Practice like a Stoic: 46, Pause when angry

Remember: don’t leave home without your helmet…

Socrates walking with friends while wearing a helmet, by Midjourney.

[This series of posts is based on A Handbook for New Stoics—How to Thrive in a World out of Your Control, co-authored by yours truly and Greg Lopez. It is a collection of 52 exercises, which we propose reader try out one per week during a whole year, to actually live like a Stoic. In Europe/UK the book is published by Rider under the title Live Like A Stoic.Below is this week’s prompt and a brief explanation of the pertinent philosophical background. Check the book for details on how to practice the exercise, download the exercise forms from The Experiment’s website, and comment below on how things are going. Greg and/or I will try our best to help out! This week’s exercise is found at pp. 268-269 of the paperback edition.]

“Remember that foul words or blows in themselves are no outrage, but your judgment that they are so. So when any one makes you angry, know that it is your own thought that has angered you. Wherefore make it your first endeavor not to let your impressions carry you away. For if once you gain time and delay, you will find it easier to control yourself.” (Epictetus, Enchiridion, 20)

“The Discipline of Assent builds on and refines the other two, in particular the Discipline of Desire. When Epictetus says that an insult itself isn’t an outrage but your angry reaction to it is, he is applying the Discipline of Desire, which uses the virtue of practical wisdom—the one that tells us what is truly good and truly bad for us. Insults appear to be truly bad, but they are not. Righteous anger in response to insults appears to be truly good, but it isn’t.