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- You're Already Free
Welcome to The Stoa Letter, the newsletter on Stoic theory and practice.
🏛️ Theory
If we’re free, then we can be authors of our lives.
If we’re not, the story of our life is driven by external forces alone.
The ancient Stoics were determinists. They believed that everything that comes to pass does so out of necessity – or, stated slightly differently, that given the laws of nature, the past, and present, the future has a determined shape.
Yet they also believed that we were free.
This may be puzzling, but it makes sense because what mattered for the Stoics were practical questions of accountability and agency.
Let’s take on agency today.
Someone exhibits agency when they cause their thoughts and choices, rather than let others think or choose for them.
Someone lacks agency when they let outside forces dictate how to act. They shrink from the smallest obstacles. They bow to every social norm. Their thinking is full of other people’s thoughts, not their own.
In contrast, people with agency are authors of their own lives. When they make a decision, they follow through. After all, the decision emanates from them – and who they are does not change just because the scenery does.
You can see Marcus Aurelius urging himself to be more of an author of his life in the Meditations:
No longer be pulled by the strings like a puppet to unsocial movements.
I think we can all relate to this impulse.
Whether or not we’re determined is irrelevant for whether we are authors of our own lives.
A person is free if he lives as he wants, if he’s not subject to constraint, impediment, or compulsion, if his inclinations are unobstructed, if his desires are never disappointed, and his aversions effectively prevent the occurrence of things he wants to avoid.
What’s holding you back?
🎯 Action
Act freely today. No longer be pulled by the strings.
🔗 Resources
🔗 This piece is adapted from a longer one of mine here.
📱 Want to learn about yourself through stories? Developed by a Jungian Analyst, Retell is a new app for exploring your psychology by listening to fresh tellings of powerful tales and myths. Coming soon! Join the waitlist here.
📖 Friend of Stoa, Donald Robertson, has a new book How to Think Like Socrates.
What did you think about today's letter? |
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