Kate Bowler Challenges Stoicism’s Most Famous Idea

0:00Ryan Holiday: Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, designed to help bring those four key Stoic virtues, courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom into the real world.

0:14Ryan Holiday: Hey, it's Ryan. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoic Podcast. It's always interesting when you find out you disagree with someone. Like, you're aligned on most things, and then they just have a very different opinion than you. You know, like, put aside bad faith disagreements or criticisms. Those are difficult to handle, and none of us are particularly great at dealing with that. But what about when there's someone who you're lined up with on most things, you are fans of many of the same things, and then you find out that they've got a very different opinion than you? Kate Bowler, whose work I love, she's a professor of religious history at Duke University.

0:52Ryan Holiday: At 35, she basically finds out she has stage four cancer, basically a terminal diagnosis. and all of a sudden, you know, she has to rethink, like, not just her life, how little of it might be left, but, you know, all her views about suffering and success and control and faith and hope, all of that, right? In the way that a diagnosis like that would turn everything upside down. And she wrote this beautiful essay in the New York Times that my sister and I connected over when my sister was going through cancer. And that essay, she quotes and talks about the stoic. She's a huge fan of her work. We've always gotten along.

1:27Ryan Holiday: I don't know if we're friends. We hadn't ever met, but we were certainly friendly. So it was interesting. I read this interview that she did. And she basically is saying in the interview, like, I think it's total crap, this idea, when people say, you might not be able to control what happens, but you can always control how you respond to what happens. And I was like, oh, I feel attacked. I mean, not literally, it was just It's like, oh, that's like colloquially the definition I often give for stoicism. And then I'm like still reading the interview. And she says, and when I say modern, she meant like the 2010s, which is wild.

2:01Ryan Holiday: She says, it is in part a result of an incomplete theology of masculinity that has been available and has become a way to explain specifically to men that there's almost a natural impassivity that is there should they claim it. And then in the face of chaos, global and personal, that there's this higher path. She says stoicism is being stripped of its original cosmology and refitted with self-help techniques. She says, but what she really objects to at the core is this idea about control. And so I was like, whoa, okay, are we having beef here? And I've seen that before, right? I've seen people who would love to come on the podcast.

2:37Ryan Holiday: They've asked me to blurt their books. And then, you know, I see them say something really nasty about me in an interview or something. And I knew that wasn't what Kate was doing because she's great and nice. And if she had a problem with me, she would say to my face, but I was like, oh, suddenly do we have like a very different opinion on this? And this is how I think you want to approach this. And I thought, well, what about her experiences would give her a different perspective on these things? And what can she teach me? So she was coming out. She has a lovely new book called Joyful Anyway, which I love, reminds me of Viktor Frankl's little essay collection, Yes to Life in spite of everything.

3:13Ryan Holiday: She has two other books that I've really liked. Everything Happens for Reason and No Care for Being Human. What about her experience as a professor of religious studies? What about her experience going through this cancer thing? What about all the people she's met that have gone through profound suffering and pain and loss? Like, is there something about stoicism that's inadequate, that's falling short, that's not working? You know, and maybe we could talk about it. So she came out. We had a lovely conversation. And I think we don't hash it out because there's no beef. But this is my point. What you tend to find is actually you agree way more than you think.

3:46Ryan Holiday: But sometimes there's a disagreement on terms. Sometimes there's a distinction without a difference. Or then sometimes there really is something that you need to go back and think about. And I think all of the above here is true. This is a great interview talking about some of the fantasies of self-help, some of the patronizing and glib things that people say, which are woefully inadequate to the profundity of the human experience. and anyways, I think you're really going to like this. Certainly the Stoics weren't being glib about any of this stuff because they knew suffering is profound and real as anything anyone has ever gone through.

4:22Ryan Holiday: And you got a lot to learn from Kate Bowler, a fantastic author, four times New York Times bestselling author. She's got a lovely podcast called Everything Happens. If you go to Duke University, you can take her classes on religious history and you can follow her on Instagram at Kate C. Bowler. You can grab signed copies of her books here at The Painted Porch and mostly you can just enjoy this conversation as I did. Look, you should be able to be comfortable anywhere, but you should also be comfortable inside your own house. Like your space should feel like you, should look the way you want it to look.

4:56Ryan Holiday: You should have the stuff that you want to have. And that's where today's sponsor Wayfair comes in because a budget doesn't need to get in the way of having all of those things. With plenty of options for every style you can imagine, you will definitely find something you like on Wayfair and at a price you can't beat. Got a new rug for the living room on Wayfair. You know, normally rugs are just like crazy expensive. And then you're like, do I like this rug? Do I not like this rug? But look, we know we got kids, we got a dog. We don't want to spend a ton of money, but we want something that looks good.

5:30Ryan Holiday: We want something that lasts. And on Wayfair, we got the best of both worlds. A rug that matches our style, doesn't cost too much. The dog tracks mud, clean it, you know, whatever. We want it to look nice. We want to be comfortable with it. We don't want to have to stress about it. Delivery was super easy. Wayfair also has installation and assembly stuff so I could spend my time writing instead of getting angry at some frustrating instructions. Ordering online is easy. It's all delivered right to your door. Wayfair products have over 20 million verified five-star reviews to help you make the right call.

6:01Ryan Holiday: And I recommend shopping with Wayfair Verified, your shortcut to the good stuff. Their team of product specialists vet everything by hand using a 10-point quality inspection so you know you're getting a great piece no matter your budget. Are you ready to upgrade your home for way less? Well, head over to Wayfair.com right now to shop all things home and get your space ready for less. That's W-A-Y-F-A-I-R.com. Wayfair, every style, every home. I heard you say some version of basically that you think my definition of stoicism is a bit not true. Or you disagree. I heard you say, and I'm not mad about it.

6:42Ryan Holiday: You? I want to talk about this. Yeah. You said, I've sometimes summarized stoicism as we don't control what happens, we control how we respond to what happens. Oh, I've been mad about that definition for sure. I didn't know that's what you said. Yeah, yeah. No, I'm not thinking personally. Tell me why you don't like that. Oh, I think that you can only control how you respond. Yes. I hear that a lot, particularly from people who are facing sometimes like life limiting illnesses or you get like a very narrow window of possibility. I think it creates enormous pressure on like a very small place of possibility and agency.

7:16And I think typically the people who are saying it are people who have almost unlimited possibility. And they're like, OK, look, you really hope you control how you respond.

7:25Ryan Holiday: Yeah, I think anytime you're doing it in a glib way, like as you said in your book, like everything happens for a reason, that even if it's true, it's a wildly inappropriate thing to tell someone who's going through. There are some horrible truths you can only tell yourself. Like I remember my son hit my other son. And then when he retaliated, he said, you know, you only control how you respond. And it's like, OK, that doesn't work either. You can't bait someone into doing something and then make and then make their response, their responsibility. Even if it is true that we shouldn't retaliate, like you're not you're not guiltless by, you know, repeatedly poking and inciting the violence that you then come and yell about.

8:08Ryan Holiday: But but so is it that you don't like that it applies pressure or you don't think it's true that we control how we respond to things? I think it's it's barely true. I think that much of what happens in our lives is beyond our control. And even and if you take the scope of our lives, a third, we're barely coherent information. At the end, we're barely coherent and information. I mean, we're just talking about the rational self as just like a window in the life cycle of being a person. And I think sometimes like a hyper fixation on rationality can over prioritize like who we are as people. It's also interesting because the Stoics talk about, which I think you were also highlighting in the response I was talking about, that the Stoics totally concede there are involuntary responses.

9:00Ryan Holiday: Like Seneca is like, if I jump out from around a corner, you're going to be scared. Or he says, if I throw cold water on you, you're going to shiver. I think when the Stoics say you control how you respond, they don't mean, although to a certain degree, you know, you see, you know, first responders or elite performance, you can train some of those reactions out. But I think the Stokes would totally concede, like, if someone you love dies, you're going to be sad. They're not saying that you can train yourself into not having those emotions. But there is some degree of agency, I would say, like, in the weeks and months afterwards.

9:35Yeah, I think we're both pointing to limited agency. Yes. And that there's a small, that between nothing is possible and everything is possible. There is a window. Yes. And we should cultivate virtue inside of that window. Yes. And I do wonder if we both might also then disagree with our culture's over-prioritization of a, you can't control what happens to you because of, I think one of the primary stories in our culture is a traumatic past. Is that we are so then pre-programmed because our bodies have kept the score that then that window of agency is even smaller and smaller. Yes. And I would say there's still meaningful action, but I think our therapeutic culture might disagree.

10:13Yeah.

10:14Ryan Holiday: And then also, you know, the system is rigged. Everything is systemic. You know, even this idea like historically, like, do you believe in sort of great men and women of history who have the power to change things? Or do you believe that everything is sort of happening as a result of these larger forces? And then there's even a third one, which is like, well, the arc of history bends in the right direction. Which is not at all what that meant. Yeah, as if it does this on its own. Exactly. As if it wasn't a statement about it. Oh, just watch it bend. Yeah, exactly. Let's clap. Yeah, I totally agree.

10:46I do think that in the conversations I'm in, you can only control how you respond is usually said to people with really acute suffering who then have to perform public cheerfulness and gratitude for the lessons they're learning. And so whenever I hear like a really sick or sad or struggling person have to land that point, I think that it's our culture's cruelty.

11:11Ryan Holiday: It is cruel. And sometimes I struggle with this, too. Like, you know, someone will ask if I'll sign one of my books for someone that's like just got a cancer diagnosis or somebody they know just died. And like, I just I'm like, that's like a lot to ask of me and this book. Like, even even if I think it could stand up. I also experienced this on Ego is the Enemy. It's like you're asking me to deliver a message for you. That's so true. Yeah. It's weird. You're puppet-handsing morality into somebody else's tragedy. Yeah. They're like, hey, listen to this person. Tell them. But I would totally agree with you that we have impossible expectations of people going through impossible situations.

11:55Ryan Holiday: Yeah. And that is pretty screwed up. I do think there's a Masters of the Universe story, though, that we have, particularly in the self-help genre, about. And I find myself reading like six magical routine steps to billionaire habits. He washes the dishes, you know, that we like hyper fixate on small things when really we are largely living inside of forces that we can't control. Yeah. And I mean, if anyone understood this, it would be the Stoics who weren't talking about, you know, little things, but talking about what happens when you live under a tyrant or you live through a plague or you live in a world where infant mortality is horrendously high.

12:38Ryan Holiday: Like one of Seneca's essays is him writing to his mother to console her after he's been exiled. And so you go, OK, they were dealing with some some real fit. And so so although he can talk to his mother this way, you probably shouldn't have told him and his mother, like, well, this could be the best thing that ever happens to you. That would be so insulting and demeaning. I'm excited for the lessons you'll learn. Yeah. I do think there is one piece, too, though, about over, like, I think in every philosophical or religious tradition, you can ask primarily, is this a head religion? Is this a heart religion?

13:18Is this a spirit religion? And stoicism is obviously a prioritization of the head and mind. But I think every now and then, when you're worried that your thoughts are not ordered, whether it's mental illness, whether it's memory loss toward the ends of life, I think some traditions, when they can step in, can be very comforting in saying we are not primarily our thought world. I mean, in the Christian tradition, we would say you're carried by a God who holds your understanding. So your self-understanding doesn't have to tell your story from beginning to end. And I think just depending on where you are and what season you are, a prioritization on thought is either going to be an enormous comfort as a possibility of action.

14:11Or it could be a terrifying thought that we have to be our own author and narrator.

14:17Ryan Holiday: So when someone is going through something, you know, gut-wrenching and overwhelming, you know, obviously showing up and doing their treatments or, you know, listening to the experts or whatever, that is part of it. But by and large, whether they survive or how it goes is not really up to them. Yeah. I mean, I'm just thinking of like all the cancer metaphors. Yes. I'm sure we both hate like you have to be a fighter. You have to, you know, as if every day you're just quietly willing the death of individual cancer cells. And it's complicated because obviously giving up doesn't help anything. Right.

14:52Ryan Holiday: And not listening and sort of having no spirit. But there are plenty of very spirited people who it got worse as the harder they fought. Right. Because it was that was what the cells preordained from the, you know, the moment that they this happened. But what what do you think a person should be thinking about in terms of a response? Well, I do remember the first advice I ever got was from a nurse. This is my first chemotherapy treatment. I didn't really know what it would feel like. I thought maybe I'd be in a target just passed out. Like I was just, you know, I was I was like really overwhelmed by what I should do and what this would require me.

15:30and the nurse leaned forward and she's like, I just know that some people take a nap and they never get up.

15:36Ryan Holiday: I'm like, do they die? Do they die? Here's a new thing to worry about all the time. Are they just tired? I was so confused. And I think that what that ingrained in me too early on was a sense that I always had to be doing the most or else I wasn't. And that's a kind of like... You had to be actively engaged against this. Heroic survivordom that didn't suit me well. I think it would have been much more sane and much more, just like the wiser choice is to have a stronger sense of my own limitations. Yeah. So, I don't know. In a way, it's a more sustainable sort of battle. And metaphors are bad here.

16:19Ryan Holiday: But you're fighting, but it's not this sort of active thing. It's the day-to-dayness of it that is the response. I mean, I think the gift of prudence, such a flick, and I know we both love it, but like the wisdom to know what is for when. And I think if I had the gift of prudence at that time, I would have known. Actually, there's some wonderful structure that's a really good idea if you're going through a really difficult time. I made rules for myself, like no sad music, period. No watching movies called The Women of Troy. It doesn't go well for them and they can mourn on their own for now. Try really hard to surround yourself with people who understand, who can read you and can keep pace with you emotionally.

17:03Take pleasure in small gifts like gummy bears and dumb things that can easily delight you. Yeah. But mostly be aware that every day you're you're you're a wind up toy that is about to run out. And if you treat yourself like you're unlimited, you'll ask something of yourself that no one else is asking of you.

17:21Ryan Holiday: Well, the interesting thing about that is like in some level you are saying like focus on what you control. It's just little things, you know, it's like little actions that you take day to day. Yeah. As opposed to go cure cancer. Yes. Go suddenly transform the personality of the surgeon who is mean to you. Yeah. You have to make this this big, enormous thing as opposed to primarily focusing on, say, conservation of energy and also, you know, showing up for however the moments that you are lucky enough to have as sometimes horrible as they are. You do have to participate with the thing that is unfolding.

18:01I really do believe that. So I am always looking for that place of limited agency inside of a big and terrible thing. But you just and sometimes there'll be moments where you really have to let yourself feel like you are being carried down the river farther than you wanted to go. But I think if you look, though, at the sticky notes on the monitors of all the nurses stations and most of the messaging you're going to get in the health care system, it is going to be like smile, chin up, better day, only optimists survive. And like you get this gritty fear that a spectrum of emotion is not going to be acceptable from you.