Chuck is in a wifi-free zone this week so unable to post a new Prokopton letter today, so we are reprising, by popular demand, his Backseat Drivers series.
You are driving down the highway with four kids in the backseat. Each kid is screaming at you asking you to do something.
“Go faster!”
“Go slower!”
“Turn left, I want to eat!”
“Turn right. I want to go to the bathroom.”
This keeps happening for the next few hours until you reach your destination. Listening to your backseat drivers could cause you to get into an accident. Even if it doesn’t, it will leave you stressed, and you may never want to drive with them as your passengers.
Our minds have backseat drivers, too. Their screams can be a lot worse than actual backseat drivers. We frequently get into trouble by listening to them and following their instructions.
Just as a good drive is a smooth, trouble-free car movement, “happiness is a good flow of life” (Zeno). Just as we can achieve a smooth drive by aligning our driving skills with the rules of the road, we can achieve a good flow of life by using the right reason and aligning it with the way things work (universal reason or logos).
Who, then, are our backseat drivers? Who is screaming from behind, making us change course? Stoics identified four of them: *foolishness, excess, cowardice, *and injustice. They called them vices. While we are driving smoothly on the highway of our life, these four backseat screamers distract us, goad us, make us go faster or slower, and make us change course. Because they scream loudly, we listen to them and act on what they demand. As a result, we lose our way, and our life no longer functions smoothly. Let’s look at the first backseat driver—folly or foolishness—here.
Foolishness is by far the loudest screamer of our backseat drivers. In fact, the remaining three backseat drivers take cues from the first one.
Every minute of every day, things happen around us—people walk past us, someone says something to us, a car speeds up, a child cries, the traffic light changes and so on. We also experience things that are internal to us—hunger pangs, thirst, and the like. We don’t just observe these ‘impressions’ but interpret them as meaning something: A person walking by us is ignoring us, the food we are presented does not taste good, etc. Some of these stimuli demand a response. For example, someone does not look where they are going and bumps into us. How do we respond? Do we overlook it? Are we annoyed? Our acts are foolish when we fail to act appropriately. What does it mean to act foolishly? From a practical point of view,
Foolishness is not knowing what to do and what not to and what does not matter one way or the other.
In other words, we need to,
…know
what is good, what is bad, and what is neither.(based on Diogenes Laertius, 7.92; Stobaeus 2.5b1).
How can we know what to do and what not to do? Consider situations like these.
You just lost your job. What should you do, and what should you not do? Should you be angry with your boss or the company you work for? Should you vent your anger at someone else? Should you get depressed?
You can hear your backseat driver screaming: “The stupid company you work for, they don’t care for their employees.”
Your spouse just said they are about to leave you. What should you do, and what should you not do? Should you be angry with your spouse? Should you vent your anger at someone else? Should you get depressed?
Your backseat driver is screaming: “You gave everything to your spouse. Look what happened! You have the right to be angry.”
You are diagnosed with cancer. What should you do, and what should you not do? Should you feel sorry for yourself? Should you regret not taking better care of yourself?
Your backseat driver is screaming: “Why did I get cancer? Why me? This is unfair!”
What should we do? Should we take instructions from our backseat driver? How do we decide what is appropriate action and what is not? How can we tell what we should or should not do? The answer to this question relates to the basic tenet of Stoicism:
Some things in the world are up to us, while others are not.Encheiridion 1—Epictetus,
*What is up to us? *Everything created by our minds, such as what we desire and we try to avoid, our intention to act one way or another, our judgments, and the like.
*What is not up to us? *Everything not created by our minds, such as our body, our wealth, our reputation, what happens in the world, and the like.
When we fail to distinguish between what we control and what we don’t, we act inappropriately, thus foolishly. Suppose you lose your job unexpectedly. You may worry about it and fail to enjoy your dinner and the weekend that follows it. You may fail to act on what you could do following your job loss, such as updating your resume, calling employment agencies, letting future employers know about your availability, and so on. If we analyze our reactions, we see that we are not acting upon what is up to us (enjoying our dinner, relaxing over the weekend, taking actions that will increase our chances of getting a job) but, rather, acting on (in this case, worrying about) what is not under our control: losing our job. We misjudge the impressions, and this is foolishness.
When our backstreet driver screams and says we should be depressed because we lost our job, we should be angry because our spouse is leaving us, or feel self-pity because of a medical diagnosis, if we follow the advice of our backstreet driver, we are being foolish. Why? Because we are trying to control what is not under our control. Being depressed will not bring back our job. Being angry will not make our spouse change their mind. Self-pity will not cure cancer.
What happens when you listen to your backseat driver and act foolishly? You become,
[…] frustrated, pained, and troubled, and you will find fault with gods and men. — Epictetus,Encheiridion 1
If you refuse to listen to your backstreet driver and act only on what you can control rather than what you cannot,
No one will ever put pressure on you; no one will impede you; you will not reproach anyone; you will not blame anyone; you will not do a single thing reluctantly; no one will harm you, and you will have no enemy because nothing harmful will happen to you. — Epictetus,Encheiridion 1
And the penalty for continuing to be foolish by trying to control what we cannot while neglecting to act on what is under our control? Again, according to Epictetus, there’s no penalty. But you will continue
[…] to be just the way you are: miserable when alone and unhappy when with others. — Epictetus,Encheiridion 12
Because foolishness is the loudest of our backseat screamers, we need to learn how to ignore it*.* The remaining three screamers are related to this one. Just by silencing this screamer, we can get rid of most worries about the past and anxieties about the future. And yet, getting rid of anxieties and worries is not enough. After all, psychopaths and sociopaths may not worry about what they have done or be anxious about what they will do. That does not necessarily make them joyful. To be truly joyful, we also need to deal with the other three screamers, which we will talk about in my future posts.
We have four backseat drivers: foolishness, excess, cowardice, and injustice. Their job is to distract us away from a life of happiness.
The most distracting of all our backseat drivers is foolishness. Foolishness is not knowing what to do, what not to do, and what doesn’t matter.
We act foolishly when we try to control things that are not under our control, such as what others think, feel, or do or what happens in the world.
We also act potentially foolishly when we don’t act on what is in our control.
We should ignore the foolish backseat driver. Instead, when something happens that negatively affects us, we should ask ourselves the question, “Is what happened under my control?” If not, then ask, “What
isunder my control?” and choose that action.
Sit in a quiet place with a pen and paper. Write down everything that you are annoyed about, worried about, or anxious about. Review it to see how many are in your direct control. If everything is under your control, what is there to worry about? If it is not, what is the use of being annoyed, worried, or anxious? Isn’t it foolish?
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