Month: May 2023

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Challenges Change Future

258 – Nothing Endures But Change

258 - Nothing Endures But Change cover

How do you handle change? Does it overwhelm you? Do you try to ignore it or do you embrace it? Today I want to talk about understanding change and how we can use stoicism to help us through some rocky times.

“Nothing endures but change.”

— Heraclitus

“There are two of the most immediately useful thoughts you will delve into. First that things cannot touch the mind: they are external and inert; anxieties can only come from your internal judgement. Second, that all these things you see will change almost as you look at them, and then will be no more. Constantly bring to mind all that you yourself have already seen changed. The universe is change: life is perspective.”

— Marcus Aurelius

Change

Change is the only constant in the universe and is something that everyone has to deal with in life. There is simply no way to avoid it. Life is change. When you stop changing, you’re dead.

As much as we like variety in life, most of us enjoy stability or the sameness of life. This is why we don’t get up and move every day. We like finding a place to live, people to be friends with, stores that we regularly shop at.

There is a certain comfort that comes with familiarity. We see this in all areas of our lives. When we go to the store, we like to know where the things are that we want and get frustrated when things are moved to a new aisle. We will often buy the same brand of shoe year after year because we like the fit or the look. We go to the same restaurants or bars because we feel comfortable with the decor, the staff, and the food.

When it comes to work we will often stay at jobs we don’t like because the amount of changed involved feels like it will be too much. Looking for a new job, learning new skills, and possibly moving can seem daunting and cause us to not take action. Starting your own company or working for yourself may be a dream that never gets fulfilled simply because there is too much change involved.

When it comes to people, we have friendships that last for years because they bring us connection and community. We will often hold onto not so great friendships simply because we have had them for a while. People may stay in romantic relationships even when both partners are unhappy simply because making that big of change is too scary. There’s a comfort with what we know, and even if we may not feel that close anymore, there’s a familiarity that is not easy to let go of.

We like things to stay the same.

We always have the opportunity to make changes and choose different things in our lives. This is something that many of us don’t really think much about. We forget that at any time we can decide to change our lives. Often it isn’t until something big happens to knock us out of our comfort zone that we try something new, and that’s often because we have no choice.

Adrift

“The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.“

— M. Scott Peck

The reason that I’m discussing this topic this week is because my life has been hit with a lot of changes over past year. My kids are out of the house and living their own lives. They’re doing a great job being adults, and I’m proud of them, but I’m not longer a caregiver in that sense any more. My romantic relationship of almost 10 years came to an end and it’s been a struggle to process it and move on. I was laid off from work a few months ago and even though my skills are usually in high demand, I haven’t even gotten a first interview. On top of that I’m selling my house because I don’t need this much space for one person. I’ve also decided to move to Europe after I get my house sold, though I’m still unsure where I’ll end up.

Talk about massive changes.

This last weekend I went camping at a regional Burning Man music and art festival. For me, events like this are always a place for reflection and processing hard things in my life. It’s a space to get away from daily life and slow down. It was a hard weekend in some ways because I realized how adrift I felt. So many of core parts of my life have shifted in such dramatic ways that at times I feel overwhelmed. I took the time this weekend to reconnect with friends and really think about my next steps in life.

So, with that said, I want to talk about some of the things that I learned over the past few months about how to deal with with big changes in our lives in the most effective way.

First, I want to talk about some of the challenging emotions that we face when we have big changes that happen in our lives.

Fear

“Fear is the basis of all suffering. Both desire and anger are manifestations of fear. Fear itself is a creation of your mind. It does not exist independently. Since it is a fabrication, you don’t have to fight it. Just understand it. Understanding is the key to freedom.”

@TheAncientSage (twitter)

We often feel fear when there is a change in our lives because we were comfortable with the way things were, and we’re scared of the unknown, we’re scared of the future. While we rationally understand that the future is never something we can know, when we are in a comfortable place in our lives, our minds get used to it and we act as if life will continue on the same.

When we start to worry about the future, we will often fall into the cognitive distortion of catastrophizing, which is where we imagine the worse case scenario and believe that is what is going to happen to us. We start to assume that things can only get worse and will never be as good as they were.

If we lose a job, we might worry about how we’re going to pay our bills. We may believe that we will never find another job. If a relationship ends we may feel like we will never find another relationship where we are loved again.

Grief

There are many emotions that come up when grapple with change. Grief is probably the heaviest one to deal with. What grief is really about is struggling with change. It’s about recognizing that from the moment of that loss, that life will no longer be the same.

When I talk about grief, I’m not just talking about the death of someone we care about. It can mean any significant loss that we facing. It could be the death of a loved one or even just someone we admire. It could mean the end of a significant relationship. It could mean the loss of a job that we really loved. It could be the loss of a home or a pet, or even moving to a new city.

When there is something that holds importance to us, we feel like it’s a part of our life. When that loss occurs, we feel like we are losing a part of our lives. Since we are social creatures, we integrate people into part of our lives. We know who we are by our interactions with other people. When we lose someone close to us, it can feel like we are losing a part of ourselves, and in a way we are because our lives aren’t just us as a single person, but us as part of a community.

Losing a job can also be something that can cause a lot of grief. We may feel a lack of purpose in our lives if our job is a defining part of our identity. I know some people identify so strong with their careers that they feel like they aren’t themselves if they aren’t dong their kind of work.

When a romantic relationship ends we can often feel a great deal of loss. When we have someone that is so entwined in our lives, they really are a part of us. You feel like you are missing your other half. Loneliness always lurks around the corner. You miss that comfort of the other person that knows you so well and has been your support.

Your social life changes pretty drastically as well. As much as they try not to, friends may divide themselves onto one side or the other. Attending events without your former partner feels strange. You often feel like you will never be loved again like that person loved us.

So how do we deal with big changes in our lives? I think that the hardest part for any of us is to let go of the resistance that we put up when big changes come along in our lives. We don’t want things to change, and the more we can flow with the changes, the easier we’ll be able to see and embrace the opportunities ahead. We’ll be able to take actions that will help us move forward into the future with confidence.

Feel It

“No amount of anxiety makes any difference to anything that is going to happen.”

— Alan Watts

I think the most important thing we can do when we struggle these heavy emotions is to give ourselves time to fully feel them. The worst thing you can do is to try and ignore them or repress them. When the stoics talk about living according to nature, for me that includes feeling your emotions. Every one of us has emotions which is part of our nature. The notion that stoics do not feel emotions is wrong. We just work on trying to manage our emotions in a healthy and productive way.

When we feel fear, we need to lean in, feel it, and understand why it is there. We can talk with our friends about the fear that we are feeling. I know for me I will often feel so much better just talking about the things that I’m afraid of. I talk about my worries of the future so that they are out of my head. Once they’re out in the open it’s easier to talk about what I can do about them. It also makes it easier to see that they aren’t really all that scary, and that people throughout history have dealt with massive changes in their lives and they have not only survived, but plenty have thrived.

“It is better to conquer grief than to deceive it.”

— Seneca

When it comes to grief, I think that it’s really important to let yourself feel it. The more you try to ignore grief, the more it will sink you. When you feel a loss so big that it causes you grief, you really are losing a part of yourself, and you need to mourn that loss. If you don’t process that grief, you are simply delaying something that your mind needs to work through. Talk with a good friend, and if it’s too much for them to handle, find a good therapist. There is no shame in grieving. Even the mighty Spartans grieved over those lost in battle.

Premeditatio Malorum

“This is why we need to envisage every possibility and to strengthen the spirit to deal with the things which may conceivably come about. Rehearse them in your mind: exile, torture, war, shipwreck. Misfortune may snatch you away from your country… If we do not want to be overwhelmed and struck numb by rare events as if they were unprecedented ones; fortune needs envisaging in a thoroughly comprehensive way.”

—Seneca

One of the best ways that we can prepare for dealing with fear, grief, and anxiety about change is to take some time and imagine the worst possible scenario. Now I know this feels like it’s falling into a catastrophizing mindset, but premeditatio malorum is about thinking through all possible cases while you are in a safe place. You prepare yourself mentally to go to a darker place, all from the safety of your own mind.

I recommend either writing in your journal, talking to a good friend you trust, or even a therapist. The more you just let them float around in your mind, the scarier than can seem, so get them out of your head. You can set out a basic format of listing all the things that can go wrong, and then think about ways you could handle them should they arise. You can work backwards and think about ways that you can prepare for them and maybe even see ways that you can prevent them.

Acceptance and Appreciation

“Don’t demand or expect that events happen as you would wish them to. Accept events as they actually happen. That way peace is possible.”

— Epictetus

The next big area I want to focus on is acceptance and appreciation. The stoics teach us that it is important to practice amor fati, that we learn to love our fate. Life is going to throw things at you whether you like it or not. The universe doesn’t care how you feel about it, so doing your best to love what gets sent your way is a way to keep yourself from feeling overwhelmed when big changes come. When you can learn to appreciate the hard things and the lessons they teach you, then you are more likely to see them as opportunities than challenges.

“Change is never painful, only your resistance to change is painful.”

— Buddhist proverb

In many ways, all the hard things that have happened to me have pushed me to step up and take more responsibility for my life. I don’t really have the option to just sit back and coast. Since I’m unemployed, I’ve had to step up and figure out how to cover my expenses. When I lost my job a few months ago, I didn’t stress out about it nor did I get mad at my former boss. I just recognized that it was just a part of life and that now I had time to work on other things that I didn’t have time for in the past.

Since then I created a 30 day challenge stoic challenge course for my listeners. I’ve been working on setting up mastermind groups and private coaching. I’ve been learning about marketing and creating content. I’ve also been practicing piano more often, exercising every day, and taking steps to improve my health. I’ve taken time to grieve over the loss from my relationship ending, and also appreciated the great things that I gained from that relationship.

Another thing I realized with all the big changes happening is that even though I do feel adrift, it’s okay. I realized that rather than feeling anxiety that things are so unsettled and wishing that things were more certain, I decided I to get comfortable with things being adrift and trust that at some point in the future things will be more solid. I’ve accepted that I’m just going to feel untethered, and that I need to stop resisting and do my best just flow with the changes.

Conclusion

“Life is a storm that will test you unceasingly. Don’t wait for calm waters that may not arrive. Derive purpose from resilience. Learn to sail the raging sea.”

— @TheStoicEmperor (twitter)

Life never goes according to plan nor according to our desires, and to be honest, I think that’s a good thing. If life went exactly the way that we wanted we’d be rather bored. It’s the challenges and the hardships that we overcome that make life interesting and exciting. When we have to stretch and work for what comes next, that’s when we grow. That’s when we learn how to accomplish great things. That’s when we feel most alive. When we accept what happens to us and figure out how to make the best of what comes our way, then we are truly living life like a stoic.

Hello friends! Thank you for listening. Stop by the website at stoic.coffee where you can sign up for our newsletter, and buy some great looking shirts and hoodies at the Stoic Coffee Shop.

Want to help support this podcast? Become a patron on patreon!

Like the theme song? You can find it here from my alter ego. 🙂

Find me on instagram or twitter.

Lastly if you know of someone that would benefit from or appreciate this podcast, please share it. Word of mouth is the best way to help this podcast grow.

Thanks again for listening.

Categories
Fear

257 – Face Your Fears

257 - Face Your Fears cover

Are you afraid to take risks? Do you continually play it safe? Are you living a life that is comfortable but unchallenging? Today I want to talk about how we can push ourselves to take more risks and live life more fully.

While we wait for life, life passes.

—Seneca

Our brains are always looking to keep us safe in any situation. It’s part of the reason why we have evolved as a species and why we are the dominant species on the planet. Because our brains catalog things that can cause us harm, we are able to avoid situations that would be detrimental to our safety, and we survive.

But survival is not the same thing as thriving. We might be able to feed ourselves, take care of our basic needs, but this is not the same thing as living a great life. A great life, to me, is one where we are able to take our skills, talents, and ambitions and live a life where we continually become better versions of ourselves. We use our talents to make the world a little better.

Purpose

People often wonder what the purpose of life is, and to be honest, I think the purpose of life is figure out what makes a good life for you, then live that. This is challenging because it takes a willingness to explore. It takes a willingness to be uncomfortable and try new things, and what makes a good life at one time in your life will be very different at another time in your life.

Fears

It can ruin your life only if it ruins your character. Otherwise it cannot harm you — inside or out.

— Marcus Aurelius

So what is it that holds us back from taking more risks in our lives?

Simply put, it’s fear.

There are lots of fears that hold is back from doing what we really want.

There’s the fear of rejection of others including family, friends, and society. Being accepted in our peer group or community is something that we all want, and doing things that might bring down the judgment of others or could get us ostracized can be incredibly scary.

There’s fear of failure, that if we try something that we’re not good at that we could fail and be embarrassed by that failure. We may also feel like we have wasted time when we put energy into something but still fail at it.

Fear of change. When things stay as they are then we feel comfortable and we know what to expect. When we step up to try something new and different, things will change. We may disrupt the way our lives are going, and even if we know in the end it will be better, change is uncomfortable.

Fear of loss of security. Often we are afraid to take risks because we don’t want to be financially insecure. Sometimes the things that we want to pursue mean that we have to change careers or put up funding that may impact our finances.

But with all of these different fears, there is just one thing in common. Each of them is created by a thought in our mind. Fear is generated because we are afraid of something uncomfortable. Whether that’s the disapproval of others or having to live a more meager lifestyle while we pursue what we really want, these are just emotions attached to thoughts based on our perspective. What others think of us can really cause no harm. We can really get by on far less than we are used to if that’s what it takes for us to pursue our dreams.

Back Up Plan

Set aside a certain number of days during which you shall be content with the scantiest and cheapest fare, with coarse and rough dress, saying to yourself the while, “Is this the condition that I feared?”

—Seneca

A good example of giving into fear is that many of us, and I include myself in this group, end up following our back up plan. We give in to our fears and we decide that rather than pursue our dreams and desires, we do something that’s safe. In my case, I got a degree in business and ended up in software development. Now don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with being in software and I haven’t had a terrible life from it, but it’s far from acting or singing or writing music which is what I really wanted to do when I graduated from high school.

And the thing is, most of us end up spending just as much time and energy on our back up plans as we would have needed to make our original plans work. I spent just as much time behind the computer as I would have spent running lines or auditioning for musicals if I’d had the courage to follow the path I really wanted.

I’m sure that if you looked at areas where you have shied away from and not taken risks, you’ll find that if you had put in the same amount of energy as you do your day job, you’d probably be quite successful at it.

Memento Mori

You are scared of dying—and, tell me, is the kind of life you lead really any different than being dead?

— Seneca

So how can stoicism help you get better at tasking risks?

The stoics are very big about reminding us of our own mortality. I mean we’re all going to die and that’s something that we all have to accept. Once do accept that, and accept the fact that you could leave life at any moment, you realize that since you only have one life , do your best to live the best life you can. Live the life that you want to live, and not the life that other people what you to live.

Another way to put this in perspective is that do you think anyone is going to remember what you did in 100 years? In 50 years? Probably not. There will come a time in the future where no one will know who you were or what you did. All your contributions, all your pain and suffering will just be things in that past as if they never existed.

And that’s great and sad at the same time. Everything we do is futile but at the same time, doing good things and how we do everything matters. So if you’re going to spend your life doing something that will be gone in the not so distant future, make sure that it’s something futile that you want to do.

Want to do stand up comedy? Get in front of your best friend and try some material out. Then find an open mic. Just start doing it. It won’t matter anyway if no one laughs at your jokes. Over time you’ll make it work.

Want to ask someone out but afraid they might reject you? You’re no worse off than you are now, so just do it.

Want to be a musician? Practice. Then download Garage Band or Audacity and record your stuff and put it on Soundcloud. You’ll find others that like your vibe.

You are here to explore and live a life that is full of joy. You do this by stepping up and trying things. We are better off as a world if you are putting things into the world that bring you joy, because there is a good chance that they will bring someone else joy.

All these things that you are afraid of, everything that stresses you out, when you die, those things will be gone. So none of it really matters. Is that nihilistic? I don’t think so. It’s just a simple recognition of the value of these things by adjusting your perspective. All of these things that you think are so important, are really not in a long enough time line.

Courage

Why does he smile when misfortune strikes? He knows it is an opportunity to cultivate virtue. Death, loss, decline. These things come for us all. Facing pain is how we make ready. Adversity sharpens the blade of will. Greet the test gladly. Endure.

—@TheStoicEmperor (twitter)

One of the four stoic virtues, and to me the most important, is that of courage. For me, courage is the key to living a good life. It is the virtue that underpins everything that helps us live a life we are proud of, and to make changes in our lives. Courage is the key to awareness of ourselves in that it helps us to see ourselves as we truly are. Courage is what helps us make that hard choices, to have the hard conversations, and to persevere when things seem bleak.

Courage doesn’t mean that you have to go cliff diving or put yourself in extreme danger. Courage is simply facing up to the things that scare you, looking at why they scare you, and doing them anyway. The more comfortable you get with facing up to small things with courage and resolve, the easier it gets to face up to the bigger fears in your life. Every time you step up and make a courageous choice, you become more virtuous.

Conclusion

So what are some areas in your life where you are afraid? What are some things you want to do in your life but are unwilling to take the risks? What’s on your bucket list that you keep putting off? Learning to take more risks in your life something that you can get better at, one small fear at a time. Taking more risks is also part of what makes life much more fulfilling and exciting, because in the end, it doesn’t really matter. And that’s a good thing.

Hello friends! Thank you for listening. Stop by the website at stoic.coffee where you can sign up for our newsletter, and buy some great looking shirts and hoodies at the Stoic Coffee Shop.

Want to help support this podcast? Become a patron on patreon!

Like the theme song? You can find it here from my alter ego. 🙂

Find me on instagram or twitter.

Lastly if you know of someone that would benefit from or appreciate this podcast, please share it. Word of mouth is the best way to help this podcast grow.

Thanks again for listening.

Categories
Coffee Break

256 – Developing Optimism

256 - Developing Optimism cover

Are you a pessimist? Do you see the glass as half empty? Do you often get depressed when you think about the state of the world? Today I want to talk about how stoicism can help make you an optimist.

Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.

— Marcus Aurelius

Have you ever noticed how most of the movies about the future of mankind are usually post-apocalyptic? Meaning that they are generally about the end of the world, or at least the world as we know it. It’s easy to think about how things can go wrong. It’s easy to think about the things that can go wrong because there are more things that can go wrong than can go right. Being a pessimist is easy.

On the other hand, finding the way that things can go right takes perseverance and dedication. It takes a willingness to believe that things can go right. It takes effort. Working in software and working on complex interdependent systems, one of the things that most developers would agree on is the fact that getting things to work properly is hard. Breaking things is easy. Things not working is far easier than getting things to work the way that we want them to.

So the reason I brought this up is that often when we think about the future, we tend to take a dark view of where things are heading, and I think that it’s easy to develop a pessimistic view of where humanity is heading. I know that I have a tendency to do this, and I want to change my perspective because I think that it would serve me better for my daily happiness, and help me to make choices and take actions that could be more beneficial in the areas where I do have influence.

A few weeks ago I was listening to a podcast with Kevin Kelly. Now Kevin Kelly, among many other things, is the founder of Wired magazine, and has lived quite an interesting life. Rather than going off to college after high school, he wandered around Asia for 10 years. He’s written a sprawling sci-fi graphic novel, a book about vanishing cultures in China, and started the Long Now Society which is focused on developing long term policy for survival of the human race. Most recently he released a book that was all about the lessons he wished he’d known when he was younger.

But even with all this impressive stuff on his resume, there was something he said that really stuck with me. He talked about the fact that even with all the doom and gloom and challenges that are facing in the world, that he’s still very optimistic about the future. He said he wasn’t naive or blind to the challenges we face, but that he deliberately chooses to be an optimist. He said that it helps to make his every day life better, and that we as a society need people in this world that keep driving us forward with a better vision of the world.

He said that a big part of why he is an optimist is that we have as a species created lots of improbable things. The fact that we have created so many complex things that actually work is due to optimism. Complex things are improbable, meaning that complex things are more likely not to work, and the fact that we make them work and work well is pretty incredible. It says a lot for us as a species. It means that we can work together to create some pretty amazing stuff that makes life better for a large numbers of people.

He went on to make the argument that life is always going to have challenges and that there is simply no way to have a perfect world. Utopia is something that never will be possible. He framed his idea as “protopioa” which he defines as a culture where we recognize that life is full of challenges and that often there are trade offs for the solutions that we come up with. Often time those solutions create even more challenges, but even so, they are still worth it because the open up more options.

So why do I bring up all these things and how does stoicism fit in to all of this?

For me, this is a clear example of how choosing your perspective on life can make all the difference in the world. Because he specifically decides to view life through an optimistic lens, Kevin is able to see things in a way that supports his world view. He looks at the world around him, and find evidence that there are reasons to be optimistic, in spite of the challenges ahead.

It gave me pause. I started to think about if I would classify myself as an optimist or a pessimist. I realized that I’m clearly on the pessimistic side of the line, and that’s something that I would like to change. I know that much of it for me comes from my past and far too often I assume the worst will happen as a safety mechanism. If the worst happens, then I’m prepared for it.

So I started thinking about how I could work on changing that because I’d rather be hopeful about life and about humanity. Seeing the down side to everything leads you to that direction and you start seeing everything through that lens. I think it’s too easy to get lost in the dark.

So how does one develop a more optimistic outlook on life using stoic principles?

I think a lot of it comes with being able to reframe how you view the world. I think it also comes down to being aware of your thoughts, and making active choices to change how you want to view the world. It means that you choose to be an optimist, and for me there are a few principles that can help us be more optimistic.

Control

Stoicism focuses a lot on what we have control over, which allows us to actually have an impact on our lives. When we find ourselves in a challenging situation, when we can clearly delineate what is within our control and what is not, we can focus on what is within our power. This gives us control over some aspects of our life.

Epictetus makes it pretty clear that the only things that we really have control over are our thoughts, choices, and actions. In short, our will. We can choose what thoughts we think. We can make choices that are more beneficial for us and those around us. We may not be able to control the circumstances that we find ourselves in, but we can take actions that will help us in the long run.

For example, let’s say that you had some health issues and your doctor prescribed a diet that would help take care of those issue. In this case, you don’t have the power to just tell your body to heal itself. What you do have power over is how strictly you adhere to the diet that your doctor prescribed.

Responsibility

Related to control, we can take responsibility for our lives. When we own up to our choices and actions, we have the ability to shape our future. We refuse to blame others for the outcomes of our choices. The more responsibility we take, the more power we have in our lives. We make it so that we aren’t helpless.

When things happen that are out of our control, we step up and take responsibility for doing what we can to improve things. We don’t focus on who is to blame, but rather, we recognize that it is our responsibility to make things better. We could sit around hoping or even demanding that someone else fix things for us, but we’re much more likely to get what we want if we take responsibility for our own happiness.

When we stop up and take responsibility for ourselves and practice self control, the better we are able to handle future situations that might be even more challenging. Every time we step up, take responsibility and stretch ourselves to handle things outside of our comfort zone, the better we are able to handle harder and harder situations. But until we are able to step up and take responsibility, we will continually blame things outside of ourselves for why we’re unhappy and things aren’t going our way.

Change

The only constant in life is change. Embrace it, adapt to it, and let it transform you for the better.

— Epictetus

The stoics recognize that life is constantly changing and that we need to embrace change. The harder we resist changes in our life, that harder we make things for ourselves. When we see change and challenges as opportunities, we are able to embrace change with a sense of optimism that we’ll come out better on the other side.

Another aspect to consider and one that came to mind as I was listening to the podcast is to look at the challenges ahead as something that will give us ample opportunity to grow, then we will have to rise to the occasion to meet them. We will have to push ourselves, to expand our thinking of what’s possible, and find ways to work together in ways that we had never considered before. If we’re never challenged then we never really find out how good we can get. If we simply do the same easy things, then we never grow. We want those greater and greater challenges so that we can grow to be even better.

Gratitude

He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.

— Socrates

The stoics teach us to be grateful and content with the things that we have. When we can be content with what have, then we don’t have to be continually striving for more in order to be happy. Now this may seem like a paradox, and it is. We need to be content with what we have, but always be looking to grow and move forward. We find in joy with appreciating what we have, and yet look forward to what’s ahead.

I think this is a profound lesson. If we can’t be happy and content with what we currently have, then when we get what we think we want, we still won’t be content and happy. By learning to want what we already have, we can be happy about things that already there. It’s an easy want to increase your happiness just by shifting your perspective, and is something that you can do at any moment.

Gratitude also helps us keep an open mind about things. I find that when I’m in a negative headspace that it is much harder to see that there are a lot more options to solving the problems that I’m dealing with. Gratitude and positivity is a choice, and it’s one that helps us widen our field of view rather than diminishing it.

Conclusion

So, are there areas in your life where you are take a dark view of things? Are there situations where you can reframe how you view things so that you see the good in even the darkest of situations? As with most aspects of stoicism, I think it’s important that we find a balance of being realistic, but also choosing how we want to view things. I don’t think we need to be naive about things and not see things as they are, but rather we can see things as they are and still choose to look at things through a more optimistic lens, and do our best to make a better future.

Hello friends! Thank you for listening. Stop by the website at stoic.coffee where you can sign up for our newsletter, and buy some great looking shirts and hoodies at the Stoic Coffee Shop.

Want to help support this podcast? Become a patron on patreon!

Like the theme song? You can find it here from my alter ego. 🙂

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Categories
Anger

255 – The WISER Model

255 - The WISER Model cover

How well do you manage your emotions? Do you feel like you’re on top of things or do you feel like you let situations get under your skin? Today I want to talk about a model I came across that can be a useful tool for managing your emotions, and handling situations like a stoic.

"Anger, if not restrained, is frequently more hurtful to us than the injury that provokes it."

— Seneca

The Harvard Study of Adult Development, is a longitudinal study that was started in 1938. Researchers followed the same cohort for more than eighty years to gather information about quality of life. Every few years the participants were interview and subjected to a physical to track both mental and physical health.

The Good Life, a book by Robert Waldinger & Marc Schulz based on the data from the Harvard study, and were able two important conclusions:

First, was that those who handled the emotions better by facing them head on and not trying to repress or ignore them, generally reported a higher quality of life and better memories of the past.

Second, it is incredibly challenging for people to change their emotional responses. They found that it didn’t come down to willpower or intelligence, but rather their awareness of their coping patterns.

In studying those that managed their emotions in a healthy fashion, they found that there was a similar pattern amongst them. They call this the WISER model, and I’m going to explain it here.

Watch

When a strong emotion comes along, the first thing we need to do is engage our awareness. Usually our first reaction is based on an impulse and not a clear understanding of the full situation. When we give ourselves some space to get curious and just observe what’s going on, and see how we’re feeling, we can get a fuller picture of what’s really happening.

Waldinger and Schulz write, “Thoughtful observation can round out our initial impressions, expand our view of a situation, and press the pause button to prevent a potentially harmful reflexive response.”

Interpret

"It is not events that disturb people, it is their judgments concerning them."

— Epictetus

Once we have some more information, we need to interpret what we learned from observation. Often, situations are ambiguous and we jump to all sorts of conclusions. By asking what assumptions we made about the situation, we can quickly see were we misinterpreted what someone said or meant, or see what meaning we gave to something.

Select

The Select stage is where we make a choice of what we want to do about the situation. This step should be a thoughtful and deliberate choice, and not reactive or impulsive. This is where we try to slow things down so that we can make choices that are inline with our values, and that have a better long term outcome.

"The key,” according to Waldinger and Schulz, “is to try to slow things down where you can, zoom in, and move from a fully automatic response to a more considered and purposeful response that aligns with who you are and what you are seeking to accomplish.”

Engage

Once you have made a choice, it’s time to put it into action. This part is can be challenging because it may mean that you have put yourself in an uncomfortable but necessary situation. But if you have taken the time to make a deliberate choice, this will be easier to do than if you are acting reflexively and will have better outcome than just ignoring the situation.

Reflect

"The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control."

— Epictetus

The last step is to reflect on how things went. Did our plan work out as expected? Why or why not? What could we have done that might have been more effective? Taking the time to think about how things went helps inform us of how we can better handle things in the future. Even if we handle a situation well, this is a good step to take because it helps us to reinforce our good choices, as well as find even more room for improvement.

Conclusion

Dealing with strong emotions in the heat of the moment is not easy, and is something that we all need to work on. For me, I really like having an acronym that helps me walk through a useful process. When we’re struggling in the moment, it’s always helpful to have another tool at the ready. So go out and be a little Wiser.

Hello friends! Thank you for listening. Stop by the website at stoic.coffee where you can sign up for our newsletter, and buy some great looking shirts and hoodies at the Stoic Coffee Shop.

Want to help support this podcast? Become a patron on patreon!

Like the theme song? You can find it here from my alter ego. 🙂

Find me on instagram or twitter.

Lastly if you know of someone that would benefit from or appreciate this podcast, please share it. Word of mouth is the best way to help this podcast grow.

Thanks again for listening.