How to find your own Stoic path

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In this episode, I explore why there is not always a single answer to the question, “What would a Stoic do?” Stoicism gives us a shared ethical framework, but it also takes seriously the particular roles, relationships, capacities, dispositions, and circumstances of each individual.

I begin with the common search for “the Stoic position” on a given issue. Sometimes a general answer is appropriate, such as returning a lost wallet. But more complex situations, such as war, require us to consider what our particular roles and circumstances demand of us.

I turn to Epictetus and his discussion of preserving our proper character, or prosōpon, in Discourses 1.2. His examples of Agrippinus and another man facing the same pressure under Nero show how two people can reason well and still arrive at different actions because their characters, roles, and circumstances differ.

From there, I explain how to begin identifying your own path toward sagehood. Start with your roles: parent, employee, neighbour, citizen, friend, carer, and so on. Then consider your individual nature, including your dispositions, strengths, weaknesses, resources, limitations, and circumstances.

I also discuss Hierocles' circles of concern and the Stoic responsibility we all share toward the cosmopolis. Everyone has that responsibility, but nobody will fulfil it in exactly the same way.

The goal, then, is not to ask, “What would a sage do?” as though there were one universal answer waiting to be discovered. The better question is: “What would I do if I were the sage version of myself, given my roles, capacities, dispositions, circumstances, and context?”

Stoicism gives us the same philosophy to guide us, but the path toward sagehood is necessarily particular to each person.