Follow up to The Fascinating Study of Stoicism
Zeno, the founder of Stoicism in ancient Greece, is said to have begun his studies in philosophy by tutoring under Crates, a cynic. One of the first things that Zeno learned, as a result, was to practice not being ashamed of things that were not shameful.
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| Zeno of Citium |
To reinforce this lesson, Crates apparently had Zeno walk around with a pot full of lentil soup in public places. When he saw that Zeno was embarrassed and tried to keep the pot out of sight, Crates broke it by striking it with his staff. Zeno ran away, mortified. When he did, Crates called out:
“Why run away, my little Phoenician? Nothing terrible has befallen you.”
And, of course, nothing bad happened to Zeno. He only worried that other people might think ill of him. And this worrying about what other people thought was something that Zeno eventually learned to overcome.
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| Lentil soup's on! |
It’s something that we all should learn if we are ever going to be happy and live a good life. Because if you want to achieve that goal, if you want to live a good life, then you need to be (relatively) unconcerned with other people’s opinions for two reasons. First, you will otherwise end up living the life that others think you should have, not yours. Second, you will otherwise end up playing a game — the recognition game — that you can never win.
The first point is obvious. If you are always trying to please other people, to live by what they think, then there will be nothing left of your life for the real you to enjoy.
The second point is pretty obvious too: there is always a bigger fish in the ocean. If you think that you can win the recognition game, you are wrong.
To illustrate, think of it this way. Marketers developed what is called a Q-Score to measure how popular various celebrities are. Their goal was to allow large firms to use those scores to more effectively advertise to their fan base. At one point, Former U.S. President Obama was on top of that list. Now, he’s not (because he’s just not in the news as much). Even if you win at that game, in short, you will be replaced.
What these points mean is that we all need to learn, we all need to practice, not worrying about other people’s opinions of us. And while there are actually harder Stoic actions — such as dying freely — this practice is the most difficult of the daily activities you could perform.
The 20th-century philosopher of Greek antiquity, Pierre Hadot, called these practices that help you become a better person “spiritual exercises,” because they are like medicine for your soul, rather than your body.
To put the goal memorably: to live an invulnerable life, you must practice daily vulnerability.
In less paradoxical language, to achieve Stoic happiness, where events outside your control don’t ruin your life, you have to address the sources of your shame — you have to be vulnerable.
The exercise of vulnerability understood in the way that people normally think of it then, is nothing but courage as the Stoics professed.
Here are two spiritual exercises concerning shame and vulnerability that are designed to help learn how to live a happier life. Let’s begin with the easier version of these exercises.
Social Vulnerability
We no longer have the Republic that Zeno wrote about, but apparently it was controversial in classical antiquity. He prohibited the building of temples, law courts and gymnasiums in his supposed “utopia.” Further, Diogenes tells us,
“He bids men and women wear the same dress and keep no part of the body entirely covered”
Why would Zeno want people to wear androgynous clothes that didn’t cover all parts of your body?
The Stoic lesson here seems to be that people become too conscious of what other people think about them, and they try, wrongly, to conform to social norms. These include how certain genders should act and the idea that some parts of the body are shameful.
This doesn’t mean that to practice Stoic vulnerability you should wear a sack cloth or wander around naked (though maybe Zeno would have liked nudism?).
To practice social vulnerability, the main thing you need to do is learn not to be trapped by social categories and expectations. I’ll give you some vivid common examples put forward by a philosopher specializing in the study of all things Stoic, broken down by gender (since that’s an important social category).
For men, the challenge can be put this way: Can you do “girly” things? Could you, for example, order a Cosmo as a drink? Could you go to a Yoga class?
For women, the challenge can’t be to perform masculine activities — at least not simply. The reason is that when women do masculine things, they still tend to be thought of in a positive light -- good for trying, or not so bad after all. A woman, for example, who can chug a beer in four seconds will command the respect of the bros at the local bar.
A better example, then, might be the no-makeup challenges that you see celebrities perform occasionally. When not using makeup, women aren’t explicitly crossing into masculine categories. They may be making themselves vulnerable, however.
Whatever your gender, what you are after is an “affective cognition”, a feeling. The thought goes like this: They are looking at me … and I’m not as I’m “supposed” to be.
The Stoics called this an immediate impression, not fully rational just yet. You need to stop yourself from just agreeing to these impressions, so that you can figure out if they are right for you.
The crucial part is to discern whether the evaluative portion of that feeling makes sense. Yes, they are looking at me. But that’s not a big deal. Also, yes, I’m not conforming to social norms — I’m not as I’m “supposed” to be. But why does that matter? Why is that bad?
What was so wrong about Zeno holding a pot of lentils in public? What’s so bad about a guy ordering a Cosmo?
Finding that feeling and learning to separate out the part that says it’s a bad thing, or not normal, is the key. Your life as a whole is not about to become worse because of what “they” think. But if you give into that irrational first impression, then it just might.
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