The problem with avoiding the unpleasant 

What is wrong with avoiding things that are unpleasant or dangerous? 

There is nothing wrong with avoiding things that are harmful or preferring one thing over another. In many cases, it may be an intelligent thing to do. If you see a speeding car when you are crossing the street, it is smart to get out of its way. If you are in a burning house, it is safer to get out quickly. If you are walking home at night, you may be better off avoiding rough areas. 

We cannot stop unpleasant things from happening 

The problem arises when we don’t have control over things that might happen. If we are averse to what is almost certain such as illness, old age, or death, we are bound to suffer. When our aversions to external things are too many or too intense, two things happen: our world shrinks and we lose our freedom. Neither is conducive to the good life. 

“Well, what’s wrong with being here in a cage?” 

“What a silly question! I was born to fly as I please, to live in the open air and sing. You want to take away all that from me and then ask, ‘What’s wrong with being here in a cage?’” 

Epictetus, Discourses 4.1 (Chuck Chakrapani, Stoic Freedom, Ch.1) 

Fear of unpleasant things shrinks your world 

The first reason to be careful about our aversions is that they shrink our world. When we are averse to many things—broccoli, crowds, loud people, foreigners, poor economic conditions, and the list can be very long—our choices narrow, and we are less free to act. Even when our aversions are simple and harmless (such as your dislike for broc-coli or long queues), when we have too many of them, we try to avoid them and, as a result, start living in a prison of our own making 

What is wrong with living in such a self-made prison? Maybe nothing, but the Stoics conceived a life of freedom, fearlessness, and openness—a life that is the opposite of being in a self-made prison. The Stoic way of life does not include living with unnecessary self-made restrictions. 

Fear of unpleasant things can run your life 

The second reason to be careful about our aversions is that they are fears of things big and small; they start running our life. For example, let’s say we are excessively concerned about job security. We become fearful of losing our job and do whatever it takes to keep it—even when what we do is unethical or conflicts with other values we cherish. Our fears—fear of losing our job, fear of losing our loved ones, fear of old age, fear of unfamiliar things and people, and the like—take over our life. Just as we lose our freedom when we give in to excessive desires, so we lose our freedom when we give in to excessive aversions. 

There is no limit to our sorrows if we indulge our fears to the greatest possible extent. 

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This is the eighteenth excerpt from our 10-week course on Stoicism. The book covering all course material, readings, and exercises is available from https://amzn.to/2Ck0fje. 

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