The Handbook of Epictetus Section 1-15

"Some things are up to us and some are not up to us (sec.1)." This might seem a pretty obvious and plain statement to some, but in reality those two things carry much more than we give them credit for. The things that are up to us include our desires and dislikes. We can determine what each of this is. I can determine whether I like coffee or I don't like coffee, but I cannot determine how coffee tastes. Those things are not up to us. Humans, at least in my case, feel we are in control of much more than we really are. I feel I can determine whether or not someone will be my friend, but in reality I cannot force them to. As Epictetus puts it, "If you think that things naturally enslaved are free or that things not your own are your own, you will be thwarted, miserable, and upset (sec. 1)..." This is one of the main reasons people get frustrated and stressed in life, they think they are truly in control.

What Epictetus recommends the reader to do in order to avoid frustration and live a full life is to accept the world and its events as they are, you cannot change them so why bother to get stressed? "Do not seek to have events happen as you want them to, but instead want them to happen as they do happen, and your life will go well (sec. 8)." This way of thinking reminded me of the movie The Peaceful Warrior. In the movie, Socrates (appropiate name?) tells the protagonist, Dan, "If you don't get what you want, you suffer; if you get what you don't want, you suffer; even when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer because you can't hold on to it forever." This is very true, we want things we can't control, money, affection, material things, or something as simple as sunshine. If we don't get them we will be dissapointed, but if we do they won't last for ever. For this dilema, Epictetus tells us, "For the time being eliminate desire completely, since if you desire something that is not up to us, your are bound to be unfortunate (sec. 2)."

The stoics believed the world occured in an intricate pattern that couldn't be alterred so they chose simply to flow in it and let life go its desired way. This reminds me of the Tao te Ching, a book from an entirely diferent culture and geographic area which tells us to let life's forces flow as they must. Coincidence? I believe not as this life philosophy proves valid everywhere and even today.

There is one doubt I have from Epictetus' stoic philosophy. If the world follows a pattern and it can't be changed by us since it is not "up to us", what is the explanation for actions we take by our own decision that affect others? In a radical example, murder. Have we just changed the course of someone's life by affecting it ourselves? Was it predestined to occur? How about love? True love is a two-way emotion, two people fall in love and they form a relationship. They are affecting the other by loving. Prior to their falling in love they lived very differently, but after they have affected the other to fall in love their lives changed. Was this the person's doing? They could have chosen entirely different people to love. Or is everything entirely predictable? On a wider scale, what of modern environment projects? Naure is not up to us, but humans have been capable of harnessing water power in dams or fuel from oil, how can this be explained by Stoic philosophy?