Stoicism for a Better Life – Weekly exercise (June 27, 2021)

Hello there,

This week’s exercise is about Hopes and Dreams, Fear and Anxieties, and I will start with some words from the Moral Letters of Seneca V 7-8:

“Hecato says, ‘cease to hope and you will cease to fear’… The primary cause of both these ills is that instead of adapting ourselves to present circumstances, we send our thoughts too far ahead.”

In our common lore, hope is generally regarded as good. Fear is generally regarded as bad. Our school teaches us, however, that they are BOTH the same and BOTH very dangerous. Hope or fear…they are basically false projections into the future about a sequence of events we do not control. Both are the enemy of this present moment that you are actually in. Both mean you’re living a life in opposition to amor fati.

If you’ve ever made an emotional decision (I’m sure none of us have ever right?) then you know fear, anxiety…basically emotions in general make for a very bad advisor. And if we are trying to live a life of virtue, one that is driven by rational decisions in the present moment, then clearly this goes against our objective.

So as a practical exercise this week write about your views on fear and hope. See if you can write out why they are different. If you write rationally and long enough, you will find that they are identical as far as our primary objectives are concerned: To work towards the betterment of humanity and be the best version of ourselves we can be in the moment.

Remember that the exercise is not about overcoming our fears, but understanding that both hope and fear contain a dangerous amount of want and worry in them. Want not, need not,….well you get the rest. 

Happy meditations my friends. Make sure to take some time to write about this. It will help you gain control over your own domain and faculties (it will help you be more grounded and present!)

Anderson Silver (Stoicism for a Better Life)