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Stoicism for When You’re Stuck (Episode 164)
649 Plays4 days ago
et these tested Stoic strategies pull you out of bed and back into life's beauty. Michael and Caleb explore ancient wisdom for reconnecting with meaning through nature, duty, and proper thinking.
(00:47) Set Up
(04:33) Crisis in Thinking
(10:29) Finding Purpose
(19:18) Beauty
(26:59) Play With Time
(38:43) Be Gentle
(42:08) Summary
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Transcript
Introduction to True Self-Love
00:00:00
Speaker
Oh, I'm going to love myself in the way that makes me feel good about myself or the way that makes me feel special. um But that's not really love unless you're also recognizing your ordinariness or yeah the fact that you're a small piece of something much, much bigger. um And that's that. Yeah, that's a more profound kind of self-love.
Podcast Inspiration: Meaning and Motivation in Stoicism
00:00:18
Speaker
Welcome to Stoa Conversations. My name is Caleb Monteveros. And I'm Michael Trombley.
00:00:25
Speaker
And today, Michael put together some notes on a topic that we got an email about. And then ah also, I think people frequently post about on Reddit, on as well as other discussion forums. So I think this should be a good practical topic will be going through on a problem a lot of people face. So I want to introduce that for us and set the stage.
Stoicism's Approach to Meaning and Motivation
00:00:47
Speaker
Yeah, so today's topic is about meaning and motivation, or in other words, howd do how do the Stoics recommend addressing the sensation of a lack of meaning or a lack of motivation in your own life? um So this was inspired, we we got as you mentioned, we got an email from a listener. um they were They were asking about how Stoicism can help with uh, low level dissatisfaction with life, feelings of sadness, lack of purpose. I think if this is kind of a general malaise, maybe you feel in a fog, you don't feel tuned in. You don't feel excited about things the way you used to be.
00:01:26
Speaker
that's ah That to me is a really interesting question because we often frame the... Stoicism is a lot about you know getting your emotions right, feeling. It has this goal of of happiness and flourishing. But when we talk about emotional therapy and stoicism, we often talk about dealing with these extreme passions. right Like, oh, I'm angry. How can I be less angry?
00:01:49
Speaker
i'm in grief how can i experience less grief um or you know change my relationship with grief how can i be less anxious in these kind of uh debilitating moments of anxiety and i thought this was kind of more of a you know instead of these 10 out of 10 How do you deal with this like this kind of four out of 10 that stays with you, needs you, bugs you? um Another incentive for this, so along with that email from a listener, um and I read this Reddit post that connected with this connect with this idea of motivation, which I think is also tuned into this um kind of general dissatisfaction. And the post on Reddit said, quote, how does stoicism help you deal with a lack of motivation?
00:02:32
Speaker
Every day I wake
Stoic Strategies for Motivation Issues
00:02:33
Speaker
up feeling like doing nothing. Honestly, it's so weird. It's almost as if life was not worth living. I'm just there hanging around. I'm aware of my capacity, and I know if I work harder, if I worked at all, better said, I would achieve good outcomes. But it's just, I don't know, it's hard to explain. I want to be virtuous, but I don't feel like doing much. What do you think?
00:02:54
Speaker
Um, yeah, great question. And so I wanted to, I wanted to, today's episode is about what is the stoic response to that question? Um, when you're sitting in bed and you don't feel like doing much and you, you recognize you have a capacity for something more, but you're not able to achieve it or you don't have the motivation to achieve it. Um, so today's going to be a deep dive into that and how the Stokes will respond. Anything you wanted to add by way of context, Caleb?
00:03:22
Speaker
I think that's that's well said. I suppose you know a lot of people do come to stoicism because they think it's a solution to, and they find that it's a solution to really obvious challenges, obstacles they face in life that maybe cause you know significant amounts of pain and such. But it's equally true that there are moments in life where It's almost as if there's nothing going wrong with your life at the time, at least nothing you can easily identify. But you feel you do feel a sense of dissatisfaction, lack the lack of motivation that was expressed in
00:03:59
Speaker
and the post you read. and i think I do think stoicism has resources for that kind of issue as well. and that's um It's one that I don i don't think anyone's going to be an alien to, so it's certainly worth discussing. Everybody's been there. ah we all if you're If you're not going through it right now, it's going to be prepare you for for something in the future as well.
00:04:21
Speaker
So I'm going to go through maybe four stoic strategies or four four ideas to keep in mind for a stoic approach to these issues. So number one is kind of a groundwork. You know, we in this channel, we're We always kind of base are base of the recommendations, try not to take quotes out of context, but base them in the the psychological and philosophical foundations of stoicism. and The first thing when we're talking about stoicism is that idea in stoicism that you you you are how you think.
00:04:54
Speaker
um So a crisis in meaning or a crisis in experience, crisis in motivation is going to be a crisis in thinking. It's going to be a crisis in terms of your values and your beliefs. Maybe not a crisis in terms of those things, but it's going to be a downstream. You feel this way because of the way that you conceptualize relate to the world. um So it is going to be a kind of an intellectual problem.
Changing Judgments for a Meaningful Life
00:05:20
Speaker
There are ways,
00:05:21
Speaker
know we are We encourage mindfulness, meditation, I think sport is is excellent. there's There's ways of coming to knowledge and changing perspective through embodied activities. But something at the end of the day says, you know if you want to feel differently, you're going to have to think differently.
00:05:39
Speaker
um And that's that's just some ground, a base ground level of understanding ah that the rest of the advice is going to be meeting. um The quote for that of Epictetus Handbook 5, where Epictetus says, it's it's not events that disturb people, it is their judgments concerning them. That's Stoicism 101. So if you feel If you feel like not getting out of bed in the morning, it's not it's it's it's not the the events themselves that is causing that that that sensation. It is your judgments about them. And so they're going to look to address address the judgments.
00:06:17
Speaker
um And this is meant to be a descriptive psychological fact. So it's when when we feel a general malaise about life, we've lost a perspective. We've lost focus on beauty, joy or meaning. So the question is going to be, how can I regain that perspective? How can I change those judgments so that I can refocus on those good things and feel the motivation that comes from being focused on or thinking about um the good, the worthwhile, the meaningful in life?
00:06:47
Speaker
Any thoughts on on that? Yeah, i think I think that's right. And I think we can we can dive into some potential beliefs that people might have that can bring about these this kind of low level dissatisfaction. I think when people are are younger, perhaps you you have lack that sense of purpose, perhaps because you Um, simply don't have beliefs about what your purpose is or perhaps have beliefs about your own capabilities and your um inability to live up to a purpose in the future. Um, that might result in a sense of aimlessness as people get older. Maybe it's a little bit, I think it might be a little bit different where they look back on.
00:07:37
Speaker
their life and see how these are ways things could have gone, but those opportunities are now closed. And of course, there's a sense that people understand that those opportunities are closed. but i think well I think with that reality comes in you know an updating of who you are, what do you do now, and ah you know how how do you shape the the rest of your life given this is where this is who you are now at this time, your choices are cemented in the past.
00:08:09
Speaker
and um i think with anyone looking back on on their life is going to feel some amount of pride and also perhaps some amount of regret and remorse at where they've ended up. I think that's maybe a little bit of a stab at and maybe what's going on behind some some of these questions and what can cause dissatisfaction, some beliefs that might cause dissatisfaction, kind of aimlessness that often often results in this this lack of motivation as well. you well i think I think everyone's situation is going to be different.
00:08:38
Speaker
But um I think those are two important categories. And I like that there are two sides of the same coin. So one is you know when you're younger, not really being able to see the purpose, not seeing the path, not seeing what you're aiming towards so that it makes any like plans of action maybe not seem worthwhile. Or as you said, you lack confidence. So I'm not going to try or there's no point in me doing that. And then the flip side when you're older is saying, Oh, what could have been what I could have done. And that kind of frustration with that or this sense of like, uh, loss, almost like a grief of your previous potential. And I think what's interesting for me at least is thinking on that, that that's not the only reason people feel this way, but on that in particular, I mean, there's this funny fact, like the stoics are always going to ask us to think about the fact of the matter.
00:09:28
Speaker
And there's this fact that people kind of retain that feeling even as they get older. you know if you If you go on, ah you're going to see somebody who's 21 posting. I i go on on Reddit a lot. That's the internet community I spend time on. if you are You see people that are 21 posting, like, is my life over? like I've wasted so much time. um and Everyone's just like yeah like, what are you talking about? Things are just beginning. And ah you know I'm 30. You should you just wait until you're that age. and I'm sure a 50-year-old would feel the same way, and I'm sure a 70-year-old would feel the same way. did that that kind of um I guess that cycle doesn't end of both like feeling ambiguous about the future and and regretting what could have been in the past, but knowing that people older than you see the potential in their own past, and that that has to be kind of motivating or make you understand that you'll one day be looking back, being like, oh, I could have really done something here, um something exciting. That's something that that I always think about.
00:10:27
Speaker
Yeah, that's well put. That's well put. I think another thing that you were hitting on there is a kind of a general, you feel meaningless or you feel unmotivated because maybe there's a lack of meaning, there's a lack of purpose.
00:10:45
Speaker
and so people And people will say that, they'll call that out explicitly. I don't think that's the only cause of it, um but that's an important one. um And so one of the ways that the Stoics are going to get around this issue, so they're they're going to be looking at how can we change your perspective? How can we call out these beliefs about, you know, there's nothing, there's no real point to any sort of long-term plan. There's nothing I can really get excited about. um I'm not really feeling engaged with the work I am doing.
00:11:18
Speaker
These are the kind of beliefs the stoics are going to try to target.
Finding Purpose through Simplicity and Connection
00:11:22
Speaker
And so one of the suggestions they make is to try to reconnect. with your role, take your take your role and reconnect with the broader world by reminding yourself of that role that you play in something bigger than yourself. so mean I could say that better, but the the idea is you know if you if you're kind of solipsistic, you're sitting in your own head and you're trying to self-generate this motivation,
00:11:50
Speaker
Well, no. Beliefs about meaning, purpose, excitement, that comes in the way that we relate to other things. It's not something you self-generate in a vacuum, so go and um Interact with ah with the broader world. Remind yourself of the connection you have to that and remind yourself really of this purpose that you can play both in terms of helping others, in terms of achieving things, in terms of contributing to things that are worthwhile. And that's a way to help you get your outside of your own head. That was abstract. So I'll pull an example from Marcus Aurelius. This is Meditations, book five, chapter one. And I always love when Marcus wrestles with these issues because he's ah you know he's the emperor of Rome. So he's in such an important position and really shows that it applies to everybody.
00:12:34
Speaker
Now, but he says, quote, at dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself, I have to go to work as a human being. What do I have to complain of if I'm going to do what I was born for? The things I was brought into the world to do.
00:12:50
Speaker
Or is this what I was created for, to huddle under the blankets and stay warm? So you were born to feel nice instead of doing things and experiencing them? Don't you see the plants, the birds, the ants and spiders and bees going about their individual tasks, putting the world in order as best they can? And you're not willing to do your job as a human being.
00:13:11
Speaker
Why aren't you running to do what your nature demands? You don't love yourself enough, or you'd love your nature too, and what it demands of you." um ah Such a powerful quote. any Any first reflections on that quote, Caleb? Oh, no. it's It's one of my favorites, certainly. I think um in a way, i one aspect I like about this part of stoicism is that It serves as a reminder that finding one's purpose isn't always that hard. I don't mean to be too trite, but in a sense, Marcus Aurelius says just, he's just saying, you know, just look, you know, you you have a role, you've already been assigned. Don't try to, you know, don't let yourself overcomplicate.
00:14:03
Speaker
things. you know You have a role as a human being. It's simply simply serving you know serving other humans, doing your duty, in his case being an excellent Roman emperor. And you have that role just in the way you can see that these other creatures have have their own roles. And perhaps a lot of, ah sometimes I think these
00:14:29
Speaker
these periods and in our lives when we feel lack of a sense of purpose, we've lost sight of how clear our purpose is and how visible it would be if we if we just look for it. Yeah, I love that quote. I love that idea of simple. um you know The ant figured it out. The bird figured it out. And not to be trite and judgmental, but it's the idea of, I mean, as you said, not not to overcomplicate it.
00:14:55
Speaker
ah You've got a family. You don't have a family, you have friends. If you don't have friends, you live in a city, a community. There are people to engage with. you know People like really simple things. you know They like to be helped in their goals or their their what they're aiming towards. They like good friendship and companionship. Integrate yourself into these things. Try to reconnect and find meaning in these things.
00:15:19
Speaker
um And there's also that idea of living in accordance with your nature and stoicism and pointing out that you know you are living not in accordance with nature if you waste that potential, if you huddle in bed, you're almost forsaking um these roles. um And it doesn't have to be that grand standard of the emperor. It can be It can be the ants you know building the ant nest. It can be the spider spinning the web. but they're Everybody, they're contributing, they're building. um And it's like, yeah, as you said, keep it simple. um Really just look to yourself and your immediate surroundings and you'll find ways to meaningfully contribute. um I found that really... I love that last part. I was like, oof. The quote is, you don't love yourself enough or you'd love your nature too and what it demands of you.
00:16:14
Speaker
And I thought that was like, wow, this idea of it's a bit judgmental because he's writing to himself. But that idea of um what comes with self-love is that loving of the simplicity of it, too. It doesn't have to be something super dramatic and and weird. Like the the spider that likes to be a spider is happy to spin the web.
00:16:36
Speaker
And the human that likes to be a human is is happy to contribute in in the small meaningful ways we can to our own community and with our with our work, with our crafts, with our effort, things like this.
00:16:50
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. I also love that idea of i love the idea of extending self-love to something that's not merely um selfish or focused on on the ego. That's of course a a common theme in Greco-Roman virtue ethics, but this idea that
Self-Love, Mortality, and Ordinary Existence
00:17:11
Speaker
Part of self-love involves embracing who you are and who you are is just this creature in embedded in a larger social network and and having these relationships. And when you properly love yourself, you you're able to find meaning in your ordinary existence that you find yourself in. So I think that's that's also, I think, a powerful idea.
00:17:42
Speaker
Yeah, I think about that idea in terms of loving other people. Like, there's that there's this often, people find it difficult to understand the stoic view that the sage wouldn't grieve. And I think about that in terms of, you know, if you love somebody fully in accordance with their nature, you're understanding their mortality as part of their nature, you're understanding that they there they will be someone that that dies.
00:18:06
Speaker
It's a, grief's a complicated one, but it's ah it's an at least an attempt to resolve that, which is to say to love somebody is to love them fully, not just love them in a way that benefits you and makes you happy, right? Like, oh, I'm going to love you if I don't have the hard parts that come with loving a person. No, that's like, that that that's a distortion of love in some way. And so that's the same idea as you were saying, put back on the self. Like, oh, I'm going to love myself in the way that makes me feel good about myself or the way that makes me feel special.
00:18:33
Speaker
um But that's not really love unless you're also recognizing your ordinariness or yeah the fact that you're a small piece of something much, much bigger. um And that's that yeah that's a more profound kind of self-love. I agree with you. Yeah. mean Maybe a funny spin on this is that ah sometimes people talk about self-care and taking time off for self-care, whereas maybe the stoic angle on this is no that's just being virtuous, right? That's self-care. You don't need to take time off to do that.
00:19:04
Speaker
Yeah, totally. Self care would be like busy yourself like the aunt, you know, like if you're like, you're not actualizing yourself by like stopping to doing the things that you were meant to do. And that's not the best you the best you is the one that's doing the things you were meant to do. Yeah, cool. Um, there's another quote here. I mean, I want to, I want to stay along this. So the idea of this lesson is to like connect yourself with the broader world by reminding the role you play within it. And there's another beautiful quote from Marcus here.
00:19:34
Speaker
about really an appreciation for nature. So there's one way of like getting yourself outside of your head by thinking about how you place yourself in the community. There's another by just like, like, emphasizing your connection to actually as part of a physical world, nature and the more um I mean, nature extends to everything in stoicism. It's like the things that exist. But um you know a little bit outside the domain of of just other people and our own kind of interactions and and that focus. So he he has a quote here about the cultivation of a a sense of the beauty in nature.
00:20:10
Speaker
This is ah book three, chapter two. Marcus says, we should remember that even nature's inadvertence has its own charm, its own attractiveness. The way loaves of bread split open on top in the oven, the ridges are just byproducts of the baking and yet pleasing somehow. They rouse our appetite without our knowing why.
00:20:30
Speaker
or how ripe figs begin to burst, and olives on the point of falling, the shadow of decay gives them a peculiar beauty, stalks of wheat bending under their own weight, the furrowed brow of a lion, flecks of foam on the boar's mouth, and other things.
00:20:45
Speaker
If you look at them in isolation, there's nothing beautiful about them. And yet by supplementing nature, they enrich it and draws in. And anyone with a feeling for nature, a deeper sensitivity will find it all gives pleasure, even what seems inadvertent.
00:21:01
Speaker
He'll find the jaws of live animals as beautiful as painted ones or sculptures. He'll look calmly at the distinct beauty of an old of old age in men, women, and of the loveliness of children. And other things like that will call out to him constantly. Things unnoticed by others. Things seen only by those at home with nature and its works.
00:21:23
Speaker
And the idea there is that beauty is available everywhere. Meaning is available everywhere. Um, there's a kind of a mindfulness attention and focus that allows you to call it out. Somebody sees the beauty in, in, in old age or the loveliness of children and somebody doesn't and it's building that skill. the Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
00:21:47
Speaker
Maybe one spin on this that might be getting a little
Stoic Focus on Self-Mastery over Achievements
00:21:50
Speaker
bit far afield or ah not to entirely be related, but I was just thinking what this passage brought to mind just now is that I think sometimes this people, when I think about myself, when I've been in these kinds of states, it can often emerge from a kind of ambition in the sense that one hasn't lived up to one's ambition. And of course, I can always drive one forward and cause one to do and good and great things. But sometimes there's also the sense that, oh, I'm a failure because I didn't live up to
00:22:28
Speaker
ah what I was aiming to do or what I now feel I should have been aiming up aiming to do and so on. And I think one mean what one a strategy for that kind of thought or something that shows that those kinds of thoughts can be illusions, of course, it's just the stoic line that what matters is self-mastery, not external, the attaining of external ambitions. you know Seneca, of course, has that famous letter where he says, you know i've I've done the thing that no conqueror could do. I've obtained self-mastery, victory over anger, desire and such.
00:23:12
Speaker
And that, you know, the key goal for the Stoics is having a kind of self mastery, of course, as well as expressing the other virtues, which involve understanding, you know, one's own nature and the nature of other things. And that this brings me back to this quote, which is understanding, seeing, you know, experiencing nature's inadvertent beauty. Just trying try to connect this all together.
00:23:44
Speaker
Perhaps this might not be where all listen listeners are at by any means, but perhaps a woman finds someone oneself in a state of... malaise due to failed ambition the stoicism calls one to back not to you know the fact that one failed to obtain some external success but that what matters is you know recognizing nature and of course you know how much progress you've made in developing your character so and thats that's what this passage brings to me to mind now
00:24:22
Speaker
What do you think about that? I mean, so we're talking about a symptom that has a lot of different causes. And so I think, I think I'll stop, um, caveatting and we'll just make it clear, you know, moving forward. And when we talk about one example, we don't think that's the only reason why you could be experiencing malaise. But I think you're right that we have these periods after ambition. I think about Olympic athletes, you know, those that come fourth, or I think about this idea of the, there's a well-known phenomenon that people that come second at the Olympics feel much worse than those that come third.
00:24:54
Speaker
Because those that come third conceptualize, you know, I won into the medal and those that come second, I lost my chance of cold. And so it's ah it's a really simple example of how um somebody can have it objectively better, but subjectively being suffering. suffering um and i I mean, it goes back to stoicism almost one-on-one, right which is like if you place your value in external things, you're going to feel the ups and downs, the volatility that come with external things because they come and go. We don't control them. They're not uptis.
00:25:24
Speaker
um And so instead, we should focus our attention internally. And then both on that self-love, I think Marcus was hitting on. And then as you were saying, um on our ability to recognize, you know to cultivate our character, to develop it. But part of that cultivation of our character is the recognition of beauty and other things um and our and our place in that beauty.
00:25:48
Speaker
um So I think that was just building on what you were saying. I mean, I i agree with your point. and I think it's a good one. um It's about turning it. I mean, I think both of these exercises, looking at nature's beauty and looking at our role, are about focusing our attention on something that is the kind of thing that if you pay attention to, you will find meaning and purpose.
00:26:09
Speaker
There are many things that if you turn your attention to, you will not find meaning and purpose, or maybe you won't sustainably.
Perspective Shifts to Manage Stress
00:26:16
Speaker
And out of that, like ah external ambition is one of those, at least when the Stoics call out. So totally agree. Right, right. yeah i think hey Yeah. And something nice about this quote also is that often as Stoics, we focus on yeah for Keeping your attention on what you control, what's up to you, that's your character. um And to get even more precise here, part of that is how we respond to nature, how we see it as a whole. Not just nature in the terms of the environment, but ah you know the the universe itself, the working of things um and being able to see the the beauty in that. That's that's a a crucial part of ah our of our character. Yeah, it's a crucial part of how you think, is how much attention you spend on that.
00:27:04
Speaker
Um, so those are two examples of, um, you know, maybe and emphasizing or putting attention onto the kinds of beliefs that make, that cause meaning. Um, and then another strategy that stoics are going to use, if you're in this situation, I would say this is more if you're feeling kind of stressed or you're really maybe
00:27:29
Speaker
fixating on a certain problem. Again, not a crisis, but a kind of low-level problem. you know You gave the example of, you know I don't feel like I've achieved anything or something like this. One of the suggestions the Stoics provide is to play around, I describe it as playing around with time and scale. So again, shifting our attention, shifting our perspective, but along the dimensions of time and scale. And that can help us um either find meaning, but also kind of recontextualize our problems.
00:27:59
Speaker
So one one way we can do that is to take things moment by moment and discard the larger narratives about the way your life is going or injustices you've faced or disappointments you've experienced. And that hits exactly to the previous point we were discussing, Caleb. And Marcus has a beautiful quote, just like all of his are, the really lovely um Book 8, chapter 36 on this.
00:28:23
Speaker
And he says, do not disturb yourself by picturing your life as a whole. Do not assemble in your mind the many and varied troubles which have come to you in the past and will come again in the future. But ask yourself with regard to every present difficulty, what is there in this that is unbearable and beyond endurance? You'll be ashamed to confess it. And then remind yourself that it is not the future or what has passed you that afflicts you, but always the present.
00:28:53
Speaker
And the power of this is much diminished if you take it in isolation and call your mind a task if it thinks that it cannot stand up to it when taken on its own. Meanwhile, this is a great quote, just the idea that ah You know, one one's one step in front of the other, one moment at a time. If you think about the injustices of your life as a whole, those you faced or the disappointments you face and might face in the future, things can be unbearable. But if you ask yourself, almost any situation, almost any minute, can I endure this minute? The answer is almost always yes.
00:29:30
Speaker
The answer is almost that we possess the power, the fortitude, to go to have a good minute by minute. It's just when we let our mind, you know you wake up in the morning, you don't feel good. you've got If you think, oh, I've got a whole day ahead of me, that is that is your mind stretching out and then the weight of the day is keeping you in bed. But if you just say, I can get up this minute.
00:29:52
Speaker
I can get in the shower this minute or I can make a plan this minute. That's a way to kind of re-empower yourself um just by focusing. No no moment is unbearable. is is ah this is ah This is a Marcus idea that I return to regularly. Yeah, yeah and I think to tie it back to the post you mentioned in the beginning, waking up, experiencing a lack of motivation,
00:30:18
Speaker
I can be so just so clarifying to think what's my next step here and then you know proceeding to go go about your day. ah And I think sometimes with with action, with decisions to take those next step, motivation will will arise. um Because yeah I think you're you're confirming that something is of value to you when you act, when you make make decisions.
00:30:39
Speaker
And if something's of value that can and drive your ah you know your actions, your I think that's for the Stoics, many other philosophers, that's motivating, that believe that something is of value, that something matters. So if you're laying in bed and think, I don't have any motivation to do this large project or go through this day, you see as a whole, it can be much easier to just think, what's that?
00:31:06
Speaker
next step and then taking yeah love it. Yeah. What's the next five minutes or what's, as you said, the next step. I find this one really helpful. This is one that really helps me when I get stressed on a day-to-day basis. I think I can do the next step. Maybe I can't do the next 10, but if you do the next step 10 times in a row, then you've done the next step. It's the trick to it.
00:31:32
Speaker
so
00:31:35
Speaker
The reason I frame this set this section as like playing around with time is that this part was about shrinking the time, shrinking it to moment to moment, step by step. But Marcus also points out that we can expand time. And if you expand the time horizon, it often de-intensifies the problems So here's another quote. Marcus says, constantly reflect on how swiftly all that exists is coming to be all that exists and is coming to be is swept past us and disappears from sight. For substance is like a river in perpetual flow, and its activities are ever changing, and its causes infinite in their variation, and hardly anything at all stands still.
00:32:18
Speaker
and ever at our side is the immeasurable span of the past and the yawning gulf of the future into which all things vanish away. Then how is he not a fool who in the midst of all this is puffed up with pride or tormented or bewails his lot as though his troubles will endure for any great while?" um It's almost like ah yeah I like to think about this in terms of like a magnifying glass of like, you're, you're changing intensity. It's like, you're looking for the right, I guess, level of zoom. And one trick is you can zoom in super tight. If something's scary. And the other trick is you can zoom out and either way, the thing that was in focus, that might be disrupting your perspective or taking up your mind, yeah distorts and changes and and hopefully alleviates. And so if you think of
00:33:13
Speaker
You know, maybe the idea of of everything as being a ah yawning gulf of the future, maybe that's gonna provide some people anxiety, but I
Embracing Change and Uncertainty for Growth
00:33:20
Speaker
like that idea of... um you know everything Everything is in flux, and when you make, when when you feel unmotivated, as you talked about attacking some of those um beliefs, there are some certainties you're asserting, right? like Things have gone this way, and they'll continue to be this way. Things won't change. There's no point in doing this. um Things will continue on the same way. Whatever way you're thinking about it, or even like i'm I'm frustrated with myself for being this way, but I can't change.
00:33:52
Speaker
whatever way you're feeling about it, you're bringing with it almost kind of a certainty and a confidence. And I like that idea of like, everything is in flux. Everything is changing. changing When you look over a long enough time horizon, the things you thought for certain usually aren't the case. And that applies to a lot of these limiting beliefs as well, or a lot of these, um, a lot of these false judgments that are, that are frustrating you. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Um,
00:34:20
Speaker
So i've I've been listening to a ah a book recently by um Henry Oliver called Late Bloomers, which I think gets at this point nicely. So one example I mentioned earlier, there were sometimes people feel a sense of dissatisfaction as maybe when they're older and they feel like they haven't lived up to their purpose or Perhaps they feel like they've already achieved their purpose and they're not search sure, you know, what's next. And I think he he catalogs a number of people who he considers late bloomers who really came to fruition in their artistic professional ah endeavors later in life. And um I think that speaks to your point directly, which is that
00:35:07
Speaker
many of these people ah didn't seal themselves off and you know didn't cement ah their future and and you know come to believe I can never be artistically successful. I can never achieve the thing that I've been striving for that I now find in myself a desire to do.
00:35:28
Speaker
Instead, I think I properly saw it as open. So many things can happen. And if you take that wider perspective and look at the range of human lives, ah so many people have experienced a change of trajectory in their life at any at any age. And you this sense of malaise that might yeah out of the or that might sometimes happen, that might sometimes be brought about
00:35:57
Speaker
by the feeling that if your future is cemented, there is no more purpose for you or whatever purpose you thought you had you haven't lived up to. It it may might be an illusion when you think through all the different kinds of lives people have had and what people have been able to achieve ah even even late in the game. Yeah, this is a great example. I mean, just saying that it is just factually backed up what Marcus is talking about here. um
00:36:26
Speaker
And another way of thinking about it, which relates to what you're saying is that we often think of uncertainty as being scary, but there's a lot of, uh, there's a lot of actually opportunity and uncertainty, randomness change. And, uh, if you focus on the, the good part of that, instead of the bad part of that, then it's like, well, maybe something great will happen. Maybe something will change, um, in a way that's beneficial and unexpected. And I think that's a just as important a thing to keep in mind is the fact that, you know, you could lose something you like as well.
00:36:57
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Just trying to tie that together as you know, you can play with time, zoom in, zoom out, play with scale. i See yourself from above. Of course, there's a common story practice viewing yourself from above, from the ceiling.
00:37:21
Speaker
from you know above your city, picturing the whole earth and continuing to zoom out. i think And then we all this lets let this last way we mentioned you you can zoom out is thinking about you know you're just one life in the the sea of trillions of lives and not to, a lot of uncertainty comes with that. And in addition to, I think the fact that zooming out like that can,
00:37:51
Speaker
but put things into a proper perspective.
00:37:55
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, there's a kind of humility to this coming through all the quotes, right? As you said, zooming out and realizing you're one of a trillion can put things in perspective and above we had comparing ourselves to ants. There's almost this grandiosity. It's like it's like I don't want to push it too far, but it's like by reducing yourself to just a part of nature, you actually regain your connection to nature and nature is a great thing. So it's like if you try to be great on your own, it's kind of difficult. So if you think, well, I'm not actually great. I'm not special. I'm just part of this bigger thing that is really great and special. Well, then greatness and specialness actually comes back. It's kind of ironic. Yeah, I think so.
00:38:43
Speaker
so So there were some strategies changing, ah you know changing reconnecting with our, reconnecting with broader nature and things outside of ourselves to feel a sense of nature, as you said, playing with time and scale. And then the fourth thing, the fourth piece of stoic advice, which is a reminder I always like to get for myself, but I think is important for anybody on the stoic journey is also to just be gentle with ourselves in the process.
Self-Judgment and Emotional Acceptance
00:39:10
Speaker
Um, so this is the idea to, to, I think what I still could recommend is to remind yourself that you're not a sage. We, everybody wants to be better and or feel better and be motivated, but fluctuations and variations are, are normal. Um, I'm thinking a lot about the Buddhist idea of the second arrow.
00:39:29
Speaker
i Did a quick solo episode on that as well, but just that idea that that when Something bad happens and that first strikes you that's the first arrow, but when we're upset with our reactions We're upset with the fact that it happened. We start adding judgments to it. That's a second arrow and that second arrow is as our own doing and it often hurts twice as much because the wounds already there and that connects with this idea Seneca says of, and we suffer more in imagination than in reality, which is just to say that, you know if you do experience these kinds of fluctuations in mood, and one of the most important stoic ideas to say, try not to add the self judgment, try not to add the self frustration because that's that's the second arrow, that's the suffering in imagination that doesn't have to compound, it's not needed, it only compounds the um suffering in reality.
00:40:21
Speaker
I think about this quote from Seneca here, this is his letters on ethics, ah chapter 85, part 3, because it's a denial of human nature that someone's mind be immune to sadness. The wise person is not overwhelmed by grief, but is touched by it.
00:40:41
Speaker
And so and there's that idea, too, that is we we talked a lot about our natures, loving yourself, loving your nature. The point here is that it's a denial of human nature to think you will be immune to sadness. To love yourself is to also you know recognize that you will be a thing that feels sad from time to time, that feels down demotivated from time to time. And so don't add um extra judgments that compound that or make that worse than it is is an important point to keep in mind.
00:41:12
Speaker
Yeah, I think so. I think so. I think um think the the the extra judgments are just ah sometimes ah another level of distraction or something that is taking you away from thinking well and from using your attention is in a way that would be bring about the the most happiness yeah for you. I think so. You could be thinking about loaves of bread. You're right.
00:41:42
Speaker
Yeah, very good thing. And that, you know, there's, there's no, I think no need for, for that, that second arrow is always a fantastic metaphor. I think, you know, there's no need for it. All you need to do is, you know, return your attention to the matter at hand in each movement. And then it's just, you know, action by action as Marcus Aurelius says. Yeah, great. So to summarize,
00:42:11
Speaker
Well, question was how would a stoic handle feelings of a low level dissatisfaction, sadness, lack of purpose, um that feeling when you wake up in the morning and you don't want to get out of bed. um You're not sure. Not because like this is not like a severe depression, but because you know, you're like, well, I don't know what there is that's worth doing, right? I don't feel excited to do anything.
00:42:36
Speaker
um and The things we talked about is is you know recognizing that a crisis in meaning is is ah connected to your values and your perspective and your attention. The Stoics think how you feel is based on what you think. It's not things themselves that harm us, but our judgments about them. so To improve how we feel, we have to improve how we think.
The Role of Attention and Perspective in Happiness
00:42:57
Speaker
How can we improve how we think? ah We can reconnect.
00:43:01
Speaker
With our larger role, with our roles outside of ourselves, our connection to nature by changing focus, we could pay attention to the beauty in nature. um the The beautiful things that are around us, again, through attention and focus, something available to us as people. And that's when we think about the stoic focusing on ourselves, this is a point you raise Caleb. It's not just, oh, can you be courageous?
00:43:26
Speaker
Oh, can you be just? But it's also like, oh, do you notice the beauty in ah and a loaf of bread? Do you notice the beauty in a ripe fruit or in the face of an animal? That's another thing about that's another thing that's up to you that determines your happiness. It is about your character and your attention.
00:43:45
Speaker
Other things we can do is we can play around with time and scale. So either focus on things moment by moment what is the next task, or zoom out recognize you know will this matter in three months three years. um Things have changed before um nothing like I was five years ago so I will be nothing like that five years from now when I kind of um need to question any sort of beliefs that lock me in or don't acknowledge that. And then the last part is this um recognition that it's a denial of human nature to think that you will never be sad.
00:44:18
Speaker
but we We will have fluctuations in mood. We will have fluctuations in behavior, ups and downs. It's a natural part of our experience. um We want to get out of them, hence the strategy, hence the discussion today. But don't add ah additional judgments or additional suffering out of frustration about that or thinking um you know this is unique.
00:44:37
Speaker
or not something other people have experienced. i mean Marcus Aurelius is was writing 2,000 years ago about wanting to stay under the blankets because it's nice and warm, and he didn't even have a smartphone. So if he was going through it, it's totally natural and normal for anyone today to be doing as well or experiencing as well. Anything you wanted to add by way of a conclusion?
00:45:02
Speaker
I think that's ah that's an awesome list. I think everyone's going to face a different set of circumstances, and I think a part of facing these kinds of problems involves recognizing how your individual circumstances are unique, you know how you fit in in the larger network of things because everyone's you know location in that network is and unique and distinct. um But these general you know ideas I think strategies at the rock level can be useful for for many people. So so I hope hope listeners find them useful. I think I've certainly found each of them important throughout throughout my life, certainly. So I think that's a a solid list and thanks for putting it together.
Podcast Closing and Feedback Invitation
00:45:52
Speaker
Great. Thanks, Caleb. Awesome. Bye, Michael.
00:45:58
Speaker
Thanks for listening to Stoa Conversations. Please give us a rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and share it with a friend. If you want to dive deeper still, search Stoa in the App Store or Play Store for a complete app with routines, meditations, and lessons designed to help people become more.
00:46:17
Speaker
Stoic. And I'd also like to thank Michael Levy for graciously letting us use his music. You can find more of his work at ancientlyre.com. And finally, please get in touch with us. Send a message to stoa at stoameditation.com if you ever have any feedback, questions, or recommendations. Until next time.