Posted: Feb 20, 2012 3:34 pm
andrewk wrote:
That's a great article. Thanks for posting it. I think I'll get his book on Stoicism, having read the article.
Having recently read a book on Cognitive Behaviour Therapy ("Change Your Thinking" by Sarah Edelman), I can't help noticing there seems to be quite a strong similarity between the CBT and the Stoic approaches to dealing with misfortune, resentment and anxiety. Not surprising then that CBT is the one form of psychotherapy that has very widespread support in the medical and psychological professions, and a good track record of success.
I hope you enjoy it. I just read through the Wikipedia article on CBT and I think your comparison sounds accurate.
That also reminded me of this article I read by Jonah Lehrer a while back, on Russian coping tendencies (relative to Americans):
What explains these cultural differences? Grossman and Kross then asked students in Moscow and Michigan to “recall and analyze their “deepest thoughts and feelings surrounding a recent anger-related interpersonal experience”. Then, the subjects were quizzed about the details of their self-analysis. They were asked to rate, on a seven point scale, the extent to which they adopted a self-immersed perspective (a 1 rating meant that they “saw the event replay through your own eyes as if you were right there”) versus a self- distanced perspective (a 7 rating meant that they “watched the event unfold as an observer, in which you could see yourself from afar”). Finally, the subjects were asked about how the exercise made them feel. Did they get angry again when they recalled the “anger-related” experience? Did the memory trigger intense emotions?
Here’s where the cultural differences became clear.* When Russians engaged in brooding self-analysis, they were much more likely to engage in self-distancing, or looking at the past experience from the detached perspective of someone else. Instead of reliving their confused and visceral feelings, they reinterpreted the negative memory , which helped them make sense of it. According to the researchers, this led to significantly less “emotional distress” among the Russian subjects. (It also made them less likely to blame another person for the event.) Furthermore, the habit of self-distancing seemed to explain the striking differences in depressive symptoms between Russian and Americans. Brooding wasn’t the problem. Instead, it was brooding without self-distance
The book dispels a lot of misconceptions about Stoicism. My understanding is that it's a collection of lot of mental hacks to better live one's life, much like how Russians (apparently) deal with depression.
Mantisdreamz wrote:I have read a bit on Stoicism in the past. And the simplest interpretation I took from it was having the philosophy in life, to just be passive and have a sort of indifference to things going on. Kind of like, watching events pass by, without having much emotional involvement.
The only thing that bugs me about this, is that I tend to think of emotional responses as being sometimes cathartic and healthy.
I think that's accurate in a limited sense. One is definitely discouraged from flipping out over every little thing, and the Stoics are very keen on getting over things like anger and sadness quickly. I think detachment is a better one-word description if we're fishing for those, and I'm not sure that's entirely appropriate. Caring about the things we can affect is encouraged. Dwelling on the stuff we can't is seen as being really dumb.
I'm personally skeptical of the hydraulic theory of anger. I don't think having more catharsis in my life would be an improvement. As it is, don't really do catharsis, ever. And I feel great. I prefer a "strangle the anger in the crib" attitude.