or four years old.

00:31:01.020 So she took more

00:31:01.920 responsibility

00:31:02.380 for raising her son.

00:31:04.240 And she seems to have

00:31:05.400 known many intellectuals,

00:31:07.140 to have been an educated

00:31:08.000 and cultured woman.

00:31:09.340 And it looks like maybe

00:31:10.460 there's a hint

00:31:11.060 that she was friends

00:31:12.200 with Junius Rusticus.

00:31:13.400 So maybe she kind of

00:31:14.740 steered Marcus

00:31:15.960 towards Rusticus

00:31:16.940 as his main mentor

00:31:18.680 or teacher in philosophy.

00:31:20.440 But we also know

00:31:21.060 that we're told,

00:31:22.140 surprisingly,

00:31:23.000 that Hadrian was friends

00:31:24.340 with the Stoic teacher,

00:31:26.040 Epictetus.

00:31:27.240 It seems kind of unlikely

00:31:28.200 because Hadrian

00:31:28.840 was really into sophistry

00:31:30.300 and a very kind of

00:31:32.000 pretentious and volatile man.

00:31:33.720 So he seems exactly

00:31:34.460 the sort of person

00:31:35.020 that Epictetus

00:31:36.100 would have warned

00:31:36.900 his students against.

00:31:38.440 But maybe also

00:31:39.120 that Hadrian

00:31:39.860 steered Marcus

00:31:41.120 towards studying Stoicism.

00:31:43.040 Well, okay.

00:31:43.940 So let's talk about

00:31:44.960 the insights

00:31:45.880 about Stoicism

00:31:46.760 we can glean

00:31:47.680 from Marcus's

00:31:49.360 meditations.

00:31:50.740 And going back

00:31:51.400 to the idea

00:31:51.800 of Stoic logic

00:31:53.000 and language,

00:31:54.480 you have a section

00:31:55.220 on how our language

00:31:56.940 can help us

00:31:58.200 manage our emotions.

00:31:59.380 And the Stoic practice

00:32:00.800 that we can get

00:32:01.500 from that.

00:32:01.860 So what's a Stoic practice

00:32:03.440 that deals with language

00:32:04.780 that we can take

00:32:05.420 from Marcus?

00:32:06.680 Well, the main thing

00:32:08.280 that the Stoics did,

00:32:09.260 I mean, we're told

00:32:10.120 a little bit

00:32:10.720 about this unlikely,

00:32:12.920 even in the ancient world,

00:32:13.860 it was thought paradoxical

00:32:15.080 that there was even

00:32:15.960 a thing called

00:32:16.680 Stoic rhetoric.

00:32:18.020 But Zeno wrote

00:32:18.660 a book on rhetoric.

00:32:20.100 And it was thought odd

00:32:21.020 because the Stoics

00:32:21.880 were known

00:32:22.280 for speaking laconically,

00:32:24.520 so concisely

00:32:26.020 or kind of abruptly.

00:32:27.560 They used plain language,

00:32:29.140 Paracia in Greek.

00:32:30.880 The word laconic,

00:32:31.920 which we use today,

00:32:32.740 comes from laconia,

00:32:34.200 the region in which

00:32:34.860 Sparta was located.

00:32:36.520 So the Stoics were known

00:32:37.600 for speaking like Spartans.

00:32:40.040 And actually,

00:32:40.460 the philosopher Cicero

00:32:41.200 literally tells us that.

00:32:43.060 We have a speech

00:32:44.300 from Cicero

00:32:44.960 where he talks

00:32:45.700 about the Stoics

00:32:46.340 and says that they speak

00:32:47.680 and act like Spartans.

00:32:49.480 So we know

00:32:50.560 that the Stoics

00:32:51.220 wanted to speak

00:32:52.020 concisely

00:32:52.860 and objectively.

00:32:54.740 So they thought

00:32:55.880 it was important

00:32:56.400 to speak effectively

00:32:57.600 and in a way

00:32:58.360 that was adapted

00:32:59.100 to the needs

00:32:59.780 of our hearers.

00:33:01.000 So we have to think

00:33:02.020 about what other people

00:33:02.900 need from us

00:33:03.660 when we're trying

00:33:04.120 to communicate with them.

00:33:05.940 We need to put ourselves

00:33:07.020 in their shoes

00:33:07.600 and empathize

00:33:08.320 with their audience.

00:33:09.220 But we also need

00:33:09.940 to be honest with people

00:33:11.080 and avoid using

00:33:12.940 flowery rhetoric,

00:33:14.500 emotive language,

00:33:15.660 and strong value judgments.

00:33:17.660 So the Stoic approach

00:33:19.020 to language basically

00:33:20.120 is to stick to the facts.

00:33:21.800 And the term

00:33:22.780 that they use

00:33:23.180 to describe that

00:33:24.020 is this kind of

00:33:24.820 obscure technical term

00:33:26.380 phantasia cataleptica,

00:33:28.600 which means having

00:33:29.320 a firm grasp on reality.

00:33:32.040 Sometimes it's translated

00:33:32.940 as having an objective

00:33:33.980 representation of things.

00:33:36.760 So the Stoics practiced

00:33:37.940 describing events

00:33:39.360 in a very down-to-earth

00:33:40.820 and objective manner,

00:33:42.840 stripping away value judgments

00:33:44.460 and assumptions

00:33:45.240 from things.

00:33:46.520 And what insights

00:33:47.140 from modern behavior psychology

00:33:49.620 bolster the Stoic idea

00:33:50.940 that our language

00:33:52.660 can influence

00:33:53.780 the way we think

00:33:54.700 about reality?

00:33:56.380 Well, it's certainly true.

00:33:57.760 I mean, we tend today

00:33:58.820 to talk about it more

00:34:00.060 in terms of clients'

00:34:00.820 cognitions or their thinking.

00:34:02.620 But we only know

00:34:03.600 about cognition

00:34:04.300 because of the words

00:34:05.420 that people use

00:34:06.200 to express their thoughts.

00:34:08.000 And we know

00:34:08.860 that people exhibit

00:34:09.640 typical cognitive distortions.

00:34:12.240 The cognitive distortions

00:34:13.400 that people exhibit

00:34:14.160 are forms of rhetoric,

00:34:16.380 basically,

00:34:17.300 such as hyperbole.

00:34:18.620 So people use exaggeration

00:34:20.320 or hyperbole.

00:34:21.500 They use overgeneralizations

00:34:23.080 when they're talking

00:34:24.000 about their problems.

00:34:25.120 And they use metaphors

00:34:26.500 to evoke emotion.

00:34:28.440 So that might be useful.

00:34:29.680 Like, if you're giving a speech

00:34:30.800 and you want to really

00:34:32.060 evoke other people's emotions

00:34:33.460 and stir them up,

00:34:34.560 it could be useful

00:34:35.340 to use flowery rhetoric

00:34:36.960 and to play on language

00:34:39.380 and stuff.

00:34:40.120 But the problem comes

00:34:41.040 when we start doing that

00:34:42.140 in our own internal thinking.

00:34:43.660 So I might say to myself,

00:34:45.720 well, that guy really

00:34:46.640 tore a strip off me

00:34:47.880 at work today.

00:34:49.240 He shot me down in flames

00:34:50.860 in front of everybody else.

00:34:52.980 Like, I felt like

00:34:53.640 a complete and utter idiot.

00:34:55.820 And so there I'm using

00:34:57.100 very emotive language.

00:34:58.640 I'm using metaphors.

00:35:00.000 I'm using generalizations.

00:35:03.060 And I could have just said

00:35:04.680 somebody disagreed

00:35:05.740 with something that I said,

00:35:07.640 which kind of seems

00:35:08.660 really banal by comparison.

00:35:10.160 But it's obviously

00:35:11.300 much less evocative

00:35:12.480 of anger and frustration

00:35:14.080 and distress.

00:35:15.580 And, you know,

00:35:16.280 sometimes we want to do that

00:35:17.560 when we're giving

00:35:18.060 a powerful speech.

00:35:19.140 But why on earth

00:35:20.020 would we want to do that

00:35:20.920 to ourselves?

00:35:22.460 So the Stoics think

00:35:23.220 we fall into this trap

00:35:24.300 of using rhetoric

00:35:25.180 in our own thinking.

00:35:26.780 And we need to be careful

00:35:28.020 to take a step back from it

00:35:29.540 and practice describing things

00:35:31.280 in sort of more banal,

00:35:32.900 matter-of-fact

00:35:33.520 and down-to-earth terms.

00:35:34.820 And doing that

00:35:35.540 will damp down our emotions

00:35:37.380 and we'll be able

00:35:38.480 to see things

00:35:39.280 in a clearer way.

00:35:40.700 And in fact, yeah,

00:35:41.160 that's one of the things

00:35:42.040 that cognitive behavioral therapists

00:35:43.280 do with their clients

00:35:44.620 or patients

00:35:45.100 is help them start describing

00:35:46.820 their problem

00:35:47.860 in this more banal,

00:35:50.140 you know,

00:35:50.420 objective,

00:35:51.300 instead of that emotive way.

00:35:53.380 Yeah, we might say things

00:35:54.480 like stick to the facts,

00:35:56.160 you know,

00:35:56.520 just like,

00:35:57.060 just describe what,

00:35:57.900 just describe what you can

00:35:58.800 actually see,

00:36:00.140 like,

00:36:00.380 and set aside,

00:36:01.040 you know,

00:36:01.360 all the other kind of,

00:36:02.060 like, flowery language

00:36:03.120 and stuff

00:36:03.640 and notice,

00:36:04.520 you know,

00:36:04.660 how that makes you feel

00:36:05.420 differently about things.

00:36:06.860 So we'll often talk

00:36:07.880 in therapy

00:36:08.240 about decatastrophizing.

00:36:09.940 That's the kind of weird

00:36:10.680 neologism that we use.

00:36:12.460 And it's a clunky term,

00:36:14.060 but it's cool

00:36:14.520 because it takes a noun

00:36:16.320 and turns it into a verb.

00:36:17.620 So the client might say,

00:36:18.520 this is a catastrophe.

00:36:19.900 And the therapist might say,

00:36:20.800 well,

00:36:20.900 is it possible

00:36:21.300 you're catastrophizing?

00:36:22.960 So is it possible

00:36:23.540 you're making it

00:36:24.520 seem like a catastrophe

00:36:25.620 because of the way

00:36:26.940 that you're describing it,

00:36:28.360 the way you're thinking about it

00:36:29.540 and the perspective

00:36:30.220 that you adopt on it?

00:36:31.360 And that makes clients realize

00:36:32.820 that they've actually

00:36:33.620 got more responsibility

00:36:34.740 than they were assuming

00:36:36.420 for the way

00:36:37.320 that they perceive

00:36:37.980 the situation.

00:36:39.100 So when we decatastrophize

00:36:40.560 a situation,

00:36:41.340 we usually have to get clients

00:36:43.100 to describe it

00:36:43.920 in more prosaic

00:36:44.800 and down-to-earth language.

00:36:46.320 Well, yeah,

00:36:46.440 an example of catastrophizing,

00:36:47.640 say someone loses their job,

00:36:49.340 the next step they make

00:36:50.300 is like,

00:36:50.540 well,

00:36:50.680 my life's over,

00:36:51.500 I'm going to lose my house,

00:36:53.000 I'm going to be home.

00:36:54.300 And the therapist is like,

00:36:55.280 well,

00:36:55.380 just stick to the facts.

00:36:56.240 What's happened?

00:36:57.300 Well,

00:36:57.560 you've just lost your job.

00:36:59.600 That's it.

00:37:00.100 That's all we know.

00:37:01.540 Yeah.

00:37:02.180 Everybody's favorite

00:37:02.840 is it's the end of the world,

00:37:04.060 right?

00:37:04.780 Well,

00:37:05.100 you know,

00:37:05.400 it's never the end of the world,

00:37:06.400 like Chicken Little,

00:37:07.100 the sky's falling in on us.

00:37:08.660 It's the end of the world,

00:37:10.200 you know,

00:37:10.620 or,

00:37:11.080 you know,

00:37:11.480 this has completely destroyed

00:37:12.700 my entire life,

00:37:14.340 you know,

00:37:14.800 somebody might say,

00:37:15.740 because they've lost their job.

00:37:17.220 And,

00:37:17.420 you know,

00:37:17.840 I'll say very simply

00:37:19.180 as an aside,

00:37:19.980 as a therapist over the years,

00:37:21.720 I've often been surprised

00:37:23.260 by the fact

00:37:24.320 that for many people

00:37:25.600 being made redundant,

00:37:27.300 losing their job,

00:37:28.200 even being sacked from a job,

00:37:29.780 might be one of the best things

00:37:30.760 that happens to them.

00:37:32.400 Because otherwise,

00:37:33.640 people often find themselves

00:37:35.020 spending too much time

00:37:36.480 in jobs

00:37:37.160 that maybe aren't ideal for them.

00:37:39.300 And so it might be

00:37:40.080 short-term pain

00:37:40.980 that they go through,

00:37:42.200 but ultimately,

00:37:43.020 they often end up

00:37:44.280 doing something

00:37:44.860 that's more fulfilling in life

00:37:46.000 in many cases.

00:37:46.760 So I've been surprised

00:37:47.820 how often

00:37:48.340 that losing a job

00:37:49.720 might actually turn out

00:37:50.860 to be for the best

00:37:51.740 in many people's lives.

00:37:53.260 Right.

00:37:53.420 So it's one of those indifference.

00:37:54.380 It could be preferred

00:37:55.080 or not preferred,

00:37:56.720 but you never know,

00:37:57.780 right?

00:37:58.020 It's the same

00:37:58.580 as a relationship breakup,

00:37:59.840 right?

00:38:00.140 I mean,

00:38:00.340 it seems like

00:38:00.760 the end of the world,

00:38:02.060 like when you're

00:38:02.820 with someone you love

00:38:03.660 and then the relationship

00:38:04.460 comes to an end,

00:38:05.460 especially if it ends badly.

00:38:07.180 But then maybe

00:38:07.820 sometime later

00:38:08.600 you'll meet somebody else

00:38:09.760 and have an even better

00:38:10.700 relationship

00:38:11.280 that you would never

00:38:12.120 have had the opportunity for

00:38:13.400 if the previous one

00:38:14.520 hadn't ended.

00:38:15.660 Who can know

00:38:16.280 what the future holds?

00:38:17.360 You don't.

00:38:17.760 You don't.

00:38:18.220 Those aren't facts,

00:38:19.420 so you just

00:38:19.980 don't worry about it,

00:38:21.300 right?

00:38:21.440 That's what the Stoics

00:38:22.000 would say.

00:38:23.100 So another,

00:38:23.880 we mentioned like

00:38:24.640 the parallels

00:38:25.260 between Eastern

00:38:26.620 philosophies

00:38:27.940 and Stoicism.

00:38:29.720 Stoics had a form

00:38:30.880 of meditation

00:38:31.440 that they would do

00:38:32.860 and Marcus describes it.

00:38:33.840 What does Stoic meditation

00:38:35.140 look like?

00:38:35.940 Well,

00:38:36.100 what they didn't do

00:38:36.840 as far as we know

00:38:37.560 is kind of sit cross-legged

00:38:38.920 and wear sandals

00:38:40.000 and burn incense

00:38:40.780 and focus on their breathing

00:38:42.280 and chant and stuff.

00:38:44.360 So we don't mean meditation

00:38:45.880 in that kind of cliched sense.

00:38:47.280 But even when we're studying

00:38:48.960 Oriental religions

00:38:50.540 or philosophy,

00:38:51.740 the concept of meditation

00:38:52.640 is much broader

00:38:53.660 than that anyway.

00:38:54.820 So that's really

00:38:55.160 a kind of caricature

00:38:56.240 or an oversimplification

00:38:57.340 of what meditation

00:38:58.180 looks like.

00:38:59.120 So we're talking about

00:38:59.800 meditation in a slightly

00:39:00.900 broader sense.

00:39:02.400 So for Stoics,

00:39:03.680 there are many

00:39:04.420 contemplative practices

00:39:06.060 that might be verbal,

00:39:08.120 they might involve

00:39:08.740 visualization,

00:39:10.140 or they might involve

00:39:10.900 more kind of abstract

00:39:11.860 conceptual thinking.

00:39:13.700 And they're a little bit

00:39:14.600 different from what people

00:39:15.700 might think of as meditation.

00:39:17.280 But when people start

00:39:18.280 practicing them,

00:39:19.180 it becomes clear

00:39:19.960 that it is a kind of

00:39:21.040 meditative exercise.

00:39:22.680 And the Stoics did them

00:39:23.660 in a systematic,

00:39:24.980 regular way.

00:39:26.100 They talk about doing them

00:39:27.260 on a daily basis

00:39:28.400 or frequently

00:39:30.260 throughout the day

00:39:31.440 or every evening

00:39:32.780 or in response

00:39:33.880 to certain situations.

00:39:35.620 So Marcus is always

00:39:36.440 telling himself,

00:39:37.780 you know,

00:39:38.140 each day,

00:39:38.800 remind yourself

00:39:39.480 to contemplate your own death,

00:39:40.900 for example,

00:39:42.080 or to think of each day

00:39:43.140 as if it were your last.

00:39:45.300 Or another Stoic exercise

00:39:46.900 we call prosoche

00:39:47.900 in Greek,

00:39:48.660 which means paying attention.

00:39:50.840 And it involves

00:39:51.860 continually paying attention

00:39:53.520 to the way

00:39:54.240 that you're using your mind,

00:39:55.920 particularly your value judgments,

00:39:58.340 and how those are interacting

00:39:59.620 with your emotions

00:40:00.680 and your desires.

00:40:01.960 So it's kind of like

00:40:02.780 Buddhist mindfulness

00:40:03.540 in some ways.

00:40:04.580 The Stoics had a similar concept.

00:40:06.520 But the other one

00:40:07.280 that's popular in Stoicism,

00:40:08.460 which is kind of

00:40:09.140 unlike most meditation

00:40:10.760 practices today,

00:40:12.100 we call the view

00:40:12.780 from above.

00:40:13.360 Hado,

00:40:14.220 who I mentioned earlier,

00:40:15.100 coined the term

00:40:15.700 the view from above for it.

00:40:17.380 And that involves

00:40:18.120 the Stoics trying to picture

00:40:19.420 the whole of space and time

00:40:21.180 and their place within it,

00:40:22.740 which obviously

00:40:23.140 is impossible to do, right?

00:40:24.700 But we can grasp

00:40:25.600 the concept in a way.

00:40:26.780 We can think about

00:40:27.660 the bigger picture

00:40:28.380 to some extent.

00:40:29.760 So the Stoics

00:40:30.160 would practice doing that

00:40:31.140 in a number of different ways,

00:40:32.420 broadening their awareness

00:40:33.640 and broadening

00:40:34.820 their perspective.

00:40:36.160 And again,

00:40:36.660 like we mentioned much earlier,

00:40:37.820 that's kind of linked

00:40:38.520 into the whole

00:40:39.700 of Stoic physics

00:40:40.780 and the fact that

00:40:41.640 they were pantheists

00:40:42.600 and believed the totality

00:40:44.020 of the universe

00:40:44.740 was the ultimate reality

00:40:46.520 and was sacred and divine.

00:40:48.260 So they'd rehearse

00:40:48.960 picturing events

00:40:50.080 from high above,

00:40:50.900 for instance.

00:40:52.180 So the Stoic meditations,

00:40:53.540 there are different types,

00:40:54.820 but it seems like

00:40:55.280 the common theme is

00:40:56.420 one is to see

00:40:57.560 the big picture,

00:40:58.920 which would,

00:40:59.280 like that sort of distancing

00:41:00.180 helps you make your problems

00:41:02.600 that you have

00:41:03.100 not seem so big.

00:41:04.280 It puts it in perspective.

00:41:05.680 But also it seems like

00:41:06.400 there's a lot of reflection

00:41:07.300 going on,

00:41:07.880 seeing where you can improve,

00:41:09.420 where your faults are.

00:41:10.280 And how you can do better

00:41:12.000 the next day.

00:41:13.580 Well, actually,

00:41:13.920 maybe just as an aside,

00:41:15.400 you know,

00:41:15.580 there's a passage

00:41:16.120 in Marcus Aurelius

00:41:17.040 where he says

00:41:17.420 something really cool.

00:41:18.720 He says that most

00:41:19.420 of what he's talking about

00:41:20.600 can be summed up

00:41:21.440 in Greek six words,

00:41:23.920 like short words,

00:41:25.000 a little phrase.

00:41:26.320 The cosmos is change,

00:41:28.240 life is opinion.

00:41:29.720 And those two little statements

00:41:31.780 refer to two

00:41:34.000 of his favorite philosophers.

00:41:36.120 So one is Heraclitus,

00:41:37.520 the pre-Socratic philosopher,

00:41:38.800 who said,

00:41:39.780 Pantare,

00:41:40.600 everything flows,

00:41:41.860 the river of time.

00:41:43.460 So Heraclitus said

00:41:44.500 that the universe

00:41:45.060 is constantly changing,

00:41:46.220 everything is in flux.

00:41:47.680 And it's from him

00:41:48.360 that Stoics get their physics

00:41:49.580 and this idea of pantheism.

00:41:51.760 And so Marcus says

00:41:53.440 the universe has changed

00:41:54.860 in order to remind him

00:41:55.900 of the transience of things,

00:41:57.740 a bit like the Buddhist doctrine

00:41:58.940 of impermanence.

00:42:00.500 And the Stoics,

00:42:00.920 in many different ways,

00:42:02.020 when they're looking

00:42:02.480 at the bigger picture,

00:42:03.400 are also focusing

00:42:04.480 on the smallness

00:42:05.340 and transience

00:42:06.120 of the current problems

00:42:07.420 that we're facing.

00:42:08.600 And they think

00:42:08.960 we become less distressed

00:42:10.060 by events

00:42:10.680 when we adopt

00:42:11.220 that kind of perspective.

00:42:12.740 And the other bit,

00:42:13.320 life is opinion,

00:42:14.680 refers to Epictetus' ideas

00:42:16.520 that it's not things

00:42:17.360 that upset us

00:42:18.060 but our opinions

00:42:18.800 or judgments about them.

00:42:20.460 And that's the Stoic idea

00:42:21.420 that we need to become

00:42:22.240 more aware

00:42:22.940 of our opinions,

00:42:24.340 prosoche,

00:42:25.320 pay attention to them

00:42:26.280 and take responsibility

00:42:27.180 for the way

00:42:28.780 that our value judgments

00:42:29.740 are distorting

00:42:31.220 our perception of events

00:42:32.200 and shaping our emotions.

00:42:33.300 So Marcus says

00:42:34.480 the gist of everything

00:42:36.220 he's saying

00:42:36.820 is encapsulated

00:42:37.860 in these two little techniques,

00:42:39.380 basically.

00:42:40.560 So one of the emotions

00:42:41.480 that the Stoics

00:42:42.260 thought a lot about

00:42:43.220 on how to manage

00:42:44.320 is desire

00:42:44.940 because desire

00:42:45.720 can lead to vice

00:42:47.420 and frustration

00:42:48.860 and whatnot,

00:42:50.680 what have you.

00:42:52.180 And I thought

00:42:53.020 it was interesting,

00:42:53.720 I was just reading

00:42:54.420 in Romans this week,

00:42:56.380 the Apostle Paul

00:42:57.480 who probably studied Stoicism.

00:42:59.580 You see some Stoic influence

00:43:00.800 in some of his writings.

00:43:01.700 He talks about

00:43:03.200 wanting to do good

00:43:04.460 but he doesn't do it

00:43:06.280 the good he wants to do

00:43:07.720 because he has his vice

00:43:08.880 inside of him

00:43:09.500 because the desire

00:43:10.480 for temptation

00:43:11.020 is so strong.

00:43:12.320 I thought that was

00:43:12.760 a very Stoic thing

00:43:13.640 that I read

00:43:14.540 as a pre-member

00:43:15.320 of this conversation.

00:43:16.800 How did the Stoics,

00:43:18.100 what did the Stoics say

00:43:18.820 about changing our desires

00:43:20.360 or moderating our desires

00:43:22.560 so it lines up

00:43:23.800 with the virtue?

00:43:24.800 Well, let me digress

00:43:25.540 for a second actually

00:43:26.360 and just say something

00:43:27.060 about Paul.

00:43:27.940 I think it helps

00:43:28.680 to put Stoicism

00:43:29.420 in a historical context

00:43:30.880 to say that you can view

00:43:32.580 Stoicism as one of the main

00:43:34.120 precursors of early

00:43:35.280 Christian ethics

00:43:36.240 and one modern scholar

00:43:37.900 actually called St. Paul

00:43:39.200 a crypto-Stoic,

00:43:40.500 a secret Stoic.

00:43:42.060 So, you know,

00:43:42.800 there are obvious Stoic influences

00:43:44.400 on Christianity,

00:43:45.840 particularly the idea

00:43:47.320 of the brotherhood of man.

00:43:49.160 So that very much

00:43:50.260 was a concept

00:43:51.060 that was associated

00:43:52.220 with Stoicism

00:43:52.900 and you can see that

00:43:54.420 running all the way

00:43:55.340 through the meditations

00:43:56.160 of Marcus Aurelius,

00:43:57.860 you know,

00:43:58.060 more associated with Stoicism

00:43:59.440 than most other

00:44:00.520 philosophical schools.

00:44:02.280 But St. Paul,

00:44:03.360 just as a little bit

00:44:04.140 of trivia,

00:44:04.740 a little aside,

00:44:05.780 not a lot of people

00:44:06.460 know this,

00:44:07.100 but in the Acts

00:44:07.700 of the Apostles,

00:44:08.960 we're told that St. Paul

00:44:10.100 went to a place

00:44:11.160 in Athens

00:44:11.660 called the Ariopagus

00:44:12.800 and that he actually

00:44:14.200 spoke to a group

00:44:15.460 of Stoic

00:44:15.960 and Epicurean philosophers

00:44:17.240 and he quoted

00:44:18.800 a poem

00:44:19.800 from one of the

00:44:21.420 early Greek Stoics,

00:44:22.480 a guy called Aratus

00:44:23.380 approvingly to them.

00:44:25.160 So he definitely

00:44:26.080 knew Stoics

00:44:27.020 and talked to them

00:44:27.780 about philosophy

00:44:28.540 and stuff.

00:44:29.220 He was talking to them

00:44:29.900 actually about

00:44:30.740 Stoic pantheism,

00:44:32.100 that's what the poem

00:44:32.700 was about

00:44:33.060 that he was quoting.

00:44:34.520 So that kind of aside,

00:44:35.860 that's a little bit

00:44:36.640 of history

00:44:36.960 that might be

00:44:37.420 of interest

00:44:37.820 to some people.

00:44:38.860 What do the Stoics

00:44:39.520 say about desires?

00:44:41.020 Sometimes Stoic therapy

00:44:42.280 is called the therapy

00:44:43.380 of desire

00:44:44.160 by modern scholars

00:44:45.500 because desire

00:44:47.140 is really central.

00:44:48.840 Desire is one

00:44:49.640 of the passions

00:44:50.280 for Stoicism.

00:44:51.100 The Greek term

00:44:51.640 for passion

00:44:52.480 encompasses both

00:44:53.720 what we would call

00:44:54.300 desires and emotions.

00:44:56.980 And the Stoics

00:44:57.820 think our desires

00:44:58.640 can become excessive,

00:45:00.220 irrational,

00:45:01.300 unhealthy

00:45:01.800 and they can lead

00:45:02.880 us into vice.

00:45:03.880 So we have to be careful

00:45:05.120 to take a step

00:45:06.520 back from them.

00:45:07.740 And the key for Stoics

00:45:08.740 is awareness.

00:45:10.200 It's about spotting

00:45:11.260 our desires

00:45:11.880 at the earliest

00:45:12.760 possible stage

00:45:13.900 so that we can

00:45:14.840 nip them in the bud

00:45:15.680 if it turns out

00:45:16.520 that they are unhealthy

00:45:17.640 or destructive.

00:45:19.040 And the way

00:45:19.460 to deal with that

00:45:20.480 is to think about

00:45:21.580 their consequences

00:45:22.620 more carefully,

00:45:24.360 more patiently

00:45:24.940 and more vividly.

00:45:26.620 So the Stoics

00:45:27.040 are always telling us

00:45:27.940 to kind of picture

00:45:28.720 in our mind's eye

00:45:29.680 where our desires

00:45:30.800 are going to lead us

00:45:31.520 in the longer term.

00:45:32.720 And that's something

00:45:33.180 that we do in modern therapy

00:45:34.440 as well.

00:45:34.900 It's similar to what we call

00:45:35.740 functional analysis.

00:45:37.440 Getting clients

00:45:37.900 to think about

00:45:38.540 what would happen

00:45:39.140 if you indulged

00:45:39.960 certain desires

00:45:40.700 over the long term

00:45:41.780 and then what would happen

00:45:42.880 if you exercised

00:45:43.600 more discipline

00:45:44.300 is almost like

00:45:45.560 a fork in the road

00:45:46.560 and two paths

00:45:47.500 that diverge

00:45:48.180 further and further

00:45:48.920 over time.

00:45:50.480 The other thing

00:45:50.940 the Stoics would do

00:45:51.740 would be to role model

00:45:53.020 wise and good people

00:45:55.280 to think about

00:45:55.960 the people

00:45:56.240 you most admire

00:45:57.000 in life

00:45:57.540 and how they would deal

00:45:58.700 with similar desires.

00:46:00.340 Because most of us

00:46:01.080 tend to admire people

00:46:02.100 that exercise

00:46:02.640 self-discipline

00:46:03.620 although we're more lax

00:46:05.640 in exercising it ourselves.

00:46:07.500 So one of the main

00:46:08.360 themes of Stoicism

00:46:09.120 is to train ourselves

00:46:10.280 to become more like

00:46:11.540 the sort of people

00:46:12.480 that we admire in life

00:46:14.120 because the Stoics

00:46:15.500 think of it

00:46:16.780 as being a kind of

00:46:17.480 hypocrisy in a way

00:46:18.540 to admire

00:46:19.440 self-disciplined people

00:46:20.520 but not to be

00:46:21.300 self-disciplined ourselves

00:46:22.340 and they want us

00:46:23.280 just to be more

00:46:23.960 consistent in our morality

00:46:26.180 more consistent

00:46:26.900 in our thinking

00:46:27.540 by being more like

00:46:29.160 the sort of people

00:46:29.740 that we typically

00:46:30.380 praise and admire.

00:46:31.640 So modeling other people

00:46:32.620 is another way

00:46:33.260 of coping with desire

00:46:34.120 and Stoicism.

00:46:35.500 What about anxiety

00:46:36.640 and worry?

00:46:37.360 That seems like

00:46:38.040 a topic that

00:46:38.960 Marcus wrote a lot

00:46:40.340 about in his meditations.

00:46:42.120 Yeah, I mean

00:46:42.800 the Stoics are very concerned

00:46:44.080 with fear

00:46:44.920 and anxiety

00:46:45.900 and worry

00:46:46.860 and so

00:46:48.600 some of the things

00:46:49.620 that they would talk about

00:46:50.660 would be

00:46:51.920 for example

00:46:52.660 like we mentioned earlier

00:46:53.680 decatastrophizing.

00:46:55.580 So in modern therapy

00:46:56.680 that's one of the main

00:46:57.860 techniques that we use today.

00:46:59.520 Worry

00:46:59.800 is

00:47:00.900 absolutely

00:47:01.920 a particular

00:47:03.100 style of thinking

00:47:04.400 as it's defined

00:47:05.140 in modern psychology.

00:47:06.940 We call it

00:47:07.500 what-if thinking.

00:47:08.380 You know

00:47:08.980 what if

00:47:09.780 this just ends

00:47:10.660 in a disaster?

00:47:11.500 What if I can't cope?

00:47:13.080 So

00:47:13.420 what-if thinking

00:47:14.340 is very

00:47:15.380 deeply associated

00:47:16.840 with catastrophizing

00:47:18.200 or kind of

00:47:19.040 exaggerating

00:47:19.960 how bad

00:47:20.680 things are going to be

00:47:21.500 and

00:47:22.040 underestimating

00:47:23.140 our ability

00:47:23.680 to cope.

00:47:24.760 And the Stoics

00:47:25.160 want us to question

00:47:26.260 that

00:47:26.700 to take a step

00:47:27.540 back from it

00:47:28.240 and re-describe

00:47:29.520 things in more

00:47:30.340 objective

00:47:30.980 and down-to-earth

00:47:32.200 language.

00:47:33.100 But they also

00:47:33.560 want us to notice

00:47:34.820 when we're beginning

00:47:35.680 to worry

00:47:36.400 and postpone it.

00:47:38.360 So Epictetus

00:47:39.020 says take a step

00:47:40.520 back

00:47:41.060 withhold judgment

00:47:43.060 for a while

00:47:43.700 until you've

00:47:44.600 calmed down

00:47:45.560 and you can think

00:47:46.760 through things

00:47:47.420 more clearly

00:47:48.040 at your leisure.

00:47:49.220 And we call that

00:47:49.920 worry postponement

00:47:50.900 today.

00:47:51.400 It's one of the

00:47:52.140 most effective

00:47:52.780 techniques in the

00:47:54.040 cognitive therapy

00:47:55.040 of worry and anxiety.

00:47:56.460 So learning to spot

00:47:57.780 when we're starting

00:47:58.620 to worry and

00:47:59.360 catastrophize

00:48:00.220 and taking a

00:48:01.120 kind of time out

00:48:01.780 from it and saying

00:48:02.500 wait a minute

00:48:02.880 I'm going to come

00:48:03.340 back and think

00:48:03.980 about this

00:48:04.480 a few hours from

00:48:05.700 now or later

00:48:06.320 in the evening

00:48:06.940 when I've

00:48:07.800 calmed down

00:48:08.660 a little bit

00:48:09.180 and I'm able

00:48:09.680 to think about

00:48:10.260 it more clearly

00:48:11.000 and to problem

00:48:11.920 solve

00:48:12.320 in a more

00:48:13.320 rational way.

00:48:14.600 And another

00:48:14.960 tactic that

00:48:15.940 Stoics use

00:48:17.240 or sort of

00:48:17.620 a meditation

00:48:18.500 is to look

00:48:19.280 at the big

00:48:19.640 picture or say

00:48:20.380 that this is

00:48:21.080 the way things

00:48:22.000 are

00:48:22.440 it's fate

00:48:23.760 or nature

00:48:24.380 and getting

00:48:25.780 upset about it

00:48:26.460 doesn't change it

00:48:27.280 so don't get

00:48:27.800 upset about it.

00:48:29.240 Yeah and when

00:48:30.160 we look at the

00:48:30.620 bigger picture

00:48:31.100 as I mentioned

00:48:31.640 earlier

00:48:32.020 it tends to

00:48:32.980 make things

00:48:33.620 seem smaller

00:48:34.600 in scope

00:48:35.200 and also more

00:48:36.140 transient

00:48:36.660 like it's just

00:48:37.280 a moment

00:48:37.680 in our life

00:48:38.360 this too

00:48:38.800 shall pass

00:48:39.460 so it's linked

00:48:40.340 in with this

00:48:40.780 idea of the

00:48:41.280 impermanence

00:48:41.860 of the

00:48:42.080 transience

00:48:42.600 of things

00:48:43.020 just as an

00:48:43.880 aside

00:48:44.220 in modern

00:48:44.780 therapy

00:48:45.320 we notice

00:48:46.060 like when

00:48:46.880 people are

00:48:47.220 worrying

00:48:47.520 and catastrophizing

00:48:48.600 it's almost

00:48:50.020 like an

00:48:50.340 interesting puzzle

00:48:51.100 the way that

00:48:51.700 thinking works

00:48:52.480 in some

00:48:52.820 situations

00:48:53.360 so you know

00:48:54.540 if you're

00:48:54.880 thinking about

00:48:55.640 losing your

00:48:56.420 job for instance

00:48:57.220 or the end

00:48:57.760 of a relationship

00:48:58.460 you know

00:48:59.280 that's a

00:48:59.620 sequence of

00:49:00.100 events right

00:49:00.780 and you

00:49:02.040 could

00:49:02.380 it's like a

00:49:02.880 little movie

00:49:03.280 clip in your

00:49:03.800 mind

00:49:04.140 and you

00:49:04.700 could choose

00:49:05.120 to focus

00:49:05.600 on any

00:49:06.060 particular

00:49:06.500 part of

00:49:07.760 it

00:49:07.920 in the

00:49:08.300 chronological

00:49:08.840 sequence

00:49:09.460 but when

00:49:10.320 people are

00:49:10.820 worrying

00:49:11.200 they tend

00:49:11.960 to obviously

00:49:12.600 focus on

00:49:13.280 the scariest

00:49:13.880 part of

00:49:14.480 it

00:49:14.660 the most

00:49:15.200 upsetting

00:49:15.600 part

00:49:16.100 and kind

00:49:16.700 of stop

00:49:17.120 there

00:49:17.420 and go

00:49:18.100 round and

00:49:18.620 round that

00:49:19.180 bit

00:49:19.480 and we

00:49:20.260 find in

00:49:20.720 therapy

00:49:21.080 that very

00:49:21.860 simply

00:49:22.420 if we

00:49:22.800 sometimes say

00:49:23.400 to people

00:49:23.780 well what

00:49:24.360 would probably

00:49:25.080 happen next

00:49:26.060 and then get

00:49:27.460 them to kind

00:49:28.100 of answer that

00:49:28.700 question and

00:49:29.780 then keep

00:49:30.260 asking it and

00:49:31.120 then what would

00:49:31.760 probably happen

00:49:32.520 and then what

00:49:33.400 would probably

00:49:33.840 happen well if I

00:49:34.800 broke up with my

00:49:35.280 girlfriend it'd be

00:49:36.120 just catastrophic

00:49:36.900 at the end of the

00:49:37.600 world well what

00:49:38.120 would probably

00:49:38.720 happen next well

00:49:40.120 I'd probably feel

00:49:40.640 really depressed and

00:49:41.800 I'd kind of stay at

00:49:42.600 home and I

00:49:43.040 wouldn't go out and

00:49:44.200 then what would

00:49:44.660 probably happen after

00:49:45.920 that well I guess I'd

00:49:47.300 start to think about

00:49:48.660 socializing again and

00:49:49.900 meeting other people and

00:49:50.800 then what would

00:49:51.240 probably happen next

00:49:52.360 well I guess I'd

00:49:52.840 probably meet another

00:49:54.080 girl and form another

00:49:55.060 relationship and so on

00:49:56.320 so when we get people

00:49:57.440 to move forward in a

00:49:59.820 kind of patient

00:50:00.480 systematic manner it

00:50:02.160 tends to damp down the

00:50:04.180 initial anxiety and

00:50:05.720 they view things in a

00:50:06.460 more balanced way and

00:50:07.560 also they start to think

00:50:08.480 more about ways of

00:50:09.440 coping whereas when

00:50:10.720 people are worrying they

00:50:11.560 tend to just tell

00:50:12.180 themselves that they

00:50:13.200 can't cope and you

00:50:15.380 know the stoic

00:50:16.120 technique of thinking of

00:50:17.440 things in terms of a

00:50:18.720 wider context I think

00:50:20.780 serves a similar

00:50:21.540 purpose it forces us to

00:50:23.480 realize that the

00:50:24.260 perceived catastrophes

00:50:25.520 that happen to us are

00:50:26.620 temporary and that we

00:50:27.920 have to move on from

00:50:29.020 them and that seems

00:50:30.040 less overwhelming

00:50:30.800 this idea of stoic

00:50:32.780 acceptance is it is it

00:50:34.440 fatalism like where the

00:50:35.560 stoics did the stoic say

00:50:36.920 well that's just the way

00:50:37.700 things are there's

00:50:38.580 nothing you can do about

00:50:39.560 it or was their

00:50:41.020 fatalism different from

00:50:42.480 that that passive

00:50:43.520 fatalism yeah like the

00:50:45.440 idea of the stoic is a

00:50:46.700 kind of passive doormat

00:50:48.060 that just sits in his

00:50:49.600 hands and stays at home

00:50:51.040 is it the stay-at-home

00:50:51.900 stoic right well that's

00:50:54.040 a caricature of

00:50:54.920 stoicism and you know

00:50:56.360 one of the reasons that

00:50:57.120 I wrote how to think

00:50:57.900 like a Roman emperor is

00:50:59.060 that I found when I've

00:51:00.580 been teaching stoicism I

00:51:01.520 mean I've been teaching

00:51:02.040 stoicism and writing

00:51:02.860 about it for I think

00:51:04.020 it's probably just over

00:51:05.080 20 years now and time

00:51:07.000 and time again I've found

00:51:08.440 that these kind of

00:51:09.660 misconceptions of

00:51:10.580 stoicism come up like

00:51:11.960 it's about being

00:51:12.780 unemotional it's about

00:51:13.880 being kind of passive and

00:51:14.920 inert and you can argue

00:51:16.520 with people about that by

00:51:17.580 referring to the texts

00:51:18.880 or the philosophical

00:51:19.820 doctrines but actually

00:51:21.460 the easiest way to

00:51:22.500 dispute it is just to

00:51:23.560 point at a stoic like

00:51:25.960 Marcus Aurelius or Cato

00:51:27.700 or Zeno and say do

00:51:29.660 these guys seem like

00:51:30.840 they were passive

00:51:31.500 doormats like obviously

00:51:33.400 they weren't you know

00:51:34.660 Marcus Aurelius was a

00:51:35.680 workaholic if anything

00:51:36.860 he put himself at the

00:51:38.420 front line and

00:51:39.820 commanding the largest

00:51:41.080 army ever assembled on

00:51:42.640 a Roman frontier we

00:51:44.180 think the Roman legions

00:51:46.680 along the Danube during

00:51:47.940 the Marcomannic Wars

00:51:49.240 numbered maybe 140,000

00:51:52.060 men in total the

00:51:53.500 legions and the

00:51:54.220 auxiliary units combined

00:51:55.800 that's a huge army and

00:51:57.540 he'd never served in the

00:51:58.420 military before but even

00:51:59.960 as a sickly man with

00:52:01.200 many health problems in

00:52:02.840 his 40s he rode out

00:52:04.120 from Rome put on his

00:52:05.700 general's uniform went to

00:52:07.520 a foreign country for the

00:52:08.600 first time to modern day

00:52:09.620 Austria and took command

00:52:11.020 of this huge army staking

00:52:12.580 everything on it so he

00:52:14.220 wasn't this kind of

00:52:15.000 fatalistic passive stay

00:52:16.660 at home type quite the

00:52:17.920 opposite stoics were

00:52:19.260 committed to action in

00:52:21.200 the service of wisdom and

00:52:22.480 justice but the thing

00:52:24.100 about stoicism is that it

00:52:25.600 teaches us how to

00:52:26.540 reconcile a commitment to

00:52:28.840 determined action in the

00:52:31.120 service of our fundamental

00:52:32.180 values and principles with

00:52:34.100 emotional acceptance so that

00:52:36.700 we don't become upset if we

00:52:39.480 encounter setbacks or we're

00:52:41.960 thwarted along the way

00:52:43.220 because the stoics think

00:52:44.560 that the most important

00:52:45.420 thing is to have the

00:52:46.400 intention to do good in the

00:52:48.040 world while simultaneously

00:52:49.900 accepting the fact that we

00:52:51.960 might not succeed or that we

00:52:53.400 might encounter resistance or

00:52:54.820 setbacks along the way and

00:52:56.560 not to kind of get upset or

00:52:58.560 feel overwhelmed if that

00:52:59.820 happens now that's explained

00:53:02.060 famously by Cicero Cicero

00:53:03.940 wasn't a stoic he was a

00:53:05.900 follower of the the academic

00:53:07.640 school of philosophy that was

00:53:09.100 founded by Plato but Cicero a

00:53:11.500 famous Roman orator they

00:53:13.000 lived centuries earlier than

00:53:14.180 Marcus was a very educated

00:53:16.200 man and he'd studied stoicism

00:53:17.720 at Athens and he tells us

00:53:20.320 that the stoics explained this

00:53:22.320 as being like a man throwing a

00:53:24.020 spear or an archer and he

00:53:26.320 focuses on throwing the spear

00:53:27.940 at the target to the best of

00:53:29.900 his ability and whether he

00:53:32.020 actually hits the target or not

00:53:33.640 is in the hands of fate once the

00:53:35.700 spear is flown if he's throwing

00:53:37.380 it at a wild boar for example

00:53:39.400 you know it might dart in the

00:53:40.800 opposite direction and he might

00:53:42.020 miss it but his only goal is to

00:53:45.060 throw the spear in this most

00:53:46.900 skillful way that he possibly

00:53:48.340 can and then to be relatively

00:53:50.160 indifferent to whether he

00:53:51.240 actually hits the target or not

00:53:52.780 simply to do the best insofar as

00:53:55.100 that's within his power but in

00:53:56.560 order to try his best he has to

00:53:58.240 have a target to aim at and that's

00:54:00.220 how the stoics view the goal of

00:54:01.940 benefiting humanity they have to

00:54:04.040 have that goal in order to aim at

00:54:05.980 something constructive and

00:54:07.100 meaningful in life to have a sense

00:54:08.960 of purpose in life but they

00:54:10.500 mustn't demand success they have

00:54:12.940 to be relatively accepting of the

00:54:15.700 fact that they might fail or

00:54:16.980 encounter setbacks along the way

00:54:18.480 that's a tight that's a tough rope

00:54:20.720 to walk there's like a tension

00:54:22.260 there that I think could be really

00:54:24.240 it's a balancing act right right

00:54:25.760 because you know you you you have

00:54:28.620 to do your best but not be attached

00:54:30.240 to the results but like the results

00:54:31.720 are often like what spurs you or

00:54:34.080 motivate you to do your best but you

00:54:37.120 have to like take a step back and

00:54:38.840 not do that and that that can be

00:54:40.240 tricky those are the preferred

00:54:42.240 indifference in stoicism which is

00:54:43.800 kind of misleading language the

00:54:45.400 stoics also say that those things

00:54:46.640 have value or axia in Greek so

00:54:49.600 those are things that we value that

00:54:50.940 we want to achieve but you know as

00:54:53.600 soon as we fail to achieve them the

00:54:55.180 stoics say they become completely

00:54:56.500 indifferent to us it's like water

00:54:57.980 off a duck's back as it were so

00:55:00.020 the stoics should just kind of shrug

00:55:01.100 that off and move on to the next

00:55:02.600 thing but nevertheless while we're

00:55:04.580 aiming for them they do have a

00:55:06.340 certain type of limited importance

00:55:08.160 or value and we have to assign that

00:55:09.980 value to things in order to motivate

00:55:11.720 ourselves and to have something to

00:55:13.620 focus on but the value that we

00:55:15.720 assign to hitting the target should

00:55:19.000 never be so much that it would

00:55:22.120 distress us if we miss like we

00:55:25.180 shouldn't place so much value on it

00:55:26.740 that we throw a tantrum like or get

00:55:29.080 upset if things don't go as we would

00:55:31.140 have desired and we should never place

00:55:32.960 more value on obtaining those

00:55:35.240 externals than we place on our own

00:55:37.800 strength of character and our own

00:55:40.040 wisdom and virtue wisdom and virtue

00:55:42.200 always trumps the value that we place

00:55:44.440 on externals and that's like the

00:55:45.880 stoics basically saying we should

00:55:47.000 never sell out for wealth or

00:55:48.720 reputation or whatever we should

00:55:50.300 never be willing to sacrifice our own

00:55:51.940 character and integrity no matter how

00:55:54.580 much is it stay externally well how does

00:55:57.640 the stoic deal with like say trying to

00:55:59.060 extinguish an injustice in the world

00:56:01.060 right the stoics were about justice

00:56:02.700 but in the process of saying fighting

00:56:04.800 some injustice they might have setbacks

00:56:07.300 you know like how would the stoics like

00:56:09.480 they say just don't get upset just keep

00:56:10.840 trying was that would that be their

00:56:12.520 their right there's reinhold he says

00:56:14.780 you know he paraphrases one of the

00:56:17.380 passages in the meditations for his

00:56:18.880 book the obstacle is a way and that's

00:56:21.140 saying that's exactly what the stoics

00:56:22.400 mean so when we encounter an obstacle it

00:56:25.100 now becomes a new opportunity for us to

00:56:27.380 exercise virtue you know we flow around

00:56:30.360 it like water is kind of how the stoics

00:56:32.460 envisage it or as Marcus says the mind of

00:56:35.060 the wise man is like a blazing fire and

00:56:37.900 obstacles are just like more fuel more

00:56:40.040 wood that's thrown on the fire and it

00:56:41.760 consumes them so for the stoic if he

00:56:44.480 encounters a setback when he's trying to

00:56:46.540 act in the service of justice he needs to

00:56:48.940 just accept the reality of it accept his

00:56:51.440 situation and then he decides what would

00:56:54.420 constitute wisdom and justice and responding

00:56:56.700 to the new situation so he just adapts

00:56:59.420 and then tries to act with virtue and

00:57:02.140 integrity and face of the news in the

00:57:04.360 face of the new situation that he's now

00:57:05.900 encountering well Donald has been a great

00:57:07.620 conversation where can people go to learn

00:57:09.020 more about the book well they if they

00:57:10.780 want to find more about the stuff that I

00:57:12.860 do my website is just my name is

00:57:14.560 Donald Robertson or one word dot name

00:57:16.940 not dot com or I have a lot of free

00:57:19.240 courses and downloads as well that people

00:57:20.860 can do and that's just on my e-learning

00:57:23.000 site which is just the subdomain learn so

00:57:25.240 it's learn dot Donald Robertson dot name

00:57:28.060 and the main books I've written I've

00:57:29.980 written six books but the the ones in

00:57:31.860 stoicism are how to think like a Roman

00:57:34.260 emperor the one we've been talking about

00:57:35.820 the stoic philosophy of Marcus Aurelius

00:57:37.520 and also a teach yourself book called

00:57:39.580 stoicism and the art of happiness that

00:57:41.880 they can find these books on Amazon or

00:57:43.600 any online bookstore and also the more

00:57:45.880 academic book that I wrote for therapists

00:57:47.980 and philosophers is called the philosophy

00:57:50.460 of cognitive behavioral therapy and that

00:57:52.940 goes more deeply into the the relationship

00:57:55.640 with psychotherapy and the the history

00:57:57.560 of stoicism and psychotherapy

00:57:59.360 fantastic well Donald Robertson thanks

00:58:00.960 so much time it's been a pleasure

00:58:01.860 thanks Brett it's been a pleasure

00:58:03.120 speaking to you my guest name is

00:58:04.580 Donald Robertson he's the author of the

00:58:05.900 book how to think like a Roman emperor

00:58:07.460 it's available on amazon.com and bookstores

00:58:09.260 everywhere you can find out more

00:58:10.480 information about his work at his

00:58:11.860 website donaldrobertson.name or also

00:58:14.360 check out our show notes at aom.is

00:58:16.200 slash Marcus where you can find links to

00:58:17.660 resources we can delve deeper into this

00:58:19.140 topic

00:58:19.440 well that wraps up another edition of

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00:58:29.520 at art of manless.com where you can find

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00:58:32.820 thousands of articles over the years

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00:59:05.500 of it as always thank you for the

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00:59:08.200 this is Brett McKay reminding you not

00:59:09.700 only listen to the aom podcast but put

00:59:11.380 what you've heard into action

00:59:12.560 thank you

00:59:33.620 you

00:59:35.620 you

00:59:37.620 you

The Art of Manliness - July 31, 2025

#537： How to Think Like a Roman Emperor

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