Be the doctor of your soul

Practice self-sufficiency. Don’t remain a dependent malleable patient: Become your own soul’s doctor. These lines, inspired by Epictetus, are from my book The Art of Living: The Classical Manual on Virtue, Happiness, and Effectiveness.

I repeatedly return to this admonition as a bulwark against cacophonous media reports of a surging pandemic with no apparent end in sight, an economy in tatters, and a culture convulsing with fear, anger, and grief.

Your mind is your own

During this tumultuous chapter in our body politic, it’s best to stay grounded in basic truths and simple remedies. Reminding ourselves to return repeatedly to the principle that no matter how unstable or chaotic conditions are outside ourselves, knowing that our minds are always our own is good medicine. It is useful to literally state this to ourselves regularly: “My mind is my own.”

Be a guardian of your integrity

We must also be the doctors of our own souls, where our character resides. Yes, we know this. I like to think I know this. Still, it is an act of will, when I am infected by anxiety based on external events over which I have no control—e.g., right now I can’t make Trump concede to Biden—to rein myself in and to remind myself that I need to be the guardian of my own integrity. That’s my business to attend to. And my life immediately gets better, and my soul is healthier for attending to my own business. As each of us focuses on safeguarding our own integrity, integrity as a societal value is affirmed and magnified in the outside world.

Self-sufficiency is an exquisite gift

Self-sufficiency is an exquisite gift we can give to ourselves. It’s always there for the taking. We can just decide in an instant to grow up. We pick ourselves up by our whiny little necks and say: “Enough!” What a delightful sense of liberation we experience when we choose just to let go of blaming other people and circumstances for the conditions we find ourselves in. It’s ironic how heavily burdensome the feeling of powerlessness is. We can reclaim our power simply by deciding to do so.

The benefits of embracing selfsufficiency multiply across all areas of our lives, including our physical health. Feeling like we don’t have control over our lives makes us sick and hurts those we love by our—however unwitting— transmission of discord and helplessness to others.

We shape the quality of our lives

The quality of our lives and our destinies is on us to shape. It is always our choice to turn away from aimlessness and weakness and instead turn towards purpose and strength. We do not have to be felled by doubt and fear. What we accept in our minds is up to us. What we choose to give our attention to is ours to pick. Our moral rutter is our own to steer.

Serenity in the wake of selfsufficiency

Serenity is the bonus gift that spontaneously appears in the wake of self-sufficiency’s embrace. Investing in our self-sufficiency does indeed yield massive returns.

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Sharon Lebell is the author of The Art of Living: The Classic Manual on Virtue, Happiness, and Effectiveness, the first modern interpretation of Epictetus’ teachings. She Tweets@SharonLebell.

 

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