Written by: Dhiraj Chapagain - 2022007, Grade X
Posted on: 27 December, 2020
Stoicism is the endurance of pain or hardship without the display of feelings and without complaint. It states that we should attempt to curb our emotions when faced with things we can do nothing about. Stoicism is supposedly designed to make people more resilient, happier, more righteous, and wiser–and as a result, better people. Stoicism teaches the development of self-control. It teaches us desirable values such as courage, patience, self-discipline, serenity, perseverance, forgiveness, kindness, and humility. But does this make stoicism good and is it really for us? what should we do about things we can’t do anything about?
Stoicism believes that we should control things that we can change: emotions, desires, feelings, and totally ignore external events and there is a problem with that. It makes us accept things we aren’t actually supposed to. According to stoicism, while the sugarcane farmers are protesting demanding payment dues, we should not respond to it but rather control our decisions. On the surface, stoicism might seem practical but the world is running with the decisions tied to our emotions. We should express our emotions to the external events occurring. We should be angry at the government if they do not fulfill their promises. When should we express our emotions instead of suppressing them? These were totally my personal opinions.
Citation: -
S Grant, January 18, 2017; https://qz.com/887524/forget-stoicism-a-leading-philosopher-explains-why-we-shouldnt-try-to-control-our-emotions
