Stoicism has gotten somewhat of a negative connotation in modern society. It is often associated with supressing, or not having emotions, but that is not what Stoicism is about at all. In fact, all of the big Stoic philosophers of ancient Greece and Rome never said that we should abolish our emotions. Stoicism tries to help us better control our emotions, however, and not allowing them to completely take a hold on us.

Human, all too human

There are a couple of things that make us Human. First of all, our rational, thinking mind. But as important as that is emotions form a big part of what it means to be Human. In fact, there are so many studies in the field of psychology that show us how our emotions guide us and how we rely on them more often than our rationale. Feeling is something we do, emotions are things we have trouble putting into words, because they can only be felt by the person experiencing them. Yet they are also universal. So they are something that connect us, but also divide us.

Stoicism understands that we are all Human and that we experience emotions and instead of advocating that we should not feel anything, the Stoics believe that we should allow these emotions to be there, but that we should not let them cloud our judgement. In other words, when we feel overwhelmed by strong emotions, like anger, sorrow, ecstasy or love, we need to be able to zoom out and allow our rational mind to control our actions instead. One way of doing this is knowing that we can control what is going on in our minds, but everything outside ourselves is not within our control.

For example; we can let someone ruin our day for saying something bad about us, because we allow ourselves to be hurt by that person’s words. We cannot control their words or actions, but we can control how we react to those words. It is our own judgement and opinions that are often the cause of our own misery. If we don’t allow a person’s words to hurt us, they cannot harm us.

Emotions are in our nature

It can be hard to not be harmed by someone else’s words, especially if they come from a person that is dear to us. The context is also very important. Why are they saying these words in the first place, and do they have a fair point for saying what they say? Nevertheless, allowing the words to hurt us is still our choice. If you have a strong mind, you will just let it slide and be as untouched as before the words were said. This takes a lot of training, constant training. I find that daily meditation greatly benefits my ability to do this.

To live the Good Life, that is basically what the Stoics endeavour with their philosophy. In order to attain this balance and life this Good Life of which they speak, one needs to live in accordance with Nature. This means that we can allow our emotions to be there, for if nature did not intend us to have emotions, why do we have them? But there is a big difference in allowing our emotions to control us and allowing them to be, but staying at the steering wheel ourselves.

In order to train this, we must not allow things outside our sphere of control to take a hold on us. This means that whatever happens to and around us, we need to make an attempt to accept them. Again, this doesn’t mean that we are not allowed to feel anything, but rather that we don’t allow ourselves to get caught up in the events around us that they govern our lives.

Training in letting go

My daily mindfulness meditation practice has taught me the skill of being able to let go of my thoughts. If I catch myself thinking about something that is counterproductive, I’ll let it go and continue what I was doing. This is a skill that can be learned, but only through practice, practice and lots of practice. This means that unless you’re truly willing, you can’t just do this by simply reading this blog and being able to just let thoughts go.

One of the best visualizations of our thoughts I know is the idea of taking a blue sky. Imagine yourself sitting on a bench, or under a tree and watching the clouds pass by the otherwise blue sky. The clouds are your thoughts and you can either just watch them go by, or pay extreme attention to a particular cloud. Maybe it’s a dark cloud that could mean it will start to rain soon. You are very likely to pay attention to such clouds, of course. The whole idea is of this visualization is that we should instead just sit and let the clouds pass by and focus on the blue sky behind them. Because that is where true contentment lies.

Long story short; if you want to train yourself in not getting caught up in emotions and thoughts, mindfulness meditation is the way to go. If you’re new to this practice, try doing it five minutes a day every day and slowly try to build it up once you’re comfortable with taking five minutes for yourself. There are plenty of guided meditations available online that will help you to train this. My preferred app for this is Headspace, which I’ve been using for well over five years now. Meditation is key to becoming balanced and resilient with your mind and for me, it’s the only way to stay sane in a world that moves too fast to be understood well. I think we can all use a time-out every day where we don’t have to think and can train our mind so we can handle strong emotions well and not dwindle on our thoughts too much.

Stay cool!

Jeffrey