Did That Make You Feel Better

The next time someone gets upset near you crying, yelling, breaking something, being pointed or cruel watch how quickly this statement will stop them cold: “I hope this is making you feel better.” Because, of course, it isn't. Only in the bubble of extreme emotion can we justify any of that kind of behavior and when called to account for it, we usually feel sheepish or embarrassed.

It’s worth applying that standard to yourself. The next time you find yourself in the middle of a freak out, or moaning and groaning with flu like symptoms, or crying tears of regret, just ask: Is this actually making me feel better? Is this actually relieving any of the symptoms I wish were gone?

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Steady Your Impulses

Think of the manic people in your life. Not the ones suffering from an unfortunate disorder, but the ones whose lives and choices are in disorder. Everything is soaring highs or crushing lows; the day is either amazing or awful. Aren't those people exhausting? Don’t you wish they just had a filter through which they could test the good impulses versus the bad ones?

There is such a filter. Justice. Reason. Philosophy. If there’s a central message of Stoic thought, it’s this: impulses of all kinds are going to come, and your work is to control them, like bringing a dog to heel. Put more simply: think before you act. Ask: Who is in control here? What principles are guiding me?

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Don’t Seek Out Strife

It has become a cliché to quote Theodore Roosevelt’s “Man in the Arena” speech, which lionizes “the one whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly.” compared with the critic who sits on the sidelines. Roosevelt gave that speech shortly after he left office, at the height of his popularity. In a few years, he would run against his former protégé in an attempt to retake the White House, losing badly and nearly assassinated in the process. He would also nearly die exploring a river in the Amazon, kill thousands of animals in African safaris, and then beg Woodrow Wilson to allow him to enlist in World War I despite being 59 years old. He would do a lot of things that seem somewhat baffling in retrospect.

Theodore Roosevelt was a truly great man. But he was also driven by a compulsion, a work and activity addiction that was seemingly without end. Many of us share this affliction—being driven by something we can’t control. We’re afraid of being still, so we seek out strife and action as a distraction. We choose to be at war in some cases, literally when peace is in fact the more honorable and fitting choice.

Yes, the man in the arena is admirable. As is the soldier and the politician and the businesswoman and all the other occupations. But, and this is a big but, only if we’re in the arena for the right reasons.

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The Smoke and Dust of Myth

In Marcus Aurelius’s writings, he constantly points out how the emperors who came before him were barely remembered just a few years later. To him, this was a reminder that no matter how much he conquered, no matter how much he inflicted his will on the world, it would be like building a castle in the sand soon to be erased by the winds of time.

The same goes for those driven to the heights of hate or anger or obsession or perfectionism. Marcus liked to point out that Alexander the Great one of the most passionate and ambitious men who ever lived was buried in the same ground as his mule driver. Eventually, all of us will pass away and slowly be forgotten. We should enjoy this brief time we have on earth not be enslaved to emotions that make us miserable and dissatisfied.

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On Being Invincible

Have you ever watched a seasoned pro handle the media? No question is too tough, no tone too pointed or insulting. They parry every blow with humor, poise, and patience. Even when stung or provoked, they choose not to flinch or react. They’re able to do this not only because of training and experience, but because they understand that reacting emotionally will only make the situation worse. The media is waiting for them to slip up or get upset, so to successfully navigate press events they have internalized the importance of keeping themselves under calm control.

It’s unlikely you’ll face a horde of probing reporters bombarding you with insensitive questions today. But it might be helpful whatever stresses or frustrations or overload that do come your wayto picture that image and use it as your model for dealing with them. Our reasoned choice our prohairesis, as the Stoics called it is a kind of invincibility that we can cultivate. We can shrug off hostile attacks and breeze through pressure or problems. And, like our model, when we finish, we can point back into the crowd and say, “Next!”

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Fear is a Self Fulfilling Prophecy

Only the paranoid survive,” Andy Grove, a former CEO of Intel, famously said. It might be true. But we also know that the paranoid often destroy themselves quicker and more spectacularly than any enemy. Seneca, with his access and insight into the most powerful elite in Rome, would have seen this dynamic play out quite vividly. Nero, the student whose excesses Seneca tried to curb, killed not only his own mother and wife but eventually turned on Seneca, his mentor, too.

The combination of power, fear, and mania can be deadly. The leader, convinced that he might be betrayed, acts first and betrays others first. Afraid that he’s not well liked, he works so hard to get others to like him that it has the opposite effect. Convinced of mismanagement, he micromanages and becomes the source of the mismanagement. And on and on the things we fear or dread, we blindly inflict on ourselves.

The next time you are afraid of some supposedly disastrous outcome, remember that if you don’t control your impulses, if you lose your self control, you may be the very source of the disaster you so fear. It has happened to smarter and more powerful and more successful people. It can happen to us too.

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You Don’t Have to Have An Opinion

Here’s a funny exercise: think about all the upsetting things you don’t know about stuff people might have said about you behind your back, mistakes you might have made that never came to your attention, things you dropped or lost without even realizing it. What’s your reaction? You don’t have one because you don’t know about it.

In other words, it is possible to hold no opinion about a negative thing. You just need to cultivate that power instead of wielding it accidentally. Especially when having an opinion is likely to make us aggravated. Practice the ability of having absolutely no thoughts about something act as if you had no idea it ever occurred. Or that you've never heard of it before. Let it become irrelevant or nonexistent to you. It’ll be a lot less powerful this way.

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