A Nobody's guide to Stoicism

The life of the ancient Stoics stands marred in pain, suffering, exile, slavery, and sickness. Even for those stoics such as Marcus Aurelius whom history remembers as the philosopher emperor of Rome. Many today may never face the tribulations that these ancient philosophers did, why then is true stoic thought so difficult to achieve and so rarely sought after in modern times?

The intent of this series is not to preach from a moral high ground or attempt to generalize brutal human emotions so that they fit neatly into square societal boxes of what acceptable emotional responses are. Instead this series will travel through my own struggles, revelations, and most importantly failures so that you, the reader, can learn from some of my mistakes or at the very least realize that we are not alone in our suffering as we travel through this life. Typically at this point in an article the author will attempt to establish rapport and set themselves up on their pedestal so that the full weight of their words may be realized and appreciated. I am not going to do this, I am a nobody. Being a nobody is what makes my words so valuable in my opinion, because most of the world is filled with 'nobodies'. When we die most of us will not have televised funerals, most of us don't have millions of people following our every move on social media, most of us only matter to those that truly know us, and that is enough for a happy and fulfilled life. How often are we bombarded with opinions and advice from those that rarely if ever have even seen what struggles we possess, or better yet they can neatly label our struggles for us due to the latest research or news article. This series will be different, I aim to look at the struggles of life through the lens of stoicism as a flawed nobody who lives their life outside of the spot light and as long as one person reads this and realizes that they are not alone in the world struggling than I will be content at the completion of this series.

Due to the introductory nature of this first segment and in attempt to keep each segment brief the remainder of this part will discuss my personal outlook on personal control, more specifically controlling one's emotions. I am starting here to provide my readers with a lens that the remaining sections can be viewed through. Most of the narratives, struggles, and advice will be painted by my person bias and opinions of how we should deal with emotions and what importance they play in our daily lives. That being said it is only fair that I outline my bias now as to not cause confusion in later articles.

Firstly, I strongly believe that emotions are a right that all humans have. The actions that are taken due to emotions however are not a right. Many stoic authors discuss that the only true control one has over a situation is their own reaction. This is true, but not every reaction is a just and good reaction. In these times when someone reacts poorly to an emotion in a way that goes against who they are they are temporarily giving away their rights to an outside source. If I start my day happy, but traffic on the way to work causes me to choose to be angry and puts me in a sour mood for the rest of the day, I allowed the morning traffic to steal my happiness that was mine by my basic rights as a human. I have spent days worrying about events that may never come to pass only to finally realize that I let a problem steal days of my happiness. We all have the right to be content and happy with life ALWAYS, whenever we are not it is our fault. The events that happen around us cannot change our mood and emotions unless we let them, and by doing this we are giving away our rights to an outside source, and for what? What benefit is there in abandoning ourselves to the whims of the environment around us? This leads into my second point, accomplishing the first point 100% of the time is the pinnacle of stoicism and has probably rarely if ever been accomplished. To go through life staying true to ourselves and feeling contentment or happiness regardless of our environment is no easy feat and for as much as the stoics talk of this concept it is not simple by any means.

These two concepts will set the stage for the remaining parts as we look at fear, failure, anxiety, joy, loss, and regret in terms of stoicism. More importantly we will look at how hard it is to keep our rights and keep the emotions we want to experience in the face of these stronger emotions, and what we can do to prepare ourselves for the next time we are faced with an obstacle. Please join me in my next part where we will look at fear and how to overcome its emotional responses.