On being a stoic and friendship

   

                                                                 

                                  

I have been reading books I believed to bring me better knowledge about living well and being wise for a long time now. I am not sure where the compulsion came from. I did not copy anyone here, it was my own idea. Maybe it was because books were good friends from a very early age? Being not all that confident (thanks God for that) I wanted to be guided by somebody cleverer than myself? People around were not well suited to do that. So, I went to books for my answers. And it stayed that way even if I met many clever people in my travels and some gave me better ideas than my own. Books are still the best source of wisdom for me.

I read Kierkegaard and Fromm… The choice was coincidental as in Poland books were a hot commodity and were sold out fast most of the time one could not buy what one wanted.  No Booktopia at those times. After Kierkegaard I became to worry about life, it was on a depressing side. So when, much later, I discovered stoics, I thought that this is something for me.  It stayed that way. I read some stoic books from time to time to learn from them how to live. The stoic philosophy and books got me through the hard hospital times and they are still of great value in the recovery times. One of my friends got me to practice being a stoic in a structured way and after initial resistance to include readings of The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday into my rather sloppy morning routine, I am actually doing it. Recently the same friend suggested and it was a strong suggestion, I must say, that I enroll on a Stoic Week that was just about to start. I do not respond well to strong suggestions, but I respect my friend’s judgement so I thought, yes, I will give it a go. I have enrolled and I am very glad I did. Firstly, the questionnaire results showed that all that reading gave good results and I scored 445 points out of 539 which makes me a fair dink-um stoic. Hmm… Have I cheated? This would not be a stoic way at all. I also turned out to be classified as satisfied with life. Hmm… again.

OK, so this makes me feel good about myself if not a little surprised and pondering about the value of such tests. But what is more important and what I realised reading the material, that is supplied by the organisers of the program, is what my major learning area will be this week. The stoics identify wisdom, justice, self-control and courage as the most important virtues one should work on to acquire. The area with the biggest need to work on for me is self-control. Will I manage to spend my time better, go for walks, exercise, read in longer stretches of time, listen less to Polish politics, play fewer computer games, eat well and not much? I think that I may at least improve a bit.

                                                     

                               

What surprised me a little and made me feel lighter was some depreciation of friendship and family life. Not that they are not important but they are not critical for feeling happy. According to stoics, that is. This should have been clear to me before as the stoic teaching is that we should not worry about things we do not have influence on. Like being pretty or healthy. It is obvious to me now that the friends and family are important and valuable but this is not always I can influence such relationships to what I would like it to be. And I still can be happy even if the best friend becomes a considerable source of grief.

I think I have done my today’s middle of the day meditation prescribed by the Stoic Week by writing this post. Now, that I have done my physical exercises I will continue to work on my virtues and inner strength. Wow, if I continue like that I will soon walk on water.