I wouldn’t call myself a student of philosophy because I didn’t see much of a need to keep looking once I found Stoicism. The philosophy of Stoicism has been a significant contribution to my peace of mind.
I would compare finding Stoicism with finding out how well I could drive a nail with a hammer. It was the perfect tool for the job of improving the quality of my mind and growing my emotional intelligence. That is, my ability to identify, understand, and manage my own emotions, as well as understand and navigate the emotions of those around me.
The ancient philosophy of Stoicism is full of advice, points, and perspectives that closely mirror the modern focus on emotional intelligence that is so popular and so helpful today. Here are just some of the overlapping practices:
1. The importance of the pause.
The goal of Stoicism is to achieve eudaimonia, often translated to mean “happiness” or “human flourishing.” And the cornerstone of this practice, according to Stoicism, is to live Virtuously. Virtue itself is composed of the four qualities of Wisdom, Courage, Justice, and Moderation.
So how does this all relate to emotional intelligence? Well, sometimes we experience an event, have a flash of emotion, and make a bad choice that does not align with Virtue. I, for example, used to have significant anger and rage issues, and I would eventually learn that there is power in the “pause.” That is, when an event occurs, I don’t have to just react emotionally if I feel emotional about the situation. Instead, by using the power of the pause, I can stay silent, and I process what I’m feeling.
In that pause, I think about whether my feelings are valid and whether or not this is a reasonable reaction to the situation. If you’ve ever heard the advice to count to ten after you get angry to give yourself a little time to cool down so you don’t say anything unfortunate out of anger, that’s what this practice is. Pause and reflect before responding.
In the modern language of emotional intelligence, this is called self-regulation and is widely considered the cornerstone of emotionally intelligent behavior.
2. Separate facts from opinion.
The Stoics often emphasized the importance of remembering that events themselves are neutral, and our response to those events is what matters most. We cannot control what happens to us; we can only choose how we react to these events.
This is embodied in the Latin phrase Amor Fati, which means “love your fate” or “love of fate.”
Now, you don’t have to like what happens to you. You don’t have to like something to practice love. Terrible things happen to innocent people every day for no reason at all. That is, unfortunately, just the way life goes. However, when terrible things happen, can you embrace them? Can you welcome and love them?
Consider a traumatic experience. No one is suggesting that you should just be okay with it. So, what does “loving your fate” look like when something awful happens? Well, it looks like acceptance. It’s saying, “This happened to me, now I’m going to take the steps to address it,” instead of drowning yourself in denial, hiding behind unhealthy coping mechanisms, and avoiding it.
In the modern realm of emotional intelligence, this maps closely to self-awareness — the ability to assess situations and our responses to them, accurately.
3. Examine your emotions to name them.
Stoics are often misinterpreted as being emotionless or striving to be completely emotionless. Author of “How to Think Like a Roman Emperor,” Donald Robertson informs us that is incorrect, and it’s because people conflate uppercase “S” Stoicism with being lowercase “s” stoic.
Instead, Stoicism and its followers strive to not react emotionally to the events that happen to us. We are still fully capable of and often experience other emotions.
When we practice Stoicism, as opposed to being stoic, we seek to understand what we’re feeling to determine whether or not our response will be rational. For example, let’s say a friend stole $100 from you. You would rightfully be angry about that, but “angry” isn’t really a helpful word. “Anger” is such a broad term because it is a generic way to express any kind of passionate displeasure.
Can you address “anger” itself? No, you have to find the roots of the anger. What am I actually feeling? I’m feeling betrayed. My trust has been broken. I feel stupid for trusting someone who was dishonest. Is this a me problem? Did I leave myself vulnerable?
Now, with that information, you can more reasonably find a way to resolve the anger. Even if the friend gives the money back, the action can’t be undone, and other emotions will linger. In the field of emotional intelligence, this approach is similar to what psychologists call emotional granularity. That is, to understand with precision what you are feeling and why you’re feeling what you do.
4. Focus on what you can control.
A focus on what you can control and discarding the rest is probably the most famous Stoic belief that’s reached the mainstream.
What can I control? My effort, my character, and my choices. That’s it. I can control nothing else in this world. And when you pair that with Virtue (remember that’s made up of Justice, Courage, Wisdom, and Moderation), it can be life-changing.
Let’s frame this in the context of this article you’re reading, right now. I can use my skill and knowledge with my craft to communicate to you the modern and ancient similarities and how they’ve improved my life. The work I put into knowing my craft, the subject matter, and how I communicate it is all within my control.
However, I cannot control how you, the reader, will receive this. I cannot control your opinion of my work, or the perceptions you have of me because of it. Would I be happy if you did take something away from this? Absolutely! But I can’t control that, so I don’t think about it much. In Stoicism, we call that a “preferred indifferent.”
I would prefer that you liked the work, but if you don’t, well, maybe I’m just not for you – and that’s okay! This requires both self-awareness and self-regulation, two of the major tenets of emotional intelligence.
5. Try to step into another person’s perspective before judging.
I’ve done a lot of wrong things in my life. One of the most interesting parts of my recovery, for me, was realizing how much of what I did wasn’t out of pure maliciousness. It was because I was struggling with severe Bipolar Disorder, depression, trauma, and autism.
I acted and reacted badly to a lot of situations because my mind was chaos. I was impulsive, angry, and my moral compass doesn’t always point north.
Now, when someone else does something wrong, I no longer immediately jump to, “Oh, that person is just a bad person.” Because I don’t know what that person has going on in their life to cause them to act that way.
All I can do is choose how to react to it. That is within my control.
That does not excuse bad or malicious behavior. Just because I’m aware you might be struggling doesn’t give you permission to act badly. It just means I’m less likely to be overly harsh or judgmental about your character versus your actions, whereas other people might just think, “Oh, he’s just a bad person.”
In the realm of emotional intelligence and modern psychology, this is what’s described as having empathy. And crucially, it can be learned.
6. Consider your challenges in advance to prepare for them.
This is not to be confused with anticipatory anxiety. Instead, when we are faced with an important event, it’s helpful to productively consider the worst-case scenarios ahead of time. That way, you can emotionally prepare for things like losing your job, a relationship ending, or an important conversation going badly. Remember, the goal of Stoicism is not emotional suppression; it’s emotional responsibility.
By doing this, when the worst does occur, you’ve already thought about it and have a bit of an idea of what to do about it. Now, remember, one of the Virtues is Moderation, and that’s where this practice departs from anticipatory anxiety. Because anticipatory anxiety will just have you going in circles over and over again. That is unproductive catastrophizing.
Instead, you think about the situation, think about how it could go wrong, create a loose plan for it, and then move forward. You cannot control what happens to you, only how you respond to it. In what we now call emotional intelligence, psychologists call this anticipatory coping.
In Closing…
I fully realized how much Stoicism had helped me improve my mental landscape when one day, I was having a great day. Then, I went outside, and I had a flat tire. Instead of immediate rage filling me like it would have done before, my mood didn’t falter at all. I couldn’t control that I had a flat tire. All I could control was my response to it. I then set about getting it taken care of and fixed.
Modern psychology, and emotional intelligence in particular, draws from these ancient practices a lot. In fact, the way I came to Stoicism is because I had a lot of success in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), because CBT was heavily inspired by Stoicism.
Stoicism is not emotional suppression, despite what many people believe; it is emotional responsibility and regulation.
