“Keep this thought handy when you feel a fit of rage coming on — it isn’t manly to be enraged. Rather, gentleness and civility are more human, and therefore manlier. A real man doesn’t give way to anger and discontent, and such a person has strength, courage, and endurance — unlike the angry complaining. The nearer a man comes to a calm mind, the closer he is to strength.”
— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 11.18.5b
When Most people think of Stoicism, they think of simply not showing emotion. I hope that anyone who reads this blog, or who I am able to inspire to read the Stoics, recognizes that there is far more involved with the Stoics than simply the masking of emotion. That said, it would be untrue to say that controlling one’s emotions is not a significant part of the philosophy.
For me, and I would imagine for many other men, the emotion most difficult and the most necessary to control is Anger. I know it is my most deadly of the seven deadly sins. Though I am actively working on it, I would be the first to admit that there are still things which engender in me a significant amount of rage.
I am grateful that in my life, the worst thing my anger has caused me to do is to get into a bar fight or two which I had no business being in. There are others for who anger has been a life-ruing force. But for the purposes of all of our lives, whether it causes a fight, a spike in competitiveness, anger-fueled immobility, or something far worse, anger is not, and can never really be a Strength.
Part of the objectives of stoicism is Eleutheria; freedom. We seek to forever maintain our free will. When we give into our anger, when we make decisions and take actions while listening to rage, we are not in control of ourselves. In fact, quite the contrary, we become slaves to fury. Out very free will, one of the few things we actually can control, is completely subverted but the various shades of red we see.
What more, it is rare that our ire serves to improve the situation at all. Say the wrath incites a fight, and I am sorry to say, it has many times for me. If I lose both my pride and body get hurt, and I look like the boy who can’t keep his cool. If I win, I run the risk of hurting others, of legal and moral trouble, and I am still the boy who could not keep his cool. I for one would much rather be the man who could.
To be clear, I am not saying there is no good time to fight. Unfortunately, violence has and will always have its purpose. As a member of the armed forces and a (wannabe) philosopher, I wrestle with questions like that almost daily. Violence can be a necessary evil and can have positive effects. I am saying that electing to engage in violence or making any choice based on anger, is the wrong choice.
Anger is a weakness. True strength is being able to hold yourself together and maintain the ability to reason regardless of what happens externally.
