Focus on the mind-body connection
The Discipline of Desire teaches that if we place our desires only on that which we completely control, we’ll never be frustrated in our goals. As you may have realized through experience, that’s easier said than done. Salaam made progress while practicing this discipline, but he still copes with plenty of desires, mainly concerning physical comfort. Working through the Discipline of Assent, however, he has found quicker progress. Instead of focusing his energy on adjusting his environment to make himself more comfortable, Salaam focused in on his moment-to-moment thoughts about comfort, tackling the root cause of his desires and aversions. This week you, too, will try to cut your desires and aversions off before they turn into full-blown passions.
"Sickness is a hindrance to the body, but not to the will, unless the will consent. Lameness is a hindrance to the leg, but not to the will. Say this to yourself at each event that happens, for you shall find that though it hinders something else it will not hinder you.”
Epictetus, Enchiridion, 9
Could it be that Epictetus is assuming a dual nature of mind and body? It appears that he suggests a sharp distinction between “the will” and the body, almost as if he were talking about the rather mystical—and scientifically unfounded—concept of “mind over body.” But a little background knowledge of Stoic theory dispels this worry. The Stoics were thoroughly materialistic in their philosophy, believing that both mind and body are made of matter, and moreover, that everything in the universe is highly connected, including those two aspects of being human.
There is a sense in which even modern science tells us that changing the way we think about something alters the way we experience it physically. If you are affected by a disease, no wishing the disease away will make it so—and it’s dangerous to think that way—but it’s equally true that people react differently to the same experience, even to a severe disease. The Stoics argue that sickness hinders the body, but not (necessarily) the will. Similarly, you may be suffering from a disability, as did the modern Stoic Larry Becker, who lived with the effects of polio, and yet your physical disability does not need to get in the way of living a virtuous life in which you exert your power as a moral agent.1 Medical researcher John Astin has reviewed evidence of extensive mind-body therapies for the management of pain (an instance of disability), and has found that a range of these therapies—from cognitive behavioral therapy to coping skills training and cognitive restructuring—are effective.2 Epictetus would not have been surprised.
Epictetus may not have had modern research in cognitive science at his disposal, but he was an astute observer of human behavior, as were many other ancient philosophers, Stoic and not. He was certainly capable of paying attention to and reflecting upon his own experiences: He was disabled because of an early fracture of one of his legs, apparently caused when he was a slave by a beating from his first master. Epictetus knew what he was talking about when he said that the limitations of your body may hinder you in material areas (such as your ability to walk), but would not hinder you from exercising your will to be virtuous and improve your faculty of judgment. An obvious objection here would be that, of course, being disabled hinders me—how can I get around without functioning legs? What the heck is Epictetus talking about?! This (common) retort misses a subtle point about selfhood that Epictetus is assuming here: that “you” are your rational faculty, according to the Stoics, your proharesis. Everything outside of proharesis is not under your full control, and therefore not “you.”