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The Discipline of Action (Episode 87)
936 Plays1 year ago
Want to become more Stoic? Join us and other Stoics this October: Stoicism Applied by Caleb Ontiveros and Michael
In this conversation, Caleb and Michael discuss the discipline of action.
(02:30) Introduction
(03:51) The Discipline of Action
(08:16) Indifferents
(12:59) Acceptance and Justice
(19:54) The Seriousness of Action
(27:05) The Sage
(30:01) Choosing Between Indifferents
(31:52) Reserve Clause
(42:37) Praemeditatio Malorum
(46:13) Clarify Your Roles
(49:21) Challenges
(56:09) Managing Desire
***
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Transcript
Stoic Intentions and Purpose
00:00:00
Speaker
because if you remember why you want to sail across the ocean, whatever it is, I think focusing on that intention in a stoic way I think would entail that your desire to sail across the ocean is done for some purpose that involves perhaps indirectly through a trail of steps of reasoning, the excellence of character.
00:00:27
Speaker
And that means that you're going to retain that excellence of character no matter what arises.
Introducing the Podcast and Hosts
00:00:35
Speaker
Welcome to Stoic Conversations. In this podcast, Michael Trombley and I discuss the theory and practice of stoicism. Each week, we'll share two conversations. One between the two of us, and another will be an in-depth conversation with an expert.
Stoic Discipline of Action
00:00:52
Speaker
And in this conversation, Michael and I discuss the discipline of action, the third stoic discipline. We have two previous episodes on the discipline of desire, the discipline of judgment, so do check those out as well. And we're wrapping up this series with this final discipline. And before we jump into it immediately, just a reminder that Michael and I
00:01:18
Speaker
are running our three-week course on Stoicism. It'll be a live course where we'll go into even deeper detail, deeper practical detail of these three disciplines, and we'll be doing it with other participants
Promoting Stoic Course and Readings
00:01:33
Speaker
as well. So check out stomeditation.com-course for more information, a registration will be closing on October 23rd. I just put together all these sets.
00:01:45
Speaker
of readings from Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Seneca. We're going to have some little bit of Musonius Rufus, as well as some selections from pure Hado, so very excited about it. StoweMeditation.com slash course. And here is our conversation.
Ethics and Duty in Stoicism
00:02:02
Speaker
Today we're going to be talking about the discipline of action. This is our third episode on the Stoic disciplines. We had the discipline of judgment or the discipline of assent, and then just cover the discipline of desire. And now we are at the discipline of action. Yeah, this is the return of the Jedi of the disciplines. This is the number three, the grand finale. What you all have been waiting for.
00:02:33
Speaker
So, in this conversation, like our previous ones, we're going to ground it in the book from Birhadeau, The Inner Citadel. In preparation, Michael and I both read the chapter on the discipline of action, or rather reread.
00:02:49
Speaker
And then we're going to be teasing out what we think is most significant about this discipline, what are some of the best exercises for practicing it. And then finally, end with a discussion of some of the primary key challenges that many will run across when they practice it.
00:03:11
Speaker
And for those listening, I do encourage, if you're starting here, jumping back and listening to the episodes on the discipline of desire and ascent, we're kind of building towards this. And the discipline of action is often, it's the part of stoicism that comes the most downstream or seems to, I think, rely on an understanding of those other ones, which is part of why we're covering it. Third.
00:03:37
Speaker
So it's worthwhile going back and listening to the series as a whole, I guess is what I'm saying. If you're jumping ahead to just this episode, as you said, Caleb, we'll be following that similar structure, but we might reference back to some terminology or ideas we covered in those previous episodes. Yeah, yeah, definitely. So how would you describe the discipline of action? How would you capture its essence?
00:03:59
Speaker
I think most simply, the discipline of action is about how we, it really is the domain of ethics in the more traditional sense. So it's how we fulfill our duties and our obligations to other people and what
00:04:15
Speaker
what actions are appropriate for a stoic to undertake to to be judged a good person in any other field that would just be ethics right like that would just be that's the domain of the discipline of action that's that's it ethics what you do what you should do
00:04:31
Speaker
But the Stoic distinction there is that a lot of Stoic ethics is grounded in this idea of virtue, it's grounded in this idea of improvement at the individual.
Role of Virtue and Indifference
00:04:39
Speaker
So the discipline of action is about, well, once you've got your desires right, so once you want the right things, once you've got your judgments right, or you're really able to think carefully about things, think in the way that you need to, to gain knowledge,
00:04:56
Speaker
Well, then what do you then, how do you then go about and act as a social creature that's in a, you know, has other obligations to others, whether that's those are family obligations, political obligations, work obligations, friendship, things like that. So yeah, I mean, I'm interested in what you think Caleb, the essence is, but I think it's this, it's this weird thing where it's like, it is really all of ethics for anybody else, but for the Stoics, it's just one part of that good life.
00:05:22
Speaker
Yeah, I suppose maybe one way to put it is you have the discipline of desire and that involves targeting yourself on being an excellent person that talks about aligning yourself with the universal nature and that these are those sort of large ideas about
00:05:41
Speaker
If you're an ancient Stoic following the Logos, maybe a more modern Stoic might say living in accordance with the facts and paying special attention to what is up to you and embracing everything else that is not.
00:05:57
Speaker
And then the discipline of action is all about, okay, so if you're supposed to be someone who lives according to nature, someone who is, of course, also a social animal, a rational animal, now what does that look like in action, as it were, when it comes to these questions about managing what the Stoics would call indifference, health, wealth, pleasure, status?
00:06:21
Speaker
How do you make decisions between those when it gets down to the nitty gritty? Now that you've got the general broad target, sort of narrow down to some of those more specific questions about, okay, in contingent situations, what do you do?
00:06:35
Speaker
Yeah, that's exactly it, which is important. I mean, there can be this tendency and stoicism to think, well, nothing external to me matters, or it's not up to me, I shouldn't care. But both, I think the average person would think that it's important how you act with others and how you navigate these indifference.
00:06:54
Speaker
And the Stoics also think it's important. It's just not the most important thing. And it's just never something, these indifference should never be chosen in exchange for virtue. You should never, you know, do something wrong to make a lot of money or become famous or things like this. When you're choosing between different things, you got to make the right choices and
00:07:23
Speaker
I would say some of the most meaningful things you're going to do are going to be in that sphere.
00:07:32
Speaker
philosopher Chris Gill, who we've had unstirred conversations before, he has aligned to the effect of indifference are the things that make the difference, which means that, look, these things are like health, wealth, pleasure, and so on, are indifference. They don't make or break your happiness, but they do make the difference in the sense that
00:07:55
Speaker
they distinguish between what you ought to do, what you ought to think very often, and their action guiding, as it were. So in that sense, they're sort of the material of virtue. Yeah, totally. Yeah. And I think we'll get a little bit more detail into that through the conversation, but I think that's a pretty good initial pass. Yeah, I agree.
00:08:16
Speaker
So I think one point that stuck out to me while reading this is just always a useful reminder about what the indifference are. And Hado's take on this was his list.
00:08:32
Speaker
were a number of other things I've already mentioned, but I think are worth putting entirely on the table. So I'll just read from his chapter, Discipline of Action, now. As examples of indifferent things, the Stoics enumerated life, health, pleasure, beauty, strength, renowned, and noble birth, as well as their opposites, death, sickness, pain, ugliness, weakness, poverty, obscurity, and humble birth.
00:08:59
Speaker
And I think there are a few things that stick out to this list. One is that these stoics that are always on the radical side in the sense that they don't think things like life, health, pleasure, death, sickness, pain are what make a life good or bad in the last analysis. Instead, it's how we use those things.
00:09:23
Speaker
And then again, of course, the second point that sticks out to you is that's just what the discipline of action is going to be all about is how you use those things in particular as a social and rational animal, how you think about making the decisions between, you know, health, careers, relationships, different interests and projects of yours.
00:09:46
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's good. That was what I was trying to say at the start, which is this idea of when you hear it's about navigating the indifference, you think it's this little bonus at the end. It's like, no, literally it's like, should you kill yourself or not, right? Should you? That is the discipline of action, right? Is it the right time to commit suicide? These things like health.
Balancing External Events and Virtue
00:10:07
Speaker
What relationship should you have with your body? In what way should you prioritize your body over other things, your family over other things? This is the discipline of action. This is really, really core and essential to how we live. I do this sometimes too, even get confused. I sometimes forget that when I think of things as indifference.
00:10:30
Speaker
It just really, I almost wonder if we could, we could have a different word for it now that I say it. It's just really the things that, that, you know, never add up to being more important than virtue, right? But still really death, you know, still really important.
00:10:45
Speaker
Yeah, that's exactly right. And I do think perhaps we ought to sit down or maybe some other people have done this before and thought, sorry, what's a better term for a difference? Because when it's clunky, kind of sounds like indifference already. And then you also add to that preferred indifference and dispreferred indifference. And you start to get quizzical looks if you bring that up in ordinary conversation. So what do you want to shout out from here or where do you want to go from here?
00:11:12
Speaker
I mean, I'm going to do some quick Greek if it's helpful. The idea for a is the indifferent here and it's really, it's really the negation of difference. So it's really this idea of like, they don't make a difference. So it's not that they don't matter. It's just that like, when you're, when you're making a choice about what is right.
00:11:32
Speaker
there's no amount of them that's going to be a tiebreaker, right? Like they don't make a, they'll never going to tip the scales against virtue towards vice. And that's, that's the idea is that like, they don't, they're not difference makers in that kind of decision between virtue and vice and the good life. I think that is, and in that sense, it's indifferent, but we're just, we're just remembering that. Cool. So one thing, I mean, that's helpful for me, but it's just, it's just the kind of thing you have to kind of ruminate on quite a bit. One thing that I flagged as an important part of the discipline of action.
00:12:01
Speaker
is this idea that Hiddo emphasizes where the discipline of action has a simultaneous concern about external events and an acceptance of those things as being caused by others.
Justice and Community in Stoic Action
00:12:14
Speaker
So you're not, you know, obviously if you're
00:12:18
Speaker
Let's say you can use family examples because those ones are really compelling, right? Like obviously if you care about your child and you want them to be healthy, so you take them to a doctor because they seem like they're sick, this is all navigating indifference, right? And not to say that like, you shouldn't, well, it doesn't matter if your kid gets sick or something like this, or it doesn't matter if you give them better medicine or worse medicine. No, you should be striving towards what's preferred here.
00:12:44
Speaker
But so you have to care about those external events, but that has to also be accompanied by a kind of radical acceptance for if you're, you know.
00:12:52
Speaker
If your child ends up having some sort of illness that renders them sick and maybe they pass away or something like this, stoicism also asks for an acceptance of that. And it's a really hard balance to strike. But there's this beautiful Marcus Aurelius quote that Hiddo points to that I think gets it right, which is Marcus says, indifference with regards to the events brought about by the exterior cause, justice in the actions brought about by the cause that is within you.
00:13:19
Speaker
and this idea of I'm going to be not disturbed or indifferent to things that are caused by external causes, but I'm going to hold myself strongly to this idea of justice acting the right way in terms of my internal cause and the way that I'm influencing those events or causing those events to change.
00:13:41
Speaker
The rest of the quote goes, in other words, let your impulse and your actions have as their goal, the service of the human community, because that for you is in conformity with your nature. So my idea there about how, you know.
00:13:55
Speaker
that, that idea of justice, acting out justice with your cause that's connecting to your nature as well. But that was, that was something that I think something clicked for me there when I was reading that this idea of I'm going to be indifferent to the external causes, but care quite a bit, or at least not disturbed by them, accepting of them willfully accepting, more fatty, but
00:14:18
Speaker
very committed to justice and to proper action in terms of how my participation influences those.
00:14:27
Speaker
And I think that goes some way towards correcting a popular misinterpretation of Stoicism, namely that it is passive, whereas as Marcus Aurelius emphasizes it again and again, justice is of course one of the key for virtues and something he's obsessed with, many of the earlier Stoics are obsessed with as well, and something that
00:14:51
Speaker
As practicing stoics or even non-stoics, I want you to keep in front of mind, really, and not fall into maybe one kind of trap that people attracted to stoicism may sometimes fall into, which is this focus on building up resilience without thinking about how, as an individual, you fit into this larger hole and thinking about what kinds of demands justice might make on you.
00:15:19
Speaker
Yeah.
Commitment to Purposeful Action
00:15:20
Speaker
And I guess the build on that with my next point. So there's this, there's this misconception that people outside of stoicism can have, which is that it's about, it's not about it's passive, but then there's this misconception that people practicing stoicism can have, which is kind of that it's passive as well. That like, I don't have to care about.
00:15:39
Speaker
this external stuff. I don't have to care about my actions or how I navigate the world. And that's one thing that I wanted to say that's important to remember about the discipline of action is that it calls us to a rejection of kind of being frivolous, apathetic, unserious, or just focusing on our own shallow impulses. It calls our behavior to something more than that. It holds us to a higher standard than that.
00:16:04
Speaker
I have an Epictetus quote here, carry out each action of your life as if it were the last and keep yourself far from all frivolity. And Marcus says, what brings perfection to one's way of life is to spend each day as if it were the last, without agitation, without endolence, and without role playing. And so this idea of
00:16:25
Speaker
So it's like not only, hey, people criticizing stoicism, not only is it not passive, you're getting that wrong, you're misunderstanding that, but hey, people practicing it, right? Carry out each action as if it were your last, like take it as in take it seriously, right? Take your, take these choices as if they, as if they matter.
00:16:44
Speaker
Right, right. And another excellent passage that Hiddo cites here is from Marcus, where Marcus Aurelius quotes the Epicurean Democritus. He has this line, act little if you want to maintain serenity, which you could interpret as containing the wisdom where, you know,
00:17:08
Speaker
there's nothing worse than a busy mind. Or what's the Seneca line? Like, busyness reflects nothing more than a haunted mind. And perhaps that's what Democritus is after there. But what Marcus follows this line up with, wouldn't it be better to say, do what is indispensable and do what you are ordered to do by the reason of a naturally political animal and do it in the way you are ordered to do it?
00:17:34
Speaker
For that is what brings serenity not only because one acts well, but because one acts Little so I I think you see there Marcus accepts. Yes, there's something to that line about Acting little especially not focusing on what is important? rejecting almost like a fake seriousness that ends up in busyness action for no reason
00:18:01
Speaker
But nonetheless, you must do what you're required to do and do it in a social manner. Be aware of your position as a naturally political animal. And that means that it's not always, perhaps that quip from Democritus doesn't respect that, well, actually, a lot of actions may be required of us.
00:18:30
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I love that switch from do little to do what is indispensable. And the do what is indispensable also makes me think of this idea of, you know, when I think of when I think of kind of
00:18:42
Speaker
any task, any craft or skill, whether that's athletics or, you know, art or any sort of talent that I've developed or tried to. It's like the things that you're supposed to do are quite uncomplicated and obvious. And it's actually that discipline and that focus on doing them consistently. And that's what this makes me think of, just do what is indispensable, which is this idea of, you know, neither do nothing.
00:19:09
Speaker
But nor be a busybody and you know, you're the kind of person who busybody may not be the right term, but you're the kind of person who feels good about yourself because you go out and engage in the community in all these ways, but you don't do the really hard work of like, I don't know.
00:19:24
Speaker
Do being kind to people for the right reasons or, you know, mending your relationships in ways that are painful or thinking about the greater good of the community. I love that idea of just do what is indispensable, which just kind of focuses the intention of like, there's only a couple of things, but those things are very important. So neither is it a many frivolous things, nor is it nothing, but it's a few important things the right way. And as you said, grounded in that kind of social aspect too.
00:19:54
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right. Another connection here with the point you mentioned earlier about the seriousness of action. I love that title from that Hado action. What is it? It's just the seriousness of action. That's all. It can matter.
00:20:11
Speaker
Right. I think it's just this idea that, look, there's some amount of urgency to our lives, like the quotes from Epictetus and Marcus you read earlier, express, and also this idea that one ought to act with purpose, with commitment. He also cites a line from Epictetus on sort of, you can think of it, I think in the modern way, we would term this sort of as career tourism. I think that'll make more sense after I read the quote.
00:20:41
Speaker
One minute you are an athlete, then a gladiator, and the next a philosopher, then a retore. But you are nothing with all your soul, because you haven't undertaken anything after having examined it. Looked at the matter from all angles and thoroughly tested it. Instead, you've engaged yourself casually, with a desire that has no warmth.
00:21:03
Speaker
in it. And yeah, I think that's a wonderful bit from Epictetus that captures a seriousness of action, you know, investing oneself deeply in what you're up to, not engaging in this merely dilettante-ish manner that, you know, maybe I'll be this today, I'll be that today, but instead deeply reflecting on
00:21:27
Speaker
who you want to be. And then he has this phrase, a desire that has no warmth in it, you know, cultivating a desire that is warm. It's a desire that invests yourself, that calls you to invest yourself in the project.
00:21:45
Speaker
Yeah that's one of my favorite Epictetus quotes and one of the ones that I know off my heart and afterwards he later on in it he talks about how you know if you if you're acting like this you're behaving like children do right who are like they play gladiator one day and they play wrestler the next you're playing you're not being and I love that quote and
00:22:06
Speaker
Pulling this out of Stos is a bit to our own lives. Caleb, I don't know if you feel the same way, but I feel like when I was younger and I was in high school, let's say, nobody was really good at anything. You're 16, so everybody's just been doing their hobbies for a couple of years. One thing that I'm very proud of in my own life or very happy about in my own life is the fact that I've stuck to some things.
00:22:29
Speaker
Like I've stuck to Brazilian jitsu, I've stuck to the study of philosophy. Those are two of the two main ones that stand out. And there's a kind of joy. There's like an identity that comes from that, a connection to that joy in reaching that level of skill in something.
00:22:46
Speaker
But I've also seen a kind of unhappiness that comes from people who have taken their life unseriously, I would say. And not really, not to say your life is based on being excellent at something and not everybody needs to be incredibly productive or talented.
00:23:03
Speaker
I don't think that's right, but I think that what you do do, you should take seriously. If what you do is not become a competitor in some sense or famous or not good in something that's competitive against other people, maybe it's just being a kind person, maybe it's being great to your friends.
00:23:21
Speaker
You know, whatever it is, you treat it with some seriousness and those people are very happy whether they're, I've seen them very happy, whether they're externally successful or not, because there's a kind of, there's a kind of identity and a kind of joy that comes with taking that identity seriously where people who have jumped around a lot.
00:23:36
Speaker
are not and I think there's a this is a bit of a side an aside but I think that sometimes that unseriousness comes with a comes with an attachment to externals so you're kind of looking for the easy win so you start jumping from thing to thing to thing instead of really understanding something for what it is taking joy in it and appreciating it even with its ups and downs
00:24:00
Speaker
That's, yeah, not necessarily discipline of action, but just ruminating that idea of seriousness. I think that's something that is very important to my life is, you know, what I'm choosing to do, I'm going to take seriously and recognize that there's a major opportunity cost that you're not doing something else. So as Marcus Aurelius said, do what is indispensable and take that seriously.
00:24:24
Speaker
Yeah, I think there's a real lesson there. As someone who I would consider myself to be somewhat of a dilettante in some ways, I get excited about something and then you'll spend a few months thinking about a new project, build a new app, and then after that I'll be like, oh, well, I want to read about the history of the Middle East and become an expert in that.
00:24:47
Speaker
And then I'll realize, you know, this is largely during the pandemic, I think pandemic, I thought, Oh, I want to learn how to speak Spanish. No, I want to learn linear algebra. And so I think I do have some, there's some identity there about wanting to learn new things, build new things. But something I've struggled with is
00:25:07
Speaker
ensuring that I don't just spend two months on a given project, come away with a shallow takeaway that fades as I get older, but rather engagement projects that either maybe build that build on each other if they're different, are part of the same larger project, or just don't get distracted to begin with and stick with what I had going on previously.
00:25:35
Speaker
Yeah, maybe we'll do a separate episode on this, but I love just the one last thing on this one. I love the idea of having it build towards a larger project. Like I don't think everybody needs to like pick one thing and settle down. Like it's not like, but this idea of maybe your larger project is I'm going to explore a lot of things to find out what I like. And then that, that you're still staying committed to that larger goal, even if there's variations in your hobbies, let's say.
00:25:59
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. I think as both probably as academics, we see people who are intellectuals, cerebral, and we see both the pattern of people who stay so narrowly focused on that one specific thing, and then look at them 10 years later and think, it just seems like they haven't learned that much, but also see on the other side, at least I do, people who have
00:26:20
Speaker
jumped from, you know, philosopher to philosopher from intellectual interests, intellectual interests that haven't been able to pull it together into a collective thread. Whereas other people do manage to become, I think, talented generalists, while others are exceptionally talented specialists and figuring out, okay, like, how do you, how do you do that? What does that look like in different domains is, isn't it interesting? Interesting. I think we should, we should tell them how that works. That's an interesting, interesting problem.
00:26:49
Speaker
Come for the discipline of action. Stay for the rumination. You shouldn't quit your hobby. Stop, stop. Don't put down your Duolingo just yet. You made a commitment. Marcus Aurelius is watching. He's judging you.
00:27:05
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Well, we got a little bit of a, got a little bit sidelined there. One last thing I want to pick out that Hado has in this chapter, I think a very good description of the sage, sort of the target, the goal.
Mindfulness and Present Choices
00:27:24
Speaker
It's good because it's so simple.
00:27:27
Speaker
At one point, he says, you can think about stoicism in the stoic life as just being a matter of focusing on the present, seeing life as a series of choices that's breaking down one's experience in a different instance, many of which are going to present choices, choices about how to handle indifference, and then choosing well every time, namely with a good will.
00:27:53
Speaker
And that's all when the sage is focused on. And because of that, they're suited to embracing everything else that is not up to their choice and lasered in on, okay, well, how can, how do I, in fact, choose well and not distracted by the temptations of the past or the future?
00:28:19
Speaker
Yeah, that's something we've been talking about. I mean, A, I think that's a great description of this age. Somebody focused in the moment. It really reminds me of like an athlete in a flow state or something, right? Like this person who's just present in the zone, navigating the information that they're given the best way they can.
00:28:36
Speaker
It also makes me think, this is something we've been talking about is this instosism being made up of principles and also your perspective and then your kind of practice of putting those together. I think this shows the incredible amount of
00:28:52
Speaker
perspective, which is the word we were using to describe kind of mindfulness, focus, attention, the incredible amount of that that goes into being a stoic as well. It's not just having a collection of principles or beliefs, but it's this ability to keep that attention laser focused in the present moment and the task before you, not what happened five years ago and not what might happen five years in the future. And that is kind of like an applied skill as well.
00:29:20
Speaker
Yeah, that's all the sage is. It's not like a moral...
00:29:25
Speaker
It's not a moral sainthood in terms of being different, being a different kind of person. It's somebody who's like really excelled at this skill, this skill of staying in the moment, focusing on what's the best thing they can do to embody, you know, the Stoic virtues in that moment. And then having, I guess, a kind of repository of knowledge or the enough knowledge of Stoic philosophy to actually make the right call.
00:29:53
Speaker
Yep, yep. Yeah, absolutely. Excellent. Well, do you have anything else in terms of takeaways from the discipline of action?
Role Ethics in Stoicism
00:30:01
Speaker
I mean, one thing we haven't talked about that we probably should, we've done, we've talked about role ethics in the past, but if you're, one of the biggest concerns about the discipline of action is always this question of, well, how do I choose between these indifference, right? Like you're not giving me a consequentialist.
00:30:19
Speaker
guide, you're not telling me any, anything else about these other than like maybe giving me a gut check, you know, act in accordance with your nature. But the Stoics ground a lot of this in rural ethics, which is this idea that what grants these things value, I mean, A, all things being equal, some things are preferred over not, you should always choose health over sickness.
00:30:37
Speaker
But then when do I choose sickness? Well, you choose sickness or these, you choose some indifference over others when they bump up against your roles, those being your universal role or your natural role as a rational social human being, and then also your particular roles, maybe as a family member or with your work or something like this. We just wanted to provide that framework because, you know, we'll be getting into that a bit later, but that's the, that's the answer to how you actually navigate these things that we haven't hit on yet.
00:31:07
Speaker
Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I think that's useful. I think it's, it's always difficult to come up with large.
00:31:14
Speaker
Well, I should say that I think that's useful in narrowing down. Okay. So how do you actually choose between indifference? One of the key stoic tools for this is that role ethics and thinking about, you know, what's required of my role understood as the human understood as someone with these particular capabilities and there's this circumstance and these relationships and narrowing down on, on the picture that way. Totally.
00:31:43
Speaker
Well, let's chat about some of the exercises. So how can one practice the discipline of action?
00:31:53
Speaker
Cool, so one, now, let me talk about the discipline of action and isolation, but now that we've laid the framework that there's the discipline of desire and the discipline of judgment, a big part of the discipline of action, as I said, is striking that right balance between I care about things outside of me, but I'm not going to let it mess up my desire. I'm not going to start desiring these things in a way that makes me really upset or makes me emotionally vulnerable to them. Again, there's some emotional vulnerability. I mean, I should say vulnerable to passions, vulnerable to going
00:32:19
Speaker
too far because you get too committed to some things. And so one of the exercises for maintaining that balance is the reserve clause. And that's something that Hadeau talks about. And it's one that I want to start building into my practice. And the reserve clause is just this practice of whenever you set up a target or a goal concerning externals, concerning indifference, you say, well, I'm going to aim for that.
00:32:48
Speaker
You know, fate permitting, that's the reserve clause. I'm going to aim for that so long as, and I'm going to want it unless it turns out that it wasn't meant to be really, right? Unless it turns out that, you know, fate was set up in a way that that wasn't going to happen for me.
00:33:03
Speaker
another version of this we see in Epictetus is he talks about you know when you're going to the bath say I want to go to the bath and have fun in the bath but not at the expense of my happiness you know and not the expense of always keeping that in reserve some quotes from Seneca here I will sail across the ocean if nothing prevents me right so I am going to I want to sail across the ocean
00:33:26
Speaker
in so far as it's possible to do.
Impulse vs. Desire
00:33:28
Speaker
And then another one from Seneca, the Sage doesn't change his decision. However, he undertakes everything with a reserve clause. In most steadfast decisions, he allows for uncertain events.
00:33:40
Speaker
So the idea is that the sage is really never disappointed because the sage builds into their goals the possibility of being thwarted, the possibility of failing because they recognize that those are external goals. So you think about this in, again, an athletic thing, which is this idea of it's not just saying I'm going to play my best.
00:34:04
Speaker
The athlete says, I'm going to win. I want to win as long as we don't, as long as, you know, it's as long as we're in the position to win. Right. As long as we're not going to lose, I guess, which sounds weird, but it's like a, it's a skill to develop that. And I think it's a way of saying.
00:34:20
Speaker
Cause I think sometimes when we talk about wanting things, we just say, well, I'm just going to do my best. It's not like I'm going to sail across the ocean. It's I'm going to do my best to sail across the ocean. It's like, no, I want to sail across the ocean. That's a goal that requires certain sacrifices, certain prioritizations. It requires me choosing some things over others to sail across the ocean. That's something I want to do, but at the same time, I'm going to build in that reserve clause, you know, insofar as nothing prevents me. And if, if on the faded day and on the day I was set to go, there's a tropical storm.
00:34:50
Speaker
Well, then I need to be in a position to kind of, hopefully the reserve clause has put me in a position to not be too disappointed by that. Yeah, yeah. I suppose one way to think about this is that the reserve clause helps you have impulses instead of desires when it comes to indifference. So in our last discussion, we just noted the distinction between desire and impulse.
00:35:17
Speaker
One way to put it is just that when desires are frustrated, that results in passion, in emotional intensity, and the kind that involves perhaps not only suffering but involves a blinkered vision or distorted vision.
00:35:37
Speaker
the kind where reason has been overlaid and one is consumed by passion and as such will not make excellent decisions. So that's desire, impulse, that's motivation can indeed be a firm motivation, firm resolve.
00:35:54
Speaker
but doesn't have the connected cost of thinking about or seeing setbacks, seeing frustration as a matter for unhappiness. So I think that's one way to think about the reserve clause. It's interesting to think about this also in the context of, I think there's a line
00:36:17
Speaker
If there's will to fail, failure will be found. And also you'll hear the advice sometimes that, you know, you should burn the boats if you really want to go all into some projects, which on the surface, I think conflicts with this advice. You know, like I'll sail across the ocean if nothing prevents me.
00:36:40
Speaker
Well, is that line revealing that you do in fact have this will to failure and perhaps you wouldn't mind if something prevented you? So there is that initial conflict, but I think the stoic response is, well, sometimes you shouldn't burn the boats or people do terrible things after they burn the boats. Maybe they're not focused on the right thing, but more importantly,
00:37:03
Speaker
the focus just is more on impulse. And that's, you know, I will sail across the ocean. I'll do my best at sailing across the ocean. Yet, and obstacles that arise, though, anything that prevents me will not disturb my reasoning ability, will not disturb me. If I'm prevented, that will not disturb me. And in a way, it's almost a more advanced position.
00:37:33
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I would have a different take on that, which is something like, I do think that if you use, I would say impulse is going to be weaker than desire. So if you think your life literally depends on this, if you think as some people do with like, extreme cases of social anxiety or something or
00:37:54
Speaker
people that feel great depression after a failure in work or something like this. People in Japan committing suicide for conceptions of honor, like, oh, I've shamed my family in some way. If you think your life literally depends on it, I'm just okay with biting the boat there and being like, yeah, it's going to motivate you stronger. You're going to act more intensely if you burn the boats.
00:38:23
Speaker
Maybe that's the case, maybe that's not. I'm okay with it being the case. Because what you get in exchange for not burning the boats is like a lifetime of happiness and a more correct outlook. So maybe it's the case that like, if I wanted people to be effective and minimal in like a small circumstance, I would try to persuade them that this is all or nothing. But I think the stoic is just not going to...
00:38:47
Speaker
is not going to do that, but they're still going to do extreme things. They're still going to do incredible things, but there might be a kind of emotional dullness to that. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe not in the sage, but certainly when I've tried it.
00:39:00
Speaker
Yeah, well, I think that that is right. And I guess you want to see, well, like, what are the cases where people have that extreme desire? In one case, it's probably like a drug addict. Drug addicts, you know, they somehow gain, you know, 15 IQ points and a whole bunch of motivation where they need to get their next fix. That's just always so difficult to apply to any other domain.
00:39:21
Speaker
And often they do things they ought not do in order to get those drugs. That's probably true for people with extreme ambitions in many different fields. Probably true for the people who literally burn the boats.
00:39:34
Speaker
One bit that I want to add here is, and I think this connects with the seriousness of action. And this is, and I think we can connect it to the reserve clause too. And this is purpose setting. So just thinking of very simple thinking about what you are doing and why you are doing it before you do
Purpose and Character Excellence
00:39:55
Speaker
anything. And this is the kind of thing you can do in the pauses of life, those transition moments.
00:40:01
Speaker
If you're driving through a social event, if you're walking over to a meeting, whatever it is, thinking about, you know, what am I doing right now? Why am I doing it? And focusing on the intention and keeping in mind, given that intention, you know, what does excellence.
00:40:19
Speaker
look like instead of, you know, going to that social event with no plan in particular, showing up to that meeting in a sort of a rather routine way that isn't focused on, you know, that doesn't take seriously the fact that you need to make these choices that are going to play a role in forming your character. So that's, I think, very simple. This kind of thing we have in front of many of our meditations, just thinking about why are you doing this meditation exercise?
00:40:49
Speaker
what's driving you, what's the purpose behind this action, and keeping that focus on acting with a purpose, not sleepwalking through life. And I think why is that related to the Reserve Clause? Because if you remember why I think you're doing anything, why you want to sail across the ocean, whatever it is,
00:41:10
Speaker
I think focusing on that intention is going in a stoic way, I think would entail that your desire to sail across the ocean is done for some purpose that involves perhaps indirectly through a trail of steps of reasoning, the excellence of character. And that means that you're going to retain that excellence of character no matter what arises.
00:41:40
Speaker
you're not going to make those, you're not going to engage in vice in order to get across the ocean, nor are you going to break down when the weather turns against you.
00:41:53
Speaker
Okay, cool. So let me try this one thing. So one way that we present the reserve clause, we can present it as like, like a bandaid, right? Or like a Tylenol, something that dulls the pain. But what you're saying here, what I was thinking from you is that no, the reserve clause is actually pulling out a purpose that was there all along and making it explicit.
00:42:13
Speaker
So your goal, if you're a good stoic, if you believe in stoicism or are trying to, your goal was always to sail across the ocean in a way that demonstrates good character. And so all you're doing with the reserve clause is you're just not forgetting that second part. You're pulling it out, but it was always there. You're not adding it to soften things. You're just making it explicit. Is that right? Yeah, yeah, I think so. I think that's a, that's a good way to put it.
00:42:37
Speaker
Yeah, cool. And to build on that, like one exercise I had was premeditatio malorum.
Premeditatio Malorum
00:42:43
Speaker
That's something we've talked about a lot, but in the context of the discipline of action, I think it kind of actually goes well with your exercise of purpose setting. So if purpose setting is the positive goal, then I think premeditatio malorum is the negative goal so that you can get a complete picture.
00:42:58
Speaker
Epictetus talks about in that quote you said earlier about being a dilettante or jumping between different interests. One day you're a gladiator, the next year a musician, things like this. I think what often knocks people off that path and what he mentions in that quote is that you didn't consider all the things that will go along with that rule.
00:43:17
Speaker
You didn't consider all the things you're trained to be an athlete. You didn't consider that you'd have to stop eating cakes. One of my favorite lines. I really resonate to stop eating cakes and that you, you know, you're going to train, you're going to get beat up. You're spraying your ankle and then you could show up at the Olympics and lose anyway.
00:43:33
Speaker
And he's like, because you didn't think about that beforehand, you then give up at the first time, you can't eat a cake. You ask for this. I don't want to be an athlete. It means I can't eat cakes. But you should have realized that when you committed to it in the first place. So I see premeditatio malorum, at least in this context, a lot of different things it can do. It can train our desire, like we talked about last episode. But one thing it can do here is it can make sure that when you set a goal,
00:43:58
Speaker
Or you said a goal for yourself that includes both the positive purpose, but also an acceptance of the negatives or the potential things that could happen. And then only when you accept it, when you're like, well, even if I do sprained my ankle and have to have to skip the cakes, I still want to be an athlete. Then you've undertaken it for the right reason. And I think that's a good way that premeditatio morum can help with discipline of action.
00:44:21
Speaker
Prematitatiya Malorum is sort of like this exercise that really does have different levels. I think at the first pass you have the sort of the psychological benefits, the benefits of planning. Okay, you've thought about ways things can go wrong. Now you can take the actions to ensure they don't.
00:44:40
Speaker
But I think some of the next level stoic benefits, if you will, to keep in mind are, one, again, you have this focus on the present. When you're minding yourself about things that could go wrong, you have that immediate contrast between where you, in fact,
00:44:55
Speaker
actually are in the present and noting that things have not yet turned out wrong. These things are not yet bad for you. They exist in the imagination only. And then there's this next step, which is that even if many of those things did occur, they would not be bad for you in the fundamental
00:45:16
Speaker
sets because, you know, the Stoke is ultimately focused on being excellent in their roles and that we should expect things to go wrong and making the right decisions is just, you know, those are just different opportunities to make the right decisions and learn how to be good.
Role Clarification and Ethical Decision-Making
00:45:36
Speaker
I think that's right. And that's something that I'm opening up to a bit more as I practice more is this idea of levels to exercises. So not just being like, well, there's the right way to do it. Cause you know, if you talk to me a couple of years ago, I would have said, no premeditatium allorum is only good if you're doing it for that final level, which you're, you're imagining situations where things go wrong, just to understand that they're not actually bad in a stoic sense.
00:46:00
Speaker
But I'm more open to this kind of levels approach and I think that's a healthier way to, well you build a practice, you build a practice by doing it at the easier version of it before you do the more complex one. I think so, I think that's right.
00:46:13
Speaker
The last exercise that I want to talk about in terms of this, it's really kind of an intellectual exercise, but it's kind of a mindful, like being a mindful in these situations is one of just clarifying your roles. So we talked about role ethics. We said, I know what is good in the sphere of action is always contextual. Appropriate actions are grounded in your identity and your position in the world. So you need to take a time to examine this and understand this, understand your relationships with others.
00:46:42
Speaker
your personal talents and your dispositions, and those will reveal information to you about what you should do. So, Epic Tetus talks about this, where if you reflect on the rule, what's expected of you, in most cases, what's expected of you and what you should do, what is indispensable, will reveal itself to you if you spend some time consciously deliberating on
00:47:05
Speaker
who you are, what relationships you have with other people, what positions you have in the world, and what those mean. So whether you're a parent, a child, brother or sister, a friend, or, you know, a politician, a co-worker, something like this, you're a student, a teacher, what is required of you and expected of you
00:47:30
Speaker
will be revealed to you just by thinking about those carefully and we don't do a lot of time thinking about those things carefully I don't think and so instead we kind of jump up to this higher picture well what is good in this more abstract sense and you can get this you can get some particular answers just by thinking just by thinking in this in this particular sense
00:47:51
Speaker
I suppose there's always this metaphor that the soaks have about the functioning body, and we should see ourselves as organs in a larger body. And whenever we do something that is antisocial, we've separated ourselves from others. We're like the foot that's been separated from the rest of the being.
00:48:14
Speaker
And I suppose that brings to mind the thought that, okay, if you want to think about what to do, one angle on that is you can think about what's good for the whole. And that's when you're at that more abstract level, you know, what's best for society and these sorts of questions. But you can also think about, okay, what does an excellent foot do and maybe even
00:48:40
Speaker
I get the analogy doesn't work quite as well, but what does an excellent organ do in this moment? And to do that, you need to zoom into particular facts of the matter. And it's not enough to look at the whole, look at this picture of you from above, you need to pay attention to the details.
00:49:04
Speaker
I'm going to get that motivational poster for my house. What does a good foot do? Whenever I'm stressed, I am the foot. I am the toes. But it's right. I think it's dead on. The foot is just a funny example. Yeah, you're right.
00:49:23
Speaker
Cool. Well, that comes into one of the, one of your main challenges, which is just understanding what our roles are and what, and what they entail. Yeah, I think it's hard. I think it's the kind of thing where it's like.
00:49:41
Speaker
I go back to Marcus Aurelius' line of do what is indispensable. I think it's easy 80% of the time, but then it doesn't really give you anything to work with the other 20%. So when you think, well, what should I do here? Well, we're friends. So I probably owe them honesty. I probably owe them kindness. I owe them a certain degree of attention and focus.
00:50:03
Speaker
to honor this friendship, that gets you 80% of the way there, that gets you 90% of the way there. It's when things get complicated or confusing, and then I find role ethics, it's like, well, what do I do now? I don't really have the utilitarian math to fall back on when we're doing complicated equations. Another example I bring up, or another thing that I think of is, what do we do when roles conflict? What is the hierarchy of roles and
00:50:29
Speaker
There are some hierarchy of roles that the stoicism provides, like our role as a rational human being obviously comes apart above that. So I don't, I don't, you know, Rob a bank because of my friendship with bank robbers. And that's my role as bank robber friend, because it violates these higher roles, these more important roles, but often these acquired roles, what they call these acquired roles of friends, your, your work, your relationships, these often conflict all the time.
00:50:56
Speaker
And how do you develop a hierarchy between those or a way of deciding between those? It's difficult. And I'm okay if the answer is maybe you just make it up or maybe you just make a choice or there is no right answer in a moral sense. And there's just, you just have to make a decision between two different ways your life could go. I'm okay if that's the case, but I wish the Stoics would be a bit more clear on that.
00:51:22
Speaker
Yeah, I'm always of two minds on this. So on one hand, I think understanding the right thing in nearly all situations is probably, if you're able to think about it clearly, easy. There are several simple ethical rules that
00:51:39
Speaker
we all know are good heuristics, and then we can think of clear cases where it might be fair enough to violate them. In general, you should never lie. There's always that famous example of maybe you should lie to the SS officers knocking on your door asking if you have Jews, and if you do, it seems fine to lie. That just seems ethically clear.
00:52:07
Speaker
And you can just sort of iterate through this whole list. What is a virtuous person? You know, they don't lie, they're kind, they care for the interests of others, they stand up for what's right, their own interests, and so on. And, you know, you can just come up with a picture of, you know, what is excellence looks like in these particular situations when you end up with conflicting roles.
00:52:31
Speaker
Is it really true that if someone put a gun to your head and you couldn't think of how to resolve the conflict? Or is it really true that if someone put a gun to your head, you couldn't think of how to resolve the conflict? In many situations, there is probably a way.
00:52:48
Speaker
through so on one hand i have that side of me on the other hand there are some difficult ethical decisions and trade-offs probably or maybe i'm just not thinking about them clearly enough i'm not i'm not sure so in one hand kell what i'm hearing is on one hand you're like just do the hard work
00:53:07
Speaker
But I guess the other part, I mean, the other part of me is that I sometimes I just want to be told what to do. Sometimes I don't want to sometimes I don't want to do the hard work and I wish it was simple. I guess the point with the gun to your head.
00:53:22
Speaker
I guess when I'm thinking of these conflicts, I'm not really thinking of ethical conflicts. I'm thinking of sometimes of conflicts that matter to me. Like you're thinking of like, you know, are you going to stay here? Are you going to move somewhere else? You know, are you going to keep your job or are you going to move to a different job? Sometimes these are just not ethical conflicts. There's no gun to your head answer, but that's because they're not moral questions. They're just personal questions. And I think sometimes I treat everything that matters like it's a moral question or everything that stresses me out like it's a moral question. And sometimes sometimes it's not.
00:53:52
Speaker
So I think the gun to your head example is a good one of more, I was giving that kind of 80-20. It's really probably 99-1 or less in terms of that couldn't pass the, if you were really pressed, you wouldn't know what to do thing. Yeah, that could be so. And I think that's not to belittle those
00:54:15
Speaker
decisions that might have to do. So maybe where you live, potentially, of course, all these facts of context come into play. That's just a matter of preference. If you go through the different roles, you have your roles as a human, your roles as that specific individual, your roles as a person with these relationships, and then finally, your preferences.
00:54:41
Speaker
Suppose everything else is satisfied, then it's just a question of what best fits your preferences. It's a question of choice. And that doesn't mean it's an easy choice where to live by choosing somewhere.
00:54:54
Speaker
I was just saying, the only unethical thing to do in a matter of preference, then, is to act against your own preferences.
Impulse Preservation and Equanimity
00:55:01
Speaker
Right. Is to not act in a way that... If you're choosing between two things you want to do, that's fine. But if you were to not consider yourself or not respect yourself in that situation, not show self-respect or self-advocacy, that would be... It would be moral because it would be a harm towards yourself.
00:55:19
Speaker
Mm-hmm. No. Yeah, I think I think that's right. And yeah, I suppose I would also say, you know, whatever you choose that's gonna involve Sacrifice. Yeah, that's gonna that's so it's not not to say it's not not an easy decision
00:55:33
Speaker
One of my friends once had a line, there are no difficult decisions. You either know what to do, need to get more information, or if it's just uncertain, you flip a coin, which I think in a sense is too flippant, but there is also, and there is a mistake in the flippancy of that line, but there is also some wisdom in it. Yeah, maybe we could be a bit more flippant, but less analysis paralysis.
00:56:00
Speaker
Maybe not. Maybe. All right. I think this other point is a good one to get to this other challenge. So I think we should touch on that. So the other challenge I have that comes when, again, you don't really think about it when you look at the discipline of action and isolation, but it comes up when we look at the relationship between the discipline of action and the discipline of desire. And it's this idea that it's hard to stop impulse from becoming desire, especially when we're doing the right thing.
00:56:26
Speaker
or we're navigating the world with justice. Marcus Aurelius talks about this justice in terms of your relation, your cause in the world. Stoics encourage an impulse to help others with indifference. Stoics encourage us to help people with their wealth, their health, with your friendship. I should be going around caring about others.
00:56:51
Speaker
But how do we stop that from slipping into a desire that can be frustrated or disappointed? So how do you, again, how do you become the kind of person who says, not, I will sail against the sea so long as something doesn't stop me, but I'm a doctor and I will save this child's life.
00:57:09
Speaker
so long as something doesn't stop me I will I will help these people in terrible circumstances unless unless something stops me how do you say that genuinely and
00:57:23
Speaker
Uh, walk that fine line. I think it's a really difficult one, especially people. And I would say this is like a stoic trajectory as you get into stoicism because you're working on yourself, but then you get up to a level of self work where you want to start giving back and start, uh, being, being leaning into that part of social in the emphasize the community. And how do you do that leaning without giving up that equanimity? That's basically what I'm asking. How do you, how do you balance that? So it's really, really hard.
00:57:53
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's another key challenge to note is that one can start out in the
00:58:01
Speaker
project of doing the right thing, do it in the right way, but one always needs to be awake and aware of whether that eventually turns into a project that becomes consuming in a way that renders you susceptible to passion or negative emotions that distort your vision and result in people making mistakes.
00:58:29
Speaker
One thing that I have to say here, like one thing that Epictetus advises is this idea of totally abstaining from desire for a period of time. So like totally, totally being almost desire agnostic and then being very careful reintroducing that. I think that's something to do here. I think if you come into
00:58:48
Speaker
philosophy too enthusiastically, you could end up in this position where you're really, really attached to these external circumstances. You've just changed the external circumstances you're attached to from, you know, being wealthy and successful for yourself to helping other people.
00:59:05
Speaker
And then you're just, you're just transferring desire. And that's probably a better thing to desire. That's probably a healthier transition, but it's not the kind of stoic end point. So I think that's something to be said is being very, even when you're doing the discipline of action, just having a kind of reverence, respect and cautious, cautiousness around desire. That strong sense of desire. Yeah. Yeah. Coming back to the beginning with that initial advice of renouncing desire to the degree that you can is a great, great technique.
Balancing Principle and Flexibility
00:59:34
Speaker
I was also trying to think of what are maybe useful historical examples of this. One that comes to mind is the stoic Cato the Younger, who resisted Caesar, was exceptionally principled. I think he was very good at reducing the amount of corruption in the Roman Republic and stood up against people who he saw
01:00:03
Speaker
as tyrants with Caesar and Caesar's allies. But in that project, he also ended up what are most likely, I think what most historians see as being inflexible and making strategic mistakes and not compromising with some of
01:00:23
Speaker
his enemies in ways he could have. And perhaps that is just because what wasn't initially a right intentioned morphed into something that was inflexible and although was initially related with justice became unrelated to it. And he sort of lost the mark as it were.
01:00:47
Speaker
Yeah, I love that Caleb. I think that's the right answer here. Or one of the right answers or an important way to frame it is this idea that, you know, it's not, well, be careful about impulse becoming desire because then you'll be sad sometimes. It's like, it's a bit bigger than that. It's like, if impulse becomes desire, you're going to suffer from what desire brings, which is distorted thinking, right? Passions that make you ultimately worse at achieving your goal.
01:01:15
Speaker
So that idea of the doctor analogy, right? Like I think the good doctors are the ones who will say, I will try to save this child's life unless something stops me. They are actually able to do that. The ones that can't.
01:01:28
Speaker
are under, if don't quit, must be under an extreme psychological duress that probably makes them worse, or at least able to perform less surgeries than other ones. So it's not just this idea of it's going to be harder for you if you do it, but it's actually going to be counterproductive if you slip into desire. Because again, when we say desire, we're meaning that really strong feeling. And when we say passions,
01:01:53
Speaker
We don't mean disappointment. We mean sorrow, grief, like soul crushing, anxiety and things like this. And those are not ultimately not productive anyway. So it's a nice, that's a, that's an external reason to do it as well as the internal reason. Yeah. Excellent. Anything else to add? No, this was great. All right. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks Michael.
01:02:19
Speaker
Thanks again for listening to Stoa Conversations. If you found this conversation useful, please give us a rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify and share it with a friend. And if you'd like to practice stoicism with Michael and I as well as others walking the stoic path, we are running our three-week course on stoicism applied. It'll be live with
01:02:44
Speaker
a forum, interactive calls, that I think will be an excellent way for a group of people to become more stoic together. So do check that out at stomeditation.com slash course. And if that's not to your fancy, you can find links to the Stoa app as well as the Stoa letter, our newsletter on stoic theory and practice at stomeditation.com. Thanks for listening. Until next time.