Thinking about the worst that can happen every day might be overdoing it a little, but I have terminal cancer, and I think about it every day. I don't get all miserable or try to experience the pain, though. It's just part of everyday life now.
I am no longer afraid of what's coming, and my wife and I can talk freely about it. We'll still be sad when the time comes, but we are ready.
Is this really anything new under the sun? Simplifications of philosophy, its “selling” in attractive, easily digestible forms, have always accompanied the popularisation of knowledge. In pop culture, Stoicism—like many other schools—gets reduced to slogans, memes, or motivational quotes, and in mass education, it is presented in brief, schematic ways.
We should ask ourselves: do these criticisms really hold much weight, if we consider the level of general education, access to pop culture, and the economics of selling philosophical content to a mass audience? In practice, the “problem with pop Stoicism” may simply be the natural outcome of popularisation—most points on the long list of complaints stem from the same mechanism: philosophical ideas reaching a wide audience need to be simplified and made appealing. Es. in the realm of modern capitalism.
Rather than treating this as a unique degradation of philosophy, it’s more productive to adopt a broader perspective: simplifications are inevitable, and critical reflection should go hand in hand with education and context, not with demonising audiences.
Well, just as a matter of principle, I *love* simplification because I think most philosophy is unnecessarily complicated. The problem here is that the simplification of pop stoicism is bad. Bad in the sense that it doesn't reflect the actual teachings of the stoics (Jared Henderson's post this week went deeper into that than I did) and because what it actually teaches is bad. I typically think that philosophy should lead you to be a wiser person, attuned to the truths of the world (whatever they me), with good habits and a beneficent nature (ironically what many of the original stoics would agree with). I don't think pop stoicism cultivates that.
Well, to be clear, I wouldn't say that stoicism "failed" me - so much as I get A LOT of mileage out of some of the practices more than others. I think like all philosophical systems, there are benefits and costs, and for me, I think the benefits are separable from stoicism itself (imagining the worst case scenario and preparing for it when something bad happens, being at peace with the brute facts of the world and responding to them).
Having said that, I think individual people are different psychologically, for various reasons. Stoicism works for many people for this reason!
But yes, generally agree with what you say. I got into stoicism in 2018ish when I was in my mid-20s, but it was really just a phase. Same with Buddhism, per my previous post
Thinking about the worst that can happen every day might be overdoing it a little, but I have terminal cancer, and I think about it every day. I don't get all miserable or try to experience the pain, though. It's just part of everyday life now.
I am no longer afraid of what's coming, and my wife and I can talk freely about it. We'll still be sad when the time comes, but we are ready.
I think Seneca was on to something!
Sorry to hear that. I hope whatever suffering is in front of you is as minimal and manageable as possible :(
I'm ready, but I think I have a while to go yet. My doc promises me a peaceful end.
Is this really anything new under the sun? Simplifications of philosophy, its “selling” in attractive, easily digestible forms, have always accompanied the popularisation of knowledge. In pop culture, Stoicism—like many other schools—gets reduced to slogans, memes, or motivational quotes, and in mass education, it is presented in brief, schematic ways.
We should ask ourselves: do these criticisms really hold much weight, if we consider the level of general education, access to pop culture, and the economics of selling philosophical content to a mass audience? In practice, the “problem with pop Stoicism” may simply be the natural outcome of popularisation—most points on the long list of complaints stem from the same mechanism: philosophical ideas reaching a wide audience need to be simplified and made appealing. Es. in the realm of modern capitalism.
Rather than treating this as a unique degradation of philosophy, it’s more productive to adopt a broader perspective: simplifications are inevitable, and critical reflection should go hand in hand with education and context, not with demonising audiences.
Well, just as a matter of principle, I *love* simplification because I think most philosophy is unnecessarily complicated. The problem here is that the simplification of pop stoicism is bad. Bad in the sense that it doesn't reflect the actual teachings of the stoics (Jared Henderson's post this week went deeper into that than I did) and because what it actually teaches is bad. I typically think that philosophy should lead you to be a wiser person, attuned to the truths of the world (whatever they me), with good habits and a beneficent nature (ironically what many of the original stoics would agree with). I don't think pop stoicism cultivates that.
Well, to be clear, I wouldn't say that stoicism "failed" me - so much as I get A LOT of mileage out of some of the practices more than others. I think like all philosophical systems, there are benefits and costs, and for me, I think the benefits are separable from stoicism itself (imagining the worst case scenario and preparing for it when something bad happens, being at peace with the brute facts of the world and responding to them).
Having said that, I think individual people are different psychologically, for various reasons. Stoicism works for many people for this reason!
But yes, generally agree with what you say. I got into stoicism in 2018ish when I was in my mid-20s, but it was really just a phase. Same with Buddhism, per my previous post
You're in luck, I wrote about this last week! https://joerjames3.substack.com/p/remember-when-people-converted-to?r=110d4