Choose your company well
It can be hard to resist going along with the crowd. Sometimes following the crowd can be fun, as when joining in on the excitement of cheering for the home team in sporting events. Sometimes it can be useful, as you might push yourself harder in an exercise class. But it’s often problematic. Alex considers himself relatively introverted and reserved, but when he hangs out with some of his old friends, he finds himself acting much more aggressively and boisterously than usual. He often insults people, once even narrowly avoiding a fistfight. As you’ll see this week, the Stoics were well aware of others’ ability to influence our own thoughts and behaviors and held fast to the old saying: “You are the company you keep.”
"Refuse the entertainments of strangers and the vulgar. But if occasion arise to accept them, then strain every nerve to avoid lapsing into the state of the vulgar. For know that, if your comrade have a stain on him, he that associates with him must needs share the stain, even though he be clean in himself.”
Epictetus, Enchiridion, 33.6
Epictetus may sound insufferably snobbish and elitist, but he is essentially giving you the same advice that your mom likely did when you were growing up: Be careful who you associate with. Seek people who are better than you, so you can learn from them; avoid those whose character and habits will drag you down. It’s important to note that you should not feel superior to others because you are a Stoic. On the contrary, precisely because you are a Stoic you recognize that you are flawed and that you need to avoid temptations and seek help to improve.
Friendship and companionship are serious business for the Stoics. The whole idea of “friends” on social networks, especially those you don’t know personally, or don’t know well, is an oxymoron from a Stoic perspective. That said, you may wonder about a potential paradox lurking in Epictetus’s advice: If we all put this into practice, wouldn’t our “better” friends also avoid our company? But we don’t need to go that far. It isn’t as though we should (or even could) rank everyone on a simple scale of virtue, then pick those who score higher and hang out with them exclusively. What Epictetus is getting at here is the far more commonsensical idea that some companionships are mutually rewarding, others are mutually destructive, and some don’t go anywhere (these are also to be avoided).
Once you start internalizing Epictetus’s perspective on friendships, you will begin to see consequences in your social life and on your broader outlook in general. Just as you began to wonder during last week’s exercise whether particular conversations were really worth having, you will now begin to ponder your choice of friends and acquaintances. Which ones are mutually beneficial, and which might you want to reconsider? Your time is limited; you’d better make the best of it.