PERENNIAL 110
How to Be Free — Like Epictetus
An Ancient Guide to Stoic Wisdom
How would you define freedom?
Is your definition of freedom similar to that of the Stoic philosopher Epictetus?
The first lesson of the Encheiridion, Epictetus’s guide to Stoicism, insists that everything that is truly our own doing is naturally free, unimpeded, and unconstrained. In the short book How to Be Free, the translator and philosopher A.A. Long explains the Stoic idea of freedom.
Long writes that freedom, according to the Stoics, is neither legal status nor opportunity to move around at liberty. It is the mental orientation of being impervious to frustration or disappointment because their wants and decisions depend on themselves and involve nothing that they cannot deliver to themselves.
Would you describe yourself as being free from a Stoic perspective?
Epictetus taught his students,
Our master is anyone who has the power to implement or prevent the things that we want or don’t want. Whoever wants to be free, therefore, should wish for nothing or avoid nothing that is up to other people. Failing that, one is bound to be a slave.
Epictetus’s idea of being free sets a high bar. However, one must remember that the path to peace is worth the effort. “If you wish peace and contentment,” observed Epictetus, “release your attachment to all things outside your control. This is the path of freedom and happiness.”
What is Up to Us?
Epictetus’s students learned these types of lessons on day one of class. The opening passage of the Enchiridion advises,
Some things in the world are up to us, while others are not. Up to us are our faculties of judgment, motivation, desire, and aversion — in short, everything that is our own doing. Not up to us are our body and property, our reputations, and our official positions — in short, everything that is not our own doing. Moreover, the things up to us are naturally free, unimpeded, and unconstrained, while the things not up to us are powerless, servile, impeded, and not our own.
Epictetus continues: “Keep this in mind then: if you think things naturally servile are free and that things not our own are ours, you will be frustrated, pained, and troubled, and you will find fault with gods and men. But if you think you own only what is yours and that you do not own what is not yours, as you really don’t, no one will ever put pressure on you, and no one will impede you, you will not reproach anyone, you will not blame anyone, you will not do a single thing reluctantly…” […]
The eternal lesson is that freedom comes only when we have trained ourselves to want only what is truly good through understanding our human nature and the nature of the universe. It is a freedom we can only give ourselves, and no one can take from us. If this is something you’ve heard or read many times, thinking about it in new ways or from different perspectives could be helpful.
For example, Seneca connects being free to happiness. He wrote to Lucilius, “The happy life is to have a free, lofty, fearless and steadfast mind — a mind that is placed beyond the reach of fear, beyond the reach of desire, that counts virtue the only good.”
Now, I imagine we might all agree that what has been said thus far could be placed in the vast category of easier said (and written) than done. Therefore, let us attempt to discuss a few specific strategies for being free.
How to Be Free
Epictetus admits that one has to be highly motivated to achieve such great goals. He says we will have to forego some things entirely and postpone others for the present.
But if we do wish to embark on the path to being free,
Right now, then, make it your habit to tell every jarring thought or impression: “You are just an appearance and in no way the real thing.” Next, examine it and test it by these rules that you have. First and foremost: does it involve the things up to us, or the things not up to us? And if it involves one of the things not up to us, have the following response to hand: “Not my business.”
Here is where it gets sticky; once we realize this is “not my business,” we still want it to be within our control. In his short book, A Field Guide to a Happy Life, philosopher Massimo Pigliucci (a previous podcast guest) explains, “We tend to desire (and have an aversion to) the wrong things, and this is a major cause of our unhappiness.”
Epictetus outlines several essential insights on training our desires and aversion. Here are three examples,
- Remember that following desire promises the attainment of that of which you are desirous, and aversion promises the avoiding that to which you are averse. However, he who fails to obtain the object of his desire is disappointed, and he who incurs the object of his aversion is wretched.
- Regarding whatever objects give you delight, are useful, or are deeply loved, remember to tell yourself what general nature they are, beginning from the most insignificant things. If, for example, you are fond of a specific ceramic cup, remind yourself that it is only ceramic cups in general of which you are fond. Then, if it breaks, you will not be disturbed. […]
- You are not disturbed by things but by the principles and notions they form concerning things. … When, therefore, we are hindered, disturbed, or grieved, let us never attribute it to others but to ourselves; that is, to our own principles.
One of the biggest challenges of any practice is remembering. Pigliucci suggests that we remind ourselves by way of a short mantra. And remember that just like anything else, training our desires and aversions requires practice (often lots of it). Probably put best by the Stoic philosopher Musonius Rufus (Epictetus’s teacher), “The person who claims to be studying philosophy must practice it even more diligently than the person who aspires to the art of medicine or some similar skill since philosophy is more important and harder to grasp than any other pursuit.”
Thank you for reading; I hope you found something useful.
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