Alright, so, something I’ve been talking about with my therapist a lot, but I thoughts folks out here could have interesting povs.
To sum it up, I’m constantly trying to act like a saint (figuratively, I’m an atheist). There’s one exception to this, people holding power and making others miserable in any way.
But basically, you know, this whole mentality of banishing anger, jealousy, egoism, selfishness, greed, desire for power and authority and all that? That’s me.
I don’t mean I manage to do so constantly, but that’s what I strive for.
One could think, and I did think, it was a desire for social praise. But really, when I get praised, which happen a lot, I don’t care and that’s more awkward that anything (like : woa dude, it’s not the Oscars or something, chill out). And little by little, I started to think it didn’t have much to do with being praised, that’s just striving to live as I think it’s better to live. To live a life I’ll me content with when the grim reaper will come and all praises won’t mean anything anymore.
My therapist thinks it’s not really an issue as long as it doesn’t cause myself pain (which it does because I’m deaf to my own needs 50% of the times).
But I don’t see a satisfying way to live apart from that.
One potential misinterpretation I’d like to prevent. It’s a very strong drive, but it doesn’t make me blind. It really doesn’t happen a lot but whenever I’m angry, I’m not feeling guilty. I know why I feel this, it’s just that I didn’t have any other way to manage a situation/feeling. I’ll just strive to do better next time by trying to modify the situation so that anger will not be the most probable answer.
Do you find it weird? Anyone adopting this kind of behavior? Maybe everyone does. It may sound a bit megalomaniac, like hey I’m exceptional, but it really isn’t what I mean. To my own eyes, I’m not a bad or a good person. I’m just trying to be what I want. If somebody tries to be someone different, it’s all fine by me.
TL;DR : Is having high moral standards for one’s self weird or toxic? Does my message actually sound megalomaniac?
My caveat to this is that many of the foundational individuals to stoicism, as well as present influencers, are members of the upper class, and while there are a lot of great ideas in there, stoicism can often be distilled into a philosophy of rugged individualism which is more easily achieved with wealth, power, and privilege.
I am of the opinion that stoicism is good, but a disproportional number of those who practice it are often out of touch.
Epictetus was a slave most of his life and then banished at the end. I would disagree with the wealthy comment. Nelson Mandela embraced stoicism to get him through his prison term. I’m not sure where your perception comes from, but a major tenant is not putting emphasis on wealth or material goods.
ETA - my deleted comment above was just me moving this one down to be in the appropriate hierarchy.
Many ancient practitioners of stoicism were wealthy statesmen, including emperors. And, the literate elite were certainly enamored with it. I’m not a historian, but stoicism was shaped by wealthy and powerful people, as was every popular philosophy.
I’m not opposed to it. I like aspects of Stoicism. But, When it comes to wealth, it always rubbed me the wrong way. It seemed so often to me that wealthy stoics make a virtue out of possessing, but not coveting wealth, and in doing so make a vice of dissatisfaction with one’s wealth. For a rich man, this is reasonable. However, a poor man is correct to be dissatisfied. Poor men need to be angry, and to rise up and demand wealth (in my opinion), their pain and anguish is meant to be felt and to stoke action.
Stoicism is not often presented as compatible with this mindset of mine. I’m sure there are types of stoicism which address this, but most influencers seem to present Stoicism though a relatively uncritical lense.
My own philosophy/creed is based on Spinoza. I’ve seen a few parallels drawn between him and stoicism. I’ll definitely read about those. Thank you very much!