I often have trouble with challenging people at work. Over time it's become a habit to turn to this book to ride it out.
I often have trouble with challenging people at work.
For the video, I find the format completely destroys the content. Reading the book, I can almost put myself in the situation of a Roman Emperor arriving at these conclusions, after weary days of argument, etc, etc. In video form, they just wash over as meaningless aphorisms.
There is a healthy and rational way to engage in conflict resolution and ignoring the problem, refusing to have difficult conversations, burying one's head in the sand, none of these things accomplish anything other than to result in a gradual surrender to people who have no such qualms.
I’m not saying stoicism is perfect or anything like it.
I describe what you’re noticing as “inviting death into life”. I do agree a lot of people use philosophies like stoicism to intellectualize and justify this behaviour. It’s a very common kind of psychological illness though, and people find all kinds of ways to do it. They suppress themselves (and those around them) by rationalizing their inability to engage in life.
I find a lot of people who do this can be very intelligent. When I realized how it works it was very eye-opening how little an intellect can protect you from maladaptive behaviours. The brain can seriously undermine itself through defensive and protective behaviour.
The classical philosophy was much purer in many ways than modern practice, agreed on that point.
Although I do often question how much value it was to Marcus Aurelius himself as a father given how his son turned out. I don't intend that as a low blow but as a serious question of the long term value of the implications contained in the philosophy.
I don't think it'll be possible to ever know why that happened and how, but it's worth being suspicious of.
One of the main issues with stoicism (from my perspective) is that people can easily think they're engaged in the philosophy internally, yet they'll rarely if ever practice it externally in the world. It's easy to think Aurelius was practicing it externally because of how he expresses himself in text, and how his time as emperor was positively renowned... But this doesn't necessarily mean he was engaged in practicing the philosophy holistically in all aspects of his life. Maybe he was a bad father. There is evidence that Commodus didn't receive as much guidance as Marcus himself did, which is odd. Marcus was ill and facing the worst kinds of things, yet you'd think he'd have the resources and sense to ensure his son was receiving training and guidance to greatest extent possible. It's easy to be critical, though. He faced tremendous losses and stress in his life that would likely wear me into a pulp.
But then there's also the possibility that the winners write history, and those who assassinated Commodus ensured that records of his rule were made to seem horrible. It's hard to be certain of what really occurred.
Still, there are likely more stoics out there who try to think like a stoic but don't act like one. It's the same with any philosophy. Bringing it into practice is the hard part, and most of us fail to some degree or another. I do think stoicism is particularly vulnerable to this mistake though, but that's only based on intuition and anecdotal experience.
Stoicism is like Buddhism or anything else here, where you're better off with primary sources or certain vetted guides/commentaries. Talking to certain segments of people that loudly consider themselves practitioners may not be the best way to actually get acquainted with the philosophy..
That's... Not what the idea was, but alright
Sure, if you can resolve conflicts and engage with problems, go for it and do it. Sometimes though the world around you is falling or you suffer terrible loss or you face impossible situations -- then Marcus Aurelius will still be there waiting for you, with advice to offer. Also worth remembering he wrote the thing itself with war and death all around him.