A Guide to the Good Life

A Guide to the Good Life : the Ancient Art of Stoic Joy
by William B. Irvine
Oxford University Press, 2009
electronic resource (ebook)
Accessible to currently-enrolled SWC students, faculty, and staff

Everybody wants to live “the good life.” However, it often has different meanings to all of us. William B. Irvine explains his understandings of a good life by the help of stoic philosophy.

By the Merriam-Webster dictionary, stoic means, “one apparently or professedly indifferent to pleasure or pain.”

Now, how does it lead to a good life? In an interview on the Daily Stoic website Irvine said: “…Ideally, a Stoic won’t have many negative emotions to deal with, inasmuch as he will routinely take steps to prevent them from arising in the first place. … On the other hand, a Stoic will embrace positive emotions. Because he engages in negative visualization, he will likely experience many little moments of delight in the course of an ordinary day. He will also likely have an unusual capacity for the experience of joy.”

Irvine gives us background information on the origin and history of stoicism in Greece and Rome, then list some of the psychological tools to practice this way of thinking, for example negative visualizations that is mentioned above.

In the following excerpt from the interview on the Daily stoic website, he talks about his favorite stoic philosophers, and why he reads them when his tranquil life, that is no doubt the result of his stoic living, is in turmoil:

 “I like all the Roman Stoics, but for different reasons. When I am dealing on an ongoing basis with annoying people, I turn to Marcus Aurelius. As Roman emperor, he had lots of experience dealing with annoying people. When I have an important decision to make, I turn to Epictetus and remind myself that there are things I can control and things I can’t. When I find myself lusting for consumer goods, I turn to Musonius Rufus, who managed quite well on being banished to the desolate island of Gyaros. And when I am feeling sorry for myself, I turn to Seneca. He reminds us that no matter how bad things are, they could be much worse."

As far as favorite quotes are concerned, I have a hundred of them. The Roman Stoics are wonderfully quotable. This one comes from Marcus Aurelius: “The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing.”

I hope that after reading this ebook, or books from any of the stoic philosophers, there will be more dancing than wrestling in your future.

Review by Erika Prange, SWC Librarian