Stoicism is a school of ancient Greek philosophy that asks the question “How can we live a good life?” - more specifically, how can an individual like you and me achieve a state of being in which we flourish, which the Stoics called Eudaimonia.
If we get this right, we remove the ability for the areas of life outside our control to impact our peace of mind, and we’re free to focus our efforts on the areas of life we can control - this essentially makes us far more resilient and effective as individuals.
If we get this wrong, we allow anything in the world around us to influence our well being - our peace of mind becomes a plaything of chance through our inability to decide what we can do something about and accept what we can't. Instead we’re pulled in all directions by anything around us that captures our attention or emotional energy.
One area of life that causes a lot of people a lot of suffering is the inability to accept the unravelling of events around them, despite these events being completely outside the individual’s control.
Regardless of what fate has been put in front of us, if it’s happened, no amount of worry, anger, jealousy, or frustration will rewind time and undo what’s been done, nor will it change anything that is yet to come, if those events are outside the reach of your control.
To illustrate this and help them learn to accept fate, the Stoics used the concept of Amor Fati, or love of fate. This was the idea that instead of resisting fate, fighting it tooth and nail, and thereby causing ourselves suffering, we should learn to accept it and even love it. After all, everything that has come before you was needed for you to be here right now. Without the unfolding of all of the things before you, gas clouds wouldn't have come together to form planets and stars, stars wouldn't have bound lighter elements into heavier elements, and life itself wouldn’t have begun from the most basic building blocks of life. We wouldn’t have wildlife, mountains, oceans, history, or culture. You wouldn’t have the ability to laugh, to feel love, to fear, to feel joy, peace, awe, wonder and create.
While there may be suffering in the world, it is exactly this suffering that’s needed to make the good feel good. We need hard work to make rest feel restful, we need loss to appreciate what we have, and we need dark to appreciate light.
Death and the fear of death can be a debilitating block to live life fully. It can prevent people from trying new things, leaving the house, and to live in constant fear of the end. Under the fear of death we can be robbed of life.
Marcus Aurelius once said:
“You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.”
The Stoics employed a principle called Memento Mori, or the practice of reminding yourself that you will die. However this was not a morbid, fear mongering exercise, it was designed to add beauty, gratitude and fulfilment to life.
Through the reminder of death we can learn to appreciate life. Knowing that there will only be a finite number of times we can see our friends, be with family, enjoy a meal, see a sunset, walk through fields, enjoy the ocean, read our favourite book, eat popcorn in front of a movie, or embrace our partner, can create an intense feeling of gratitude in the moment. We stop taking things for granted, we stop focusing on the little arguments, and the minor annoyances and instead become more deliberate with our attention because it’s a limited resource.
“In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.” - Eleanor Roosevelt
There’s one thing people do that blocks all routes to growth, and that’s blame. If we blame other people for our conditions, if we blame other people for our actions, if we blame other people for our mood, we’re rejecting any responsibility. Rejecting any ownership over the things we’ve said, thought and done that have put us in the position we’re in.
If we look back on control and the things in life Epictetus drew out that are within our control; everything in there is our responsibility. He said:
"Within our power are our own opinions, aims, desires, dislikes—in sum, our own thoughts and actions."
A lot of us resist change, and understandably so, we like comfort, we like predictability and we like to know the order of things and have the world around us fit nicely into the mental framework we’ve made for it. Change is often the unknown, it’s the unfamiliar and it risks destabilising all of these things that make us feel safe and comfortable. But it’s inevitable, it’s the nature of the world around us, and if we don’t learn to be flexible in the face of change, we risk breaking under the force of it.
The more we resist, the more we suffer as it happens around us.