I see this meme shared a lot on social media. Though it has wide appeal, I don’t care for it. I’ve seen the case made for Cognitive Behaviour Therapy in terms of sound science and solid philosophy. I can’t speak with much authority when it comes to the science, but I do know philosophy well. The philosophy in question here is Stoicism. I know it well. It’s a noble tradition. But not mine. A key aspect of Stoicism, certainly in its modern assimilation, concerns the internalisation of external stresses and strains. This meme is all about altering personal perceptions of the world rather than identifying, confronting, and changing any ‘perceived’ faults in the world. It’s just another exercise in making societal and structural problems purely personal, a perfect remedy for an age of subjectivism, narcissism, and nihilism. If you are experiencing difficulties in life, don’t seek the source of problems in others or in external structures, but look deep inside yourself and take ownership of your own inadequacies.
There’s some truth in this position, insofar as it underlines the need to take responsibility for all those things you are indeed responsible for. That requires that you do all you can to exercise a degree of self-mastery and self-restraint. That pertains to all those things which are within your control, which may be a whole lot more than you think. That’s the truth contained in the statement. Rather than seeking in the first instance to blame others as well as external forces and events for your problems, try to determine how much if within your power to influence, and seek to be proactive in exercising your powers.
That said, this truth is not the whole truth. And a partial truth which is generalised to become a whole truth is a falsehood, and a dangerous and damaging one at that. In effect, this half truth condemns individuals to confronting the world and its weight alone, internalising ressures which are as much external as personal, facing their problems alone. This doesn’t so much solve the problem that a person in need faces as restate the horrible truth that you are indeed alone.
I’ve been offered Cognitive Behaviour Therapy many times. I have also spoken with people with deep, deep problems who tell me that they have been offered CGT time and again – for want of any serious help with substantial resources in terms of time and money behind it. CGT costs the authorities nothing and shifts the onus of responsibility onto those seeking help in face of impossible circumstances.
I can point out the utter inadequacy – and evasion– of this kind of help and this kind of philosophy. Stoicism was the product of tired minds at the end of their tether in a tired age in which events seemed out of human control. There’s a lot about Stoicism that I like, particularly the discussions about real and false goods and the nature of happiness. But Stoicism is riddled with internal contradictions, such as its position on free will and determinism. Stoicism holds that the universe – the external world - is a rigidly deterministic single whole, in which everything happens as the result of prior causes beyond human control. At the same time, Stoicism asserts the complete autonomy of the individual will and that no person can be forced to sin by outside causes. This contradiction implies that benevolence is an illusion, for the reason that one can do neither good nor harm to another since the will is autonomous and the virtuous will alone is good.
Stoicism originated as a tired philosophy for tired people in a tired age. And I feel that it is being rehashed for a similarly hopeless age. It is a convenient philosophy for hopeless authorities who have little or nothing to offer people in trouble in troubled times - other than advice for what people can do for themselves. So when I hear proponents of CBT claim that their recommendations have a solid philosophical grounding I, as a philosopher by training, am more than entitled to raise objections – and point to internal contradictions. This kind of philosophy is the raising of the white flag of surrender in face of circumstances ruinous to human health and happiness. Stoicism is a philosophy of resignation and defeat, not a philosophy of freedom and happiness. To those who claim that CGT – and CGT alone, without societal and structural changes – has sound philosophical grounding, I will insist that other, more expansive and optimistic, philosophies are available.
The book which turned me on to philosophy was Bertrand Russell’s A History of Western Philosophy, which I bought in W.H. Smith in St Helens one idle afternoon in 1990. Russell presents the historical context of Stoicism:
“The economic system was very bad; Italy was going out of cultivation, and the population of Rome depended upon the free distribution of grain from the provinces. All initiative was concentrated in the Emperor and his ministers; throughout the vast extent of the Empire, no one, except an occasional rebellious general, could do anything but submit. Men looked to the past for what was best; the future, they felt, would be at best a weariness, and at worst a horror. When we compare the tone of Marcus Aurelius with that of Bacon, or Locke, or Condorcet, we see the difference between a tired and a hopeful age. In a hopeful age, great present evils can be endured, because it is thought that they will pass; but in a tired age even real goods lose their savour. The Stoic ethic suited the times of Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, because its gospel was one of endurance rather than hope.”
We are being taught to reconcile ourselves to a less-than-optimal existence, a life that is well short of our potentialities. Russell continues:
“There is, in fact, an element of sour grapes in Stoicism. We can't be happy, but we can be good; let us therefore pretend that, so long as we are good, it doesn't matter being unhappy. This doctrine is heroic, and, in a bad world, useful; but it is neither quite true nor, in a fundamental sense, quite sincere.”
We are being taught to accept the fact that we are leading bad lives in an unalterably bad world. I’ve never accepted that judgement as fact. In fact, I’ve identified it from the first as a craven surrender on the part of people and authorities who have reconciled themselves to their own hopeless positions, people who are happy to consign others to a hopeless – and helpless – condition.
Most of all, I am concerned to reject thoroughly this pressure upon individuals to internalise the bad pressures of the world. Not only does this view re-assert the pernicious doctrine of false fixities, naturalising historically alterable forces prior to their personal internalisation, it does serious mental and physical harm to individuals in need. I speak from personal experience here. I have ended up with not one but two chronic illnesses grace of an undiagnosed autism. I have never been unfit. I'm not unfit now. I can hit 15km in 30 minutes on my exercise bike. I can still dazzle one and all on the football field. The health issues have come directly from internalising external pressures arising from difficulties in social interaction and communication. There are things I cannot change on my own. Knowing from hard experience that there was no understanding and no help coming my way in light of my evident difficulties with all manner of things, I learned to mask and mirror my condition. In time, when even this effort no longer sufficed, I took to hiding and evading. I did this for good reason. In expressing difficulty and asking for help I was met with demands that I take responsibility, take the initiative, stop raising barriers, change my negativity into positivity, take assertiveness lessons (if you please). The approach taken by various authorities all along has been for the people who find the courage to ask for help to either change themselves and become free and happy beings like ‘normal’ people or just learn to reconcile themselves to their unfree and unhappy lot.
I do argue for freedom, free-will, and the taking of personal responsibility. A societal change without this existential dimension is empty, without appetitive quality and meaning.
For my part, the external circumstances confronting me in terms of social, mental, and physical health remain thoroughly wretched and are not within my power to change – or within the power of those who feign to offer help, either. You need others. Where are they? Looking after themselves and their own 'perceptions' of reality.
This is a tired philosophy for tired people.
The problems faced by people are not ones of perception.
