What Is Stoicism? It's Just 8 Things

We contemporary Stoics really overthink this stuff...

There are no shortage of humans on the internet who spend countless hours, spilling innumerable gallons of digital link in various Discords and Facebook Groups, arguing over what Stoicism actually is.

This population of Stoicism enthusiasts (and, if you ask them, actual Stoics) are incredibly good at citing texts, memorizing passages, and diving into the weedy mucky muck of Stoic philosophy from a “what are the facts of this philosophy’s history?” angle — and I think we must all have an appreciation for people who endeavor to understand Stoicism in this way. Surely it requires no small effort of intellect to suss out the “purest” form of Stoicism! After all I, myself, attended the College of Stoic Philosophers partly for this purpose.

I feel, however, especially as of late, that far too much time is spent by contemporary Stoics getting lost in the Stoic sauce. After all, no Ancient Stoic (that I’m aware of) ever said, “Alright, folks! This is it, the correct form of Stoicism, don’t deviate from it or you’re wrong!” — and this is in holding with most philosophies in general, isn’t it? Most, if not all, philosophies are a work in progress. They’re a group of people working to perfect a framework; constantly using new information to figure out whether or not that framework is still holding up under the weight of advancing knowledge.

If your philosophy isn’t that — if it’s only this one unchanging truth that no one can question — it’s a religion. Which is fine, religion can be super for some people, but the dogmatic aspect of it is at least one thing that sets it apart from a working philosophy — which, again, I feel is every philosophy and Stoicism absolutely.

I remember a conversation I was having with Leonidas Konstantakos, a few months back, where during he made a remark, or posed a question, along the lines of, “You know, you don’t have to be a Stoic in order to be Stoic.”

That’s not verbatim, but that was the gist. One could be perceived, by others, as being Stoic, through their behaviors and actions, by others — even by Zeno! — without having to identify as a Stoic personally.

That really stuck with me, and it reminded me of this thing Epictetus was supposed to have said at some point in his life as the preeminent Roman Stoic philosopher: that 50% of Stoicism is understanding what you’re supposed to be doing, but the other 50% is the actual doing of that understanding.

We can all preach, and some of us can teach, but can we all be what we preach? And which is more important, in the end?

Obviously the greatest point of ascribing to a life philosophy is to embody it, not just understand it. So the more important of the two halves Epictetus spoke of, is the point. That is, the being.

We’ve got a lot of people who are good at understanding the what, why, and how of Stoicism (and plenty of other things) but, as evidenced, I feel, by the state of the world, not near as many who are good at the being.

In the spirit of encouraging more being, I wanted to make a “Stoicism is this this and this” sort of article — something that might make it easier to start “being Stoic” today, and have that start be a pretty solid one.

I would encourage you to learn more about each of these, of course, but never at the expense of being/doing each of them.

Stoicism is just 8 things

The first thing is the recognition, and internalization of the truth that the only power we have is our power of choice — and that everything that isn’t our choice is an indifferent.

The second thing is understanding what indifferents are. Indifferents are things which reflect nothing of our moral character because they do not control our choices and they, themselves, are not our choices. Only our choices are our choices.

The third thing is understanding that the fabric (and therefore the quality) of our moral character is woven by our choices. When we choose to behave virtuously, we weave strong threads (that is, threads of a virtuous quality) into that fabric.

The fourth thing is understanding what Virtue is. In Stoicism, Virtue is the knowledge of how to live excellently. When we say that the fabric of someone’s moral character is “good” or “approaching Virtue”, we mean that their choices suggest they have acted excellently — that they possess something that looks like the knowledge that is Virtue.

The fifth thing is understanding impressions and assent. An impression is an idea of what’s going on, or how you ought to feel, or how you ought to act. Assenting to an impression means you’re adopting it as a held belief. If you get the impression that your spouse is cheating on you, and you assent to that impression, you have created a mental reality where your spouse is cheating on you. You’ve committed to a view of reality.

The sixth thing is understanding how the first five things are related. You must exam your impressions carefully, so that you assent appropriately. You must do this because only with as accurate a view of reality as possible can you make appropriate choices. When you make appropriate choices, you express an character moving towards Virtue (excellence). To express this character you must know what you can and cannot choose, and you must choose when you can and let go whatever frustration might be caused by trying to chose things you’re unable to choose (like how other people behave, for example).

The seventh thing is to not misunderstand the sixth. We cannot choose perfect health for our child, our parents, or ourselves — these are indifferents (any thing we cannot choose is an indifferent). However, when we choose not to make the choices we can make, in concerns to these indifferents (like exercising, trying to eat well, encouraging others to take care of themselves), we have chosen not to care — this is a choice, and therefore not an indifferent. Things that are not choices are indifferents, but choices about how we regard indifferents are not indifferents, they are choices.

The eighth thing is to conduct yourself with these things in mind.

The practice is really what matters

If we’re trying to make the world a better place, and ourselves better people, the training and studying matters to the extent that it will inform how we practice — this is why it has to matter somewhat! If, however, we don’t get past the texts and debates, we wind up spending all day arguing about how we should act instead of acting how we should. Spirited debate can be fun, of course, and even beneficial, but it’s a potent distraction when we engage it in too frequently and at the expense of implementation or action.

Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.
— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 10.16

To “be Stoic”, in effect anyway, you just need to keep these 8 things in mind, learn a bit more about them, and then implement them in your own life in the way you deem appropriate.

Sure, someone with a PhD in Greek Philosophy may tell you you’re not technically a Stoic because you don’t ABCXYZ, but that person is a philosopher of Stoicism, and not, necessarily, or probably in my experience, a Stoic themselves.

I think keeping these things in mind will help you to behave more Stoically more often, and I hope you found this article useful.

Thanks for reading.