My Stoic Thoughts: Day 5 of Stoic Week 2019

Stoic Week 2019

Friday, October 11th, 2019

Theme:  Emotions:  Values and the Passions

Our judgments of things harm us (and our relationships with others) more than the things themselves.  We are more to blame than what is outside ourselves, however it is best to accept things as they are, attributing no blame to self or others.  

As we work to cultivate virtue and the happy life our emotional life also changes.  We stop having ethically misguided and intrusive or conflicting emotions/passions and move toward “good emotions”.  Passions (not to be confused with passion as desire/interest in something) develop form the idea that indifferents are the key to a happy life and generate emotions such as fear, anxiety, anger, jealousy, etc. which are marked by intensity, inner conflict, and instability.  Good emotions are based on sound ethical judgments and marked by a calmer and more stable consistent pattern of feelings.

Stoic believe there are three main “good emotions” (which have subdivisions) that are focused on developing the virtues:

• Wishing – directed at gaining what is genuinely good (virtue) rather than desire/craving for indifferents.
• Caution – directed at avoiding what is bad (vice or defective character) rather than fear of losing indifferents.
•  Joy – delight directed at what is good (virtue or happiness in self and others) rather than misguided pleasure in something trivial or malicious.

Good emotions are a result of virtue and not an objective goal in their own right.  They might be thought of as feelings reacting to stimuli (our acts of virtue or thoughts) that are a “happy accident.”  Emotions/passions are the result of our judgements and actions where the good ones focus on virtuous actions and wise judgement.

Stoics also recognized wise forms of erotic love and affction for family and friends in addition to the three main good emotions and their subdivisions.  (I’ll have to look into this more!).

(This is a summary of my thoughts inspired by prompts during Stoic Week and do not fully encompass everything on Stoic emotions.  I’m still learning in the area as well so I highly encourage you to learn more, leave comments, and add to this conversation!)