Stoicism: The First Self Help Philosophy is Still The Best

Join us as we dive deep into the ancient Greco-Roman philosophy of Stoicism. We explore its origins with key figures like Zeno of Citium, Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius. Learn how Stoicism's principles—focusing on inner virtue, emotional resilience, and harmony with the natural order—remain relevant in the modern world. We discuss how Stoicism differentiates from and complements our own philosophies, such as Pragmatism and Technopuritanism. Get insights on practical applications of Stoic principles and their metaphysical underpinnings, challenging irrational beliefs, and tackling real-life decisions with wisdom, courage, justice, and self-control.

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Malcolm Collins: Hello, Simone. Today, we are going to be talking about stoicism. We are going to be doing an overview of the philosophy of stoicism, investigating how it relates to the modern world, and where it differentiates from our own philosophy and belief system which I see as, as we go into stoicism, you're going to see that they are highly related to each other.

And if Anything you could see our larger philosophy as just building on the Stoic philosophy. Really? Wow. To why we are doing this YouTube told us to. We've been trying to figure out how to grow the channel and YouTube was like, your audience would like to hear about Stoicism. And so I'm like, well, dang, let's go into it.

Stoicism is an ancient Greco Roman philosophy that originated in the 3rd century BCE with Zeno of Citium and and was further developed by thinkers such as Cleonisis, Chrysosophus, Seneca, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius. [00:01:00] I can't pronounce the word. Seneca, Epictetus. Common thing on the show. Okay.

Simone Collins: Marcus Aurelius.

Okay.

Malcolm Collins: At its core, Stoicism is not just a theoretical system of thought, it is very much a practical philosophy aimed at cultivating inner virtue, emotional resilience, and harmony with the broader natural order. Stoics understood philosophy as a way of life, something to be enacted in one's day to day conduct.

Okay. Rather than treated as an abstract intellectual pastime, which is something I really appreciate about the stoic philosophy as we get into it, is that it's very much designed around sort of guiding actions instead of something to just talk about idly like this is good or this is good and I think in a way that can make it better for daily life than other philosophies because the stoic philosophy is going to help you make a day to day decisions much more than the more abstract philosophical frameworks you might interact with.

[00:02:00] But unlike let's say a modern You know, there's like modern self help is sort of, ideologies that are sort of meant to help you live a healthier life. Stoicism covers a lot more than that. So it has its own sort of metaphysical framework. So, Stoics believes that the universe is an orderly, rational whole.

Often referred to as the logos, human beings as rational creatures share in this order and have the capacity to live in alignment with it. The stoic ideal is to understand nature's laws, accepting what is beyond our control and live according to reason and virtue. So Huge part of stoicism is accept the things you cannot change.

And they think that a lot of the negatives in an individual's life comes from not accepting the things you cannot change. However, this is part of their metaphysical understanding of reality rather than just like life advice. So to drill on that a bit further, They held that the universe is governed by the Logos, the rational principle, [00:03:00] and human beings as rational agents have the capacity to align themselves with it.

To do this, one must use reason to see belong personal biases, fears, or desires. Stoics believed in a concept called Okiosis, the idea that individuals have natural tithes and obligations extending outwards, first to themselves, then to their family, then to others. community and ultimately to the wider human polis is so it could reflect on these concentric circles of obligation So does that make sense to you simone and like what are your thoughts on on this more broadly this idea of tying?

A moral mandate to To action and to act on reason to virtue to a metaphysical understanding, which is that logos sort of reason to virtue is the principle that governs our reality and that you are acting in alignment with the the, the sort of the, it's not a God exactly. It's almost sort of like a [00:04:00] clockwork God of virtue that you are aligning yourself with the clockwork God of virtue when you act in a virtuous way.

Simone Collins: It sounds extremely like our worldview, which is more driven by like our understanding of quantum physics and just rational behavior and pragmatism, but I mean, that's if it ain't broke, don't fix it. This sounds great.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah, you can go to our track series to learn more about our worldview or our Nietzsche video, which I think does a pretty good job of laying out our modern worldview.

. So here I've talked a lot about this concept of virtue, and you might be thinking, well, what does that mean in a stoic mindset, right? Central to stoicism is the notion that virtue encompassing wisdom, courage, justice, and self control is the only true good.

External things such as wealth, reputation, health, and even life itself are considered quote unquote indifference, meaning that they are neither inherently good nor bad. What matters most is how one uses these externals [00:05:00] and whether one's actions reflect moral excellence. So if you ask them further to define, I'm like, okay, yeah, but then define virtue as an action, right?

This gets me. It's like, okay, well, if virtue is just things that embody wisdom, courage, justice and self control, anyone could subjectively define anything is virtuous, right? Like, that's a really weak system for virtue. And they would say, In the Stoic worldview, a virtuous action is one that aligns perfectly with reason and nature.

Virtue is not a contingent property that depends on circumstances or outcomes. Rather, it is stable and complete expression of the rational soul, acting in accordance with the cosmic order. To, quote, live according to nature, end quote, means to understand the nature of the world, the universal order, and one's own nature as a rational being.

And to let this understanding guide one's actions. Here you can almost think of this as like Wu Wei, if you're talking about Dao philosophy, or [00:06:00] Slack if you're talking about subgenius philosophy. At least it seems it,

Simone Collins: I see it more as just, in this case, efficiency. Like don't wait, you are

Malcolm Collins: allowing a way of seeing the world to almost aesthetically guide your actions with the understanding that this will lead to better outcomes, but this is tempered by the way of seeing the world that they aspire is dispassionate logic or rationality.

The four cardinal stoic virtues, wisdom, courage, justice, and temperance serve as guides. Virtue is defined as an excellent state of character. The perfectly wise person always acts virtuously because they perceive the right course of action through reason. Hence, any act performed from true virtue, i. e.

from a rational, fully informed, and morally sound perspective is quote unquote good in and of itself. The stoics emphasize That only true virtue is genuinely good, while external circumstances, wealth, reputation, [00:07:00] health, are indifference, that they have no moral value on their own.

The right action, then, is the one a perfectly rational agent would choose, an action chosen for the sake of doing what truly matters. Reason prescribes independently of personal gain or l