Epictetus: The Calm Switch

Keeping Calm When the World Seems to Bait You

“In the case of things that delight you, benefit you, or to which you have grown attached, remind yourself of what they are. If it is a piece of china you like, for instance, say, ‘I am fond of a piece of china’. When it breaks, then you won’t be as disconcerted.” Painting: Francisco de Zurbarán, Still Life, 1650. (source: Wikipedia)

Every day we meet frustrations.

Things often don’t go our way. The news is bad. We get annoyed or sad that the world isn’t bending to our will. We attempt to exert more control and our expectation that things will go well never diminishes. And yet we find ourselves time and again with the same frustrations.

How do we break this cycle?

The first-century Stoic philosopher Epictetus starts from a simple question: what is out of our control?

It’s always a surprise to understand just how much is out of our ultimate control. The philosopher strips away all that isn’t “us” until he’s left with “the will”, the reasoning self under the skin.

When we understand just how little is in our control, we can take solace in the fact that it is the way we take in the world that is in our full control. It’s the self that takes in the world — all the impressions of what is going on around and within us. It’s therefore the self that’s in control of how we feel about it.

While we are never fully in control of what happens to us, we are in control of how we respond. “It is not events that disturb people,” Epictetus taught, “it is their judgements concerning them.” We know this deep down, yet we…