Rethinking Fear
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There is such a life denying smugness in addressing fear as the article does, for example saying. "Our imaginary fears harm us more than reality ever does.". I think that depends pretty heavily on your reality. Detachment from reality or fear is a pseudo-cure that just attempts to skip over true existential problems.
Over the last decade or so stoicism keeps popping up in 'business leader' and tech circles and blogs like this trying to sell people 'timeless wisdoms' which I think is very on-brand. It's always been less of a philosophy and more of a ruling class handbook on how to conduct oneself.
Sounds like a pretty disingenuous take. Epictetus was a slave and a Stoic.
> "Our imaginary fears harm us more than reality ever does.". I think that depends pretty heavily on your reality.
Yes, but it's true for the vast majority of humanity, and so arguably considerable suffering is imaginary is it not?
> Detachment from reality or fear is a pseudo-cure that just attempts to skip over true existential problems.
Stoicism is not about detachment. A better reductive one-word summary: Stoicism is about perspective.
Which is neither here, nor there. "Stoic" philosophy, as understood and practiced by ruling class/execs/etc has almost nothing to do with Epictetus, and is the product of a culture millenia away from the ancient mindset.
Similar to what western "Buddhism" or "zen practices" (used to be more productive, combined with modern life as a lifestyle accessory) is to traditional Buddhism.
>Yes, but it's true for the vast majority of humanity, and so arguably considerable suffering is imaginary is it not?
Citation needed.
For neurotic people their "imaginary fears" might be harming them more than actual problems. But not for the "vast majority of humanity".
War, hunger, poverty, health issues, precarious jobs, bad jobs, persecution, bullying, bad relationships, loneliness, old age, betrayals, and so on, are actual things that harm people in actual reality, more than any "imaginary fears" they have.
Since you started it, I'll ask for a citation on this too. I'm sure you have a subjective sense in which this seems true, but I'm not personally convinced that humanity and human problems have changed all that much, nor that stoicism as currently understood is all that different than Epictetus's conception.
> For neurotic people their "imaginary fears" might be harming them more than actual problems. But not for the "vast majority of humanity".
Extreme poverty is now very rare (1 in 7 people) [1]. Death from violent conflict is also rare (most pessimistic estimate is 2 per 100,000) [2]. Obviously this is not the complete picture of all bad things, but I think it's basically the case that constant physical suffering is a pretty uncommon for most people these days, where mental suffering is common to most people.
Furthermore, fear, anxiety and unnecessary mental suffering are not the domain of purely neurotic people. Neurotic people simply become non-functional in various ways because of it, and that's why it's considered a disorder. Just because you're functional does not mean you're not suffering mentally (and possibly unnecessarily).
> War, hunger, poverty, health issues, precarious jobs, bad jobs, persecution, bullying, bad relationships, loneliness, old age, betrayals, and so on, are actual things that harm people in actual reality,
Absolutely. But I don't think it's at all obvious that the magnitude of harm actually outstrips the constant anxiety and fear of imagining yourself possibly experiencing that harm.
Take bullying, something with which many people on HN probably have some experience. The actual experience of bullying is terrible when it happens. Each instance is what, perhaps 5-10 minutes of suffering? Now consider how much suffering you experienced outside of that, the fear and paranoia that you might run into your bully around every corner, the constant review of the humiliating experience every night, the dread of the walk to school or between classes, to defense mechanisms you build up to that can reduce your ability to connect with others in adult life.
So what is really harming the bullied more overall, the actual bullying, or the mental suffering surrounding the bullying? Yes, the mental suffering was triggered by the bullying, but that doesn't mean it has to dominate your life, so I don't think the answer is as clear as you imply, and I think the same argument applies to most of the other items on your list, eg. the physical suffering is often temporary, but the mental suffering is considerably longer lasting and thus probably more impactful. Stoicism can arguably grant you a perspective shift that reduces or eliminates a lot of that mental suffering.
Human problems haven't changed all that much (in some sense).
But the application of Epictetus philosophy has changed greatly, from sincere following for centuries in times when it was a survival tool, to a lifestyle accessory in times when it's a fad (of which several others have come and go in the 30 years I've followed the space, and more will) - from people who have no modesty or charity (philanthropia), but like to "play the stoic" as one in the 70s would play the world savvy playboy type or in previous decades the rugged boostrapped guy, and so on.
>Extreme poverty is now very rare (1 in 7 people)
That's a feel-good statistic, about third world people being able to get a few dollars whereas they had even less before.
You can be several steps away from "extreme poverty" in the Hans Rosling/Steven Pinken sense to have serious money issues (and not because of some personal irresponsibility of lack of trying).
Billion nominally out of this "extreme poverty" are struggling very hard and very real, with exhausting jobs, eviction, feeding and educating their kids, paying the rent every month, covering health payments, and so on. Everywhere, including the first world, job precariousness, shitty jobs, money anxiety, debt and so on is very common (most people). To the point that e.g. https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/19/56percent-of-americans-cant-...
I see you haven't spent any considerable amount of time in third world countries.
"Meaning and morality of One's life come from within oneself. Healthy, strong individuals seek self expansion by experimenting and by living dangerously. Life consists of an infinite number of possibilities and the healthy person explores as many of them as posible. Religions that teach pity, self-contempt, humility, self-restraint and guilt are incorrect. The good life is ever changing, challenging, devoid of regret, intense, creative and risky." -Nietzsche
When Nietzsche talks about Amor Fati he is making an even stronger point. People should not just assert control over their own lives and risk things, they should do so even if they know that they are doomed. Love for one's fate and love for life is supposed to be so strong that even imagining the worst outcome repeating forever ('Eternal Return' in Zarathustra), one still ought to say 'yes' and embrace fear, suffering, what have you.
And that is where he parts from the Stoics. Where the Stoics, in the face of fear advocate retreat, or moderation, or some kind of contemplation and withdrawal he makes the case that is it precisely the fear that makes asserting one's will worthwhile.
That said, I think there is value in repeatedly stressing people near or past their breaking points, relieving burnout potential, and gradually increasing challenges to moderate an individual's stress response and build their confidence ("break them down and build them up"). Furthermore, the Marines train their leaders make to decisions with incomplete information under pressure. Stressful experiences help make future experiences seem less daunting.
Why is that not valid still? No model or strategy works for everyone. A philosophy aimed at people at the top still has value unless you prove otherwise. It being in a niche does not disqualify it automatically.
The ridiculous part in the articles you describe is the targeting, not the ideas. It's the age old fallacy - train as Arnold did for the Olympia and you are going to get as big as him, when in fact he got big first, then adopted the training style and if you would copy that you would only get injured. In the same way a philosophy for top leaders could be very bad for the bottom socioeconomic class.
Passiveness, denying emotions and lived experience and with that also beauty and heroism and embracing risk and instead opting for rationalizing and theorizing and detachment is, he argues, bad not just for ordinary people but for the entire culture.
And I think that's very relevant today when it comes to leaders. We don't really have leaders as such but rather science, public intellectuals, bureaucrats, processes and so forth. When was the last time there was a modern leadership that had a sense for beauty or aesthetics?
Granted, parity in this sense doesn't track "reality", but it might be worth deconstructing your dismissal a bit. There are people that have to deal with irrational fear. Recognizing that you have direct control over that experience can be liberating and life-affirming, to use your language.
Personally, where I find the juicy bits are in the questions:
- How do you discern reasonable vs. unreasonable fear?
- What external factors are controllable and which are not?
- The feedback between external and internal factors is probably a mess of non-linearities. Where are the attractors? What does the landscape look like? How can you find the really nice/cool/fun/interesting attractors?
Etc. Of course, the above can be generalized beyond fear (via some appropriate natural transformation---hi Haskellers).
I have a condition of unknown etiology apparently causing autonomic disfunction that also causes my sense of fear to be almost silenced.[i] It's a constant state of "anxiety", hyper-vigilance, and inappropriate sinus tachycardia unmanageable by anxiolytics (CBD, BZs, etc.), box breathing, meditation, therapy, or anything so far. Emotionally and psychologically, I do not feel much in the way of any actual fear or anxiety despite having physiological anxiety symptoms. Adrenaline and self-preservation instincts still work alright. If I could relax, I would give my left nut. I don't have PTSD, i.e., intrusive thoughts, nightmares, flashbacks, or sweating episodes. If I had to do front-line combat, I wouldn't have any aftereffects.
i) Examples:
1. I had no problem confronting a 300 lbs. aggressive, mentally-ill, homeless dude from terrorizing a mother and her young son.
2. I do stupid, extreme sports shit and take random risks (not gambling or substances) for fun. PPG, 40+ mph e-scooter in traffic, and learning to longboard. Used to street race.
3. I've been through multiple mass-casualty regional disasters. In each, I only felt inconvenienced and later reflected on the losses of life.
4. I may not be John Wick, but anyone stupid enough to come at me with a weapon better know how to retain it, or they're going to lose it and likely receive an educational beatdown. Irish propensity for grudges, finishing fights, and lengthy military family lineage.
There's an author that wrote, facing your fear is a lot worse than living with the underlying feeling of helplessness that comes from doing things to avoid it.
Of course it's not that simple and more context dependant, somethings like fear of a predator or fear of starving are valid and should be addressed.
I suppose if you're a zookeeper or fasting than those are ok too..
But I think of you can reconcile what you're fearing rationally then all that's left is the emotion and you just have to go towards it.
All that being said... damn it's the best and worst emotion by far. Really I just commented so that I'll see what HN has to say for it
Fear is awareness of imminent danger.
Anxiety is awareness of future imagined danger.
Perhaps how we avoid both is by turning off the noise all together and stop the daily doomscroll. Why do we do this to ourselves?
1. The Source of Fear [0]
> Often, it is said that face your fear but what does facing your fear really mean? And whatever it may mean, how to go about it? To begin with, personify your fear. Whatever is your fear, personify it and go for intense visualization. Imagine your fear is actually a person and you are facing it. Talk to your fear, send it vibes of love and compassion, befriend it. The same energy that was fueling your fear will become your strength instead. Try it. Viktor Frankl in propounding Logotherapy once wrote about a certain man who used to sweat a lot in public. Every time, he had to speak on the stage or address a group, he would start sweating profusely, a condition he found rather embarrassing. The anxiety that surrounded in anticipation of his perspiration would make him sweat even more.
> “Announce your anxiety,” Viktor advised him. “If you don’t know the audience well enough, just announce it to yourself.” A week later the man returned to report that whenever he met anyone who triggered his anticipatory anxiety, he said to himself, “I only sweated out a quart before, but now I’m going to pour at least ten quarts!”
> The result was that after suffering for four years, with this single self-prompt, he was cured of it permanently within that one week.
2. The Antidote To Fear Is Faith [1]
> When your fear is genuine, arising out of a reasonable anticipation or a certain action (or lack of it), preparedness is the only way to help you face the fear. For example, if you fear failing an exam tomorrow because you haven’t prepared for it, it’s a genuine fear. Positive talk or self-affirmation won’t really help you. Only preparedness will.
> And, at the root of readiness is a simple affirmation. Putting your hand on your heart, if you can say I did the best I could then you’ve done your bit. The rest must be left to the Nature, Fate, Karma, God, whatever you want to call that element. We can only do what we can and ultimately, we can only do so much. If you’ve prepared as well as you could, that’s all that matters. We don’t control everything that happens to or around us. There’s little sense in fretting over things beyond your control.
> If you’ve put your seat belts on and you are obeying the traffic laws while driving carefully, worrying about an accident is a pointless fear. You’ve no control over it. Worrying about a plane crash while taking a flight is another example. Excessive thinking is the mother of such fears. Any specific fear you can’t get out of your head is a phobia. Either way, good meditation, counseling or other similar methods can help you overcome them. For all genuine fears, though, readiness is the only way as far as I know.
0: https://os.me/the-source-of-fear/ 1. https://os.me/the-antidote-to-fear/
Just be right all the time and you will also only have real fears and avoid the imaginary anxiety inducing ones. Again, you just have to be right all the time in predicting the future by correctly evaluating the infinity of variables and how they come together to create risks. Small potatoes. /s
When you take this "small" requirement into account the article basically becomes "be right, don't be wrong". Well, thank you very much.