>Exercise: Sit in a comfortable chair, close your eyes, and, for 15 minutes, meditate on all the things you could lose: your job, your house, your savings, and so forth. Then brood about living in a homeless shelter.
really roughly this is what stoics do, yet somehow they come to the conclusion "actually, what was i fearing? Proceed with adventure"...
Those things never really scared me. Do they also meditate on being sick, in constant crippling pain and come to the same conclusion? I get a stomachache and recognize a bad personality change in myself. I dont imagine id be able to draw on the same mental skills while in that state for prolonged periods.
I think this is a better exercise. I stole it from Seneca.
Look at the back of your wrists: see those fragile greenish-blue veins?
What if tomorrow - while thinking about some problem with money or love - you trip and fall, and a particularly sharp rock on the ground or a shard of glass on the street cuts one of those thin exposed blue-green veins open?
What is the reaction you're "supposed" to get by thinking about that? I took a moment to think about it and I don't think I got it. My reaction was, "Well then I probably die", but I don't feel particularly different about the present.
If that's the thing I'm supposed to feel then so be it, but I feel Seneca intended for some greater profundity, or he would dispense with the mental theatrics. What am I missing? Does it need to be more visceral?
That life is absurd and fortune can bring death as easily as peace.
It’s my fault for not putting more time into my comment; it’s more about finding a scenario that scares you: since I also have no fear of poverty or sickness thinking about that does little for me.
An absurd death scares me so that’s ehy I used that, but if losing life doesn’t scare you, then maiming? Like you get hit by a self driving car and instead of losing your life, you lose both eyes, or both your arms, etc. You are also paralyzed now.
Now it’s very hard to kill yourself. Maybe impossible. But if your mind is still at peace, then you are truly wise, and you’ve made good use of your time in the world.
I would be a horrible and mean wretch if that calamity happened to me. I know I’m a mess, and I couldn’t face that future with any poise or grace.
This is the first time I've heard the quote, but I think it's to appreciate that life is short and could end at any time, and while bleeding out you'd realize that worrying about these long-term things was a waste of time.
That's not exactly the purpose Stoics do that AFAIK.
One of the objectives is to appreciate what you have right now and stopping this urge that we have in today's society to always get more.
If you stop and really think about how bad it would be to live without your eyesight, for example, you can appreciate even the smallest things we take for granted.
> Compare Greek καρπός (karpós, “fruit”) and κείρω (keírō, “to cut off”), English harvest, sharp, shear.
Carpe diem totally fits; You just have to consider that an optimum can be approached from two sides, ie the right time to harvest, neither too soon nor too late. In another sense it might mean the day is ripe, I guess. But it's not cape diem, not take the day away.
I fail to see that as highly positive though - with that attitude, I would stop exercising and invest all of my savings into cake and pizza. These things would make me happy each day, but miserable each month.
That’s part of it, but mostly, it’s about thinking if the worst thing that can happen and how would you deal with it: do you bleed out peacefully or crying?
We are always thinking nothing will happen to us, yet, we’ve all here have had problems, accidental or due to our own stupidity, that have already changed the course of our life for the worse.
Seneca says it’s worth thinking about that every day to find peace of mind.
I'm probably doing it wrong but the first thing I think of is "better do that on a busy street, hopefully there's someone that knows to bind off my wrist or something[0]"
Do I need to imagine that I'll bleed out alone, with everyone walking past me as if I don't exist?
Because 1. I don't like that exercise and 2. it mostly makes me consider to what extent I'm currently surrounding myself with people that dis-compassionate an whether I should move ...
3. does it matter that one of my wrists actually has a huge scar, that's grown with me from when I was 4 years old, jumped off a couch and smashed my tiny right wrist into a glass on the table? I managed to miss both my artery and my tendons, ... or I wouldn't be typing this :D
You’re not doing it wrong; perhaps you’re more worried about how others will treat you because you feel you’re lacking friendships?
Most, if not all, would watch you bleed out: its the bystander effect. See the Kitty Genovese murder. Are you bothered by this?
You could have died. I fell and hit a glass table too and now I have a scar right next to my eye, less than a finger width away.
I could have lost the eye but I don’t like to think about it either. There’s a lot of stories where I could have been maimed, and I do have injuries that have left me weaker.
From what I understand about suicide, no little crossways cut on those veins will ever kill you. You have to go up the arm and deep. Humans aren't that fragile really.
The buddhists do that and more. For example, recognizing the components of the body to such a degree that even when you see the most attractive person you may become entirely disgusted.
I think people are just different. To some, thinking through the worst case scenario is a way to face and overcome their fears. To others, it's a way of instilling fears.
I think the idea behind the exercise, from a Stoicism standpoint, is to mentally expose yourself to the fear of being homeless (or whatever about the exercise creates anxiety for you). Eventually you desensitize yourself to that feeling and begin to realize it wouldn't be as bad as you think.
This is also an aspect of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT).
Most homeless people are suffering from a cocktail of problems with abuse, mental illness and drugs. If you woke one one morning to find yourself on the street with ragged clothes and empty pockets in a foreign city, but you still had your wits about you, you likely wouldn't be there for long.
Most of them are in a better state then alone in a strange city, with nothing but the clothes on their back. They often have jobs, and may be living on couches or in a car, or have a bank account, or social support (Not enough to keep them in a home, but something.)
The homeless that are sleeping rough for 9 months tend to stay homeless. It is a horrible way to live, and it breaks you down really fast.
because they find a home. Think about how many people in the US are living hand-to-mouth, where any disruption can cause them to fall behind on rent. Those people make up the majority of people who have been homeless recently. They are homeless for the time it takes them to save up a deposit and find a place to live.
Being without a home sucks and is logistically annoying and aggravating to a significant degree. But a lot of the misery of most homeless people is due to the intractable personal problems that landed them there to begin with.
It does get compounded by social stigma. For me, the social stigma and the very real problems that caused was the worst part of being homeless for 5.7 years.
A lot of homeless people sleep in a tent. That's what I did. Some people do that for fun and call it camping.
Most of the homeless are couch surfing, living out of cars, etc. In one sharehouse I lived in, we had one guy on the couch and another in a tent in the back yard, both of whom were acquaintances going through a rough time. As far as worst cases go, while it would suck to have to sleep on someone's couch, it's honestly not that bad.
That's just an example, it's not about actually being homeless but about losing everything you have. It's not as bad as you think, and as long as you're healthy and free, you should be able to rebuild.
I find it more helpful to examine the fear of being homeless and judge it. If I found myself in that bad situation, would I actually be helpless, or would I find a way to overcome it? Evidence based on my past experience suggests that I'd overcome it; therefore the fear is invalid.
Most psychotherapy seems like a clinical, medicalized repackaging of wisdom that the ancients already had. (Which is most certainly not to disparage the value of psychotherapy!)
I don't get that impression from the stoics, this sudden 'hmmmph?' clarity that's almost amused at how silly oneself was being.
What I do get is that you can fear the worst and live in that fear to the point that it almost feels like you are experiencing what you fear every moment you are not experiencing it. And it either happens or it doesn't. And if it does, well, I don't know.
Someone or something fucked up somewhere, but I'm certainly not going to blame myself as though I am lord and master of all events that come to pass, seer of all future events and protector of all ills. Humans share that burden equally, and some feel it more than others. But I think like the stoics, like Zen, you can cultivate a sort of inner strength from that suffering.
That doesn't mean pursue suffering to be strong, no no no, not at all. It means you work with what you have. You have pain, use it. Use it to make someone else's life better. You have joy, enjoy it.
I'm not sure it's the right philosophy, or way of being, but it's the most clear and present thing I can muster when I feel my feelings. And I think stoicism reflects that. Deep sadness, old wounds, aching pains. Don't use it against yourself to worsen the hurt. If all you can be is neutral, be neutral. If all you can be is Zen, be Zen. If you can be happy, be happy. Don't take some old dead Greek dude's word for how to live your whole life. There are plenty of other Greek philosophers who spoke of happiness, to learn from too.
I spent three months traveling through Central America. You really quickly get used to a constant sense of danger — the water and food can kill you, the bugs can kill you, the roads can kill you, the police and gangs could kill you — hell even taking a hot shower there is tempting fate since they have electric heaters in the shower heads and basically no electrical safety standards to speak of.
You either have to cower in your hotel in fear or live life. I went hitchhiking in Nicaragua, sledded down a volcano, went cliff diving, etc — stuff i’d never do at home.
There’s something to be said for facing down your fear of death and acting in the face of it.
This just isn't true. They felt exactly the same as OP up until the moment they died. A sudden death is, by definition, something that can not be regretted.
> To that specific individual, it doesn't because they are dead.
I wasn't clear enough. The decisions one makes during their life are affected by whether or not they care about anything that happens after they are dead (any many specifics beyond that). Many people do things whose primary impact won't be felt until long after they are gone. So it isn't true to simply say that nothing matters after the individual is dead.
I'm sure some of them felt some amount of regret in the last, terrifying moments between when they realized that they were going to die and when they finally lost consciousness.
I had a sign: Act now or homelessness later. Choose.
Homeless shelters here are terrible TBH. I’d rather sleep rough. Living in a van for me is better than a house or apartment because:
- no rent, no mortgage
- no noisy neighbors sans the phony-“tough,” backwards-hat teenager act
- less space to fill it up whth $crap I don’t need
- always mobile
- able to leap tall buildings in a single bound
- dual burner stove and 20 kg propane tank
- all Burner, all the time
- no lawn to mow
- no bills but the basics
- it’s really quiet
- no neighbor from hell to gas you out smoking, using too much lighter-fluid and cooking with their BBQ right next to a fence below you and screaming/terrorizing/trying to intimidate everyone
- indoor nudist as long as I want
- volunteers of the blond varietal tested suspension for squeaks; needs more data
- able to monitor DIY blinker fluid meters closely
Exactly. Doing this, if anything, makes me incredibly grateful I haven’t lost those things. And at the same time realize that it wouldn’t be the end of the world.
I saw this documentary on cnbc about modern day slavery on fishing boats[1]. Ppl are promised jobs, entrapped and sold to shipping vessels as slaves where there are worked to death. When someone falls sick or dies from overwork they simply throw the body out in the ocean. I am still traumatized by this documentary, I can't imagine anything worse that could happen to a human being.
I can shop at whole foods that does the homework for me but what about Chinese masses that don't give a shit. Why do humans have to reproduce so much and at all costs. fucking sick!
By buying fish obtained this way, the consumers in the second paragraph economically empower the perpetrators of the first paragraph to continue, allegedly because of food demand created by overpopulation.
Not endorsing the argument, but there is a connection.
...and many of the rest were killed, because they were resisting, and/or to cow others who might have tried to resist.
You're missing the point: telling victims they're victiming wrong (literally, as in, "You're doing that wrong", which is so unbelievably much of this thread) is bullshit. It's especially so if you have no relevant experience on which to make that judgement, and that goes double if your likelihood of having that experience is structurally negligible. Hand-waving about how someone should handle something that has never — and, for practical purposes, will never — happen to you is ludicrous on its face.
> Anyway, perfectly ordinary slaveowner DiCaprio asks a rhetorical question, a fundamental question, that has occurred to every 7th grade white boy and about 10% of 7th grade white girls, and the profound question he asked was: "Why don't they just rise up?"
Kneel down, Quentin Tarantino is a genius. That question should properly come from the mouth of the German dentist: this isn't his country, he doesn't really have an instinctive feel for the system, so it's completely legitimate for a guy who doesn't know the score to ask this question, which is why 7th grade boys ask it; they themselves haven't yet felt the crushing weight of the system, so immediately you should ask, how early have girls been crushed that they don't think to ask this? But Tarantino puts this question in the mouth of the power, it is spoken by the very lips of that system; because of course the reason they don't rise up is that he-- that system-- taught them not to. When the system tells you what to do, you have no choice but to obey.
really roughly this is what stoics do, yet somehow they come to the conclusion "actually, what was i fearing? Proceed with adventure"...