“I can’t get no satisfaction!”

Keith Richards apparently came up with the idea for the song in his sleep. Mick Jagger then wrote the lyrics by a hotel pool in Clearwater, Florida.

“When I’m drivin’ in my car, and the man come on the radio
He’s tellin’ me more and more about some useless information
Supposed to fire my imagination

I can’t get no, oh, no, no, no, hey, hey, hey
That’s what I say
I can’t get no satisfaction, I can’t get no satisfaction.”

The words describe a man who goes through life, never feeling satisfied. One reason why the song became so popular, apart from the catchy tune of course, was the fact that it evoked a familiar feeling among many of its fans.

I usually can’t get no satisfaction either. Despite trying. And trying.

What does Mick Jagger and a catchy song from the 1960’s have to do with Buddhism you might ask? On first look, not much, but if you really dig deep down, it has everything to do with it.

For it can help you understand one of Buddhism’s most important concepts: dukkha.

Suffering, not getting satisfaction, unease

Dukkha comes from the ancient Indian language of Sanskrit, and is often translated as “suffering”. While suffering is the most common word used in English for the concept of dukkha, it doesn’t capture the whole meaning.

Rather, dukkha is a sort of existential angst that comes from living life. Suffering, lack of satisfaction, unease, are all words that can be used to get a grasp of what dukkha means.

See where Mick Jagger comes in? Despite being a famous rock star, and having the world at his feet, he still can’t get no satisfaction. That’s how life basically is. Despite having what you need, you always crave for more.

The Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta is a Buddhist text which allegedly records Siddharta Gautama’s first sermon. In it, the Buddha defines what dukkha is:

“Birth is dukkha, aging is dukkha, death is dukkha; sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair are dukkha; association with the unbeloved is dukkha; separation from the loved is dukkha; not getting what is wanted is dukkha. In short, the five clinging-aggregates are dukkha.” — Buddha

While mental suffering that comes from objective factors such as death or physical pain are dukkha, much of the anguish that comes with dukkha is actually self-inflicted. It comes from various cravings you have.

You want to be rich and famous, but are stuck working the late shift at McDonald’s? That’s dukkha.

You are working hard 24/7 trying to deliver on deadlines, but you still get passed over on the promotion? Again dukkha.

You are trying to be a good person, but some bad person makes a false accusation against you and trips you up? Dukkha.

All of these examples point at different types of sufferings, dissatisfactions, or unease. Yet, they are all examples of dukkha. You have certain hopes and expectations about life, but they turn out to be untrue. You have certain cravings, but they don’t get fulfilled. That’s all part of living in the world.

This is what Buddha realized when he was sitting under that bodhi tree two and a half thousand years ago. Life is not very pleasant. Life is suffering, both mental and physical.

You grow old. People die. You want something, but don’t get it. You suffer injustice. Instead of money, life gives you lemons. And despite trying hard to make lemonade, you just end up with some awfully tasting liquid.

Yup, shit sucks…

Life is fleeting, and your mind leads you astray

The most frustrating thing about life is that it passes. Sometimes, you might actually even experience a happy moment. That’s the problem though. It’s just a moment. It passes. Then back to bad old suffering.

This process describes one of the three marks of existence. Impermanence, or in Buddhist language anicca. The other mark has to do with your own changing self. While the word anatta, or no-self, is interpreted differently in various Buddhist traditions, the crux has to do with the fact you don’t have a permanent self. It’s always changing. Life is change.

One time you are up. The other down. This causes suffering. This causes dukkha. However, let’s take a deep dive into what is actually at the root of this. It’s your tendency to cling. To want what you can’t have. To worry about stuff you can’t control.

With this realization, you can also start applying what the Buddhists see as the solution to all these problems. As one of my favorite Buddhist texts the Dhammapada says, it’s all in the mind.

“All that we are is the result of what we have thought: it is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts.”— Verse 1 of Buddha’s Dhammapada

The stuff you want, or must have, are an illusion. You don’t actually need them. It’s just your mind leading you astray.

Realizing this, and always keeping it in mind when shit hits the fan, you are on your way to navigating the bad stuff life throws at you. You might never reach Enlightenment, but that’s OK.

Keeping perspective can help you lead a life that is much less unsatisfactory than what other people experience. Even billionaires, or rock stars. Sounds unbelievable, but it’s true.

Just look at how many rock stars die of drug overdoses. They have the money. They have the fame. They are doing what they always dreamed of doing. Yet, they are still unhappy. They still can’t get no satisfaction. So they drown themselves in alcohol and drugs.

Life is about having a good axle

According to some linguists, the word dukkha comes from the old Sanskrit word for axle hole. More than three millennia ago, Aryan tribes from the plains in the north invaded India and took over much of the country.

That’s why Sanskrit and many of the northern Indian languages like modern Hindi are much more closely related to languages like English, German, or Russian, then they are to the Dravidian languages of southern India. Some Indo-European tribes went west, and became Europeans. Others went south, and became Indians.

Initially, these tribes were nomadic, and the center of their world were carts drawn by horses and oxes. These were on wheels, connected through axles. You can imagine having good axles was incredibly important. With good axles, you could travel long distances. On bad axles, you couldn’t.

Bad axle holes became the source of the word dukkha. Good axle holes became the source of another word, sukha. This is having an authentic state of happiness, as opposed to the existential suffering and unease you get with dukkha.

It’s not easy to experience sukha, while dukkha is basically your everyday state. Understanding the origin of these words, gave me a new perspective on what you need in life. All you need is a good axle, and you can travel great distances!

And even if you end up with a bad axle, that still isn’t the end of the world. People get dealt shitty cards in life all the time. It’s how you deal with it that counts. Just get as far as you can.

While not actually being Buddhists, guys like Albert Camus or Viktor Frankl came up with ways to overcome a life of dukkha. One had you smile in defiance of life’s struggles, just like Sisyphus smiles doing his never-ending backbreaking task. The other had you find meaning in your suffering. Both of these are good strategies to adopt.

Steps to overcoming a life of dukkha

The first thing you need to do is accept how life is. It’s not perfect. Stuff you want, you will not always get. Your best laid plans will usually come to nothing. Despite your hard work.

The key is to be realistic about this. It will make things hurt a lot less in the end. As Lama Surya Das says in his book Awakening the Buddha Within, life is difficult.

“What Buddhism does say is that life, by its nature, is difficult, flawed, and imperfect. That’s the nature of life, and that’s the First Noble Truth. From the Buddhist point of view, this is not a judgement of life’s joys and sorrows; this is a simple, down-to-earth, matter-of-fact description.” — Lama Surya Das

So the first step is understanding how life is and accepting it. This is already huge. Getting a perspective on the nature of life, is half the battle. Most people never even get here.

The second step is living with this knowledge. Meditation can help. It can calm your mind, but also aid you to reach higher levels of understanding. Life is a prison, but much of it is self-imposed.

The third step is thus to get rid of attachments. Your views about what you need to do, what you want, and what you must have are what is holding you down. You should shift your perspective. About yourself and the world.

Of course, you can go full in and become a Buddhist, and spend your time in meditation and prayer. And maybe if you are lucky, you will achieve Nirvana that way.

Just keep in mind that different Buddhist traditions have different ideas on this. The Theravada Buddhists, the old-school ones in places like Sri Lanka or Thailand, believe you can escape life and reach this blissful state.

However, the Mahayana Buddhists, which are basically the majority of the different schools in places like Tibet, China, and Japan, believe that no one can reach the state of Nirvana, until everyone does.

For me, learning about dukkha has been incredibly enlightening. While I don’t consider myself a Buddhist, these teachings gave me a great perspective on how the world works. I have combined them with insights from other traditions and philosophers, and they help me navigate the different complexities of life in this world.

Maybe they can do the same for you.

An earlier version of this article was originally published on “Medium” here.
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There are a lot of Buddha quotes going around the internet, but not all of them were actually said by him. The Buddhist tradition is vast, but there are some general texts that many people agree as accurately reflecting his teachings. One of these is the “Dhammapada”.

This is a book of the basic sayings of the Buddha. The “Dhammapada” is especially favored in the Theravada Buddhist tradition, which is prevalent in Sri Lanka and South-East Asia. However, you don’t have to be a Buddhist in order to learn from its wisdom. Many lay people have also turned to it in order to find guidance.

Personally, I have read through the book several times, highlighting passages that speak to me. It’s a fast read, but every time I read it, I get a different perspective on things. If you are facing some sort of a problem in life, often you can find a solution there. Below I share some of my favorite quotes from the “Dhammapada”, and how I have interpreted them to help me in my life.

Lesson 1: Everything Springs from Your Thoughts

“All that we are is the result of what we have thought: it is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts.”
— Verse 1

The “Dhammapada” begins with one fundamental observation of human behavior. Everything that you are is a result of your thoughts. Suffering follows bad thoughts, while happiness follows good thoughts.

Social Psychologist Jonathan Haidt in his book “The Happiness Hypothesis” uses the metaphor of a rider and an elephant to show how the mind works. The elephant signifies the irrational part of your mind, the one which does things automatically and based on emotions. The rider sitting on top of the animal is the rational part of the mind. He is supposed to control the elephant, your brain’s irrational thoughts. However, usually the rider does not succeed, and your mind does whatever it wants.

This metaphor of the mind is quite ancient. It comes directly from Buddhist scriptures, but interestingly even Cicero used a similar way of describing the mind. The idea is for the rider to have the ability to tame the elephant. There are some tools that you can use to do that. One tool to reframe your mind comes from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), and is called the ABC Method. It’s a way to transform your negative beliefs into positive ones.

I use this type of reframe when I am stuck in a bad spot. Having read through Buddhist books like the “Dhammapada”, and learned about Buddhist techniques, I noticed how similar many of them are to CBT. And indeed, psychologists have shown that they can be used concurrently together for a beneficial effect.

Lesson 2: Conquering Yourself is the Hardest Battle

“Though one may conquer a thousand times a thousand men in battle, yet he indeed is the noblest victor who conquers himself.”
— Verse 103

Conquering yourself is the hardest battle that you will ever fight in your life. There have been countless times in my past when my greatest enemy was myself. I have discovered that going through your existence, you sabotage yourself at every step.

This is one of the main lessons that the Buddha and the “Dhammapada” tried to hammer home. Just like in “Star Wars” when Luke descended into the cave on Dagobah in order to fight a great evil, but found out that he had actually fought himself.

It’s only by effort, discipline, and self-mastery that you can overcome this tendency to self-sabotage yourself.

“By effort and heedfulness, discipline and self-mastery, let the wise one make of himself an island which no flood can overwhelm.”
— Verse 25

Those who only live for constant gratification have weak willpower and get overpowered by emotions easily.

“He who lives looking for pleasures only, his senses uncontrolled, immoderate in his food, idle, and weak, the tempter will certainly overthrow him, as the wind throws down a weak tree.” — Verse 7

Reading through the book of Buddha’s lessons, one thought keeps repeating itself. The person who lives only looking for pleasure, will end up ultimately unhappy. This wisdom is at the basis of the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism. Suffering is caused by craving.

While this was true for the ancient world, it becomes even more pertinent in the modern world. If you live in the First World, you don’t have to worry about many of the things that your ancestors did. You live in a comfort that the previous generations could only dream of.

Yet, with this, we are also seeing a wave of materialism, and of craving for instant gratification. While in the past, most people understood that reward only comes with hard work, many people in the current generation haven’t learned that lesson. They crave constant satisfaction, and have weak willpower. This leads to the many problems of today such as obesity, drug addiction, and selfishness.

“He who lives without looking for pleasures, his senses well controlled, moderate in his food, faithful and strong, him temper will certainly not overthrow, any more than the wind throws down a rocky mountain.” — Verse 8

The “Dhammapada” gives a good solution for this modern problem. Stop looking for pleasures, control your senses, and moderate your wants. This is what will make you happy. As Socrates used to say, self-discipline is the key to happiness. Willpower is at the basis of all this. The people who have more of it, tend to be more successful.

In 1972, a group of scientists at Stanford University administered a simple test to a group of kids. A marshmallow was put in front of them. They were told that if they could wait a certain period of time without eating the treat, they would get another tasty snack. If they ate it before the time was up, then they would get nothing else.

As happens with kids, some of them ate the marshmallow before the time was up, while others waited and got the second treat. However, what is even more interesting are the findings of the follow-up to the test. According to a subsequent study of the kids as they grew up, scientists found that the ones who waited tended to have better outcomes in life.

“Those 4-year-old children who delayed gratification longer in certain laboratory situations developed into more cognitively and socially competent adolescents, achieving higher scholastic performance and coping better with frustration and stress.”

This shows how important your individual willpower is for good things to happen in your life.

A trained mind brings happiness.

A trained mind can even overcome pain, whether mental or physical. Scientific studies of physical pain have shown that the perception of pain is not objective, but instead based on various mental processes, such as beliefs or feelings. The same process applies to mental pain as well. As studies have demonstrated, perceived stress is also varied according to subjective matters.

Many successful athletes have risen to the top of their disciplines, not because of their physical prowess, but due to their mental capabilities. They were able to garner techniques to overcome physical pain, and apply them to their crafts.

“The mind is very hard to check and swift, it falls on what it wants. The training of the mind is good, a mind so tamed brings happiness.” — Verse 35

Playing sports and hiking in the mountains have also allowed me to discover the power of mind over matter. I used to be a quitter, quitting at any slight inkling of pain, however over time I have learned to control these urges to quit. It has helped me to achieve things that even a few years previously I would have found impossible.

Rain cannot penetrate a house that is well-thatched.

“As rain does never penetrate a house that is well-thatched, passion will not break through a well-reflecting mind.” Verse 14

As Charles Duhigg, author of the book “The Power of Habit” states, much of your life is based on habits, whether negative or positive. A large portion of what you do is automatic. If you create positive habits, and stick to them, you can build a well-thatched mental house that rain will never penetrate. This is the secret to success. Duhigg noted in his book that champions don’t do extraordinary things, they just follow good habits that they have learned:

“Champions don’t do extraordinary things. They do ordinary things, but they do them without thinking, too fast for the other team to react. They follow the habits they’ve learned.”

Lesson 3: Find What Truly Matters

“They who imagine truth in untruth, and see untruth in truth, never arrive at truth, but follow vain desires.” — Verse 11

Buddhists have the goal of becoming a better person and seeing the world more clearly. For that, you cannot wallow in vain desires. You also cannot fall for your cognitive biases, and see truth in untruth. This is especially pertinent in the current modern age, where many people have a tendency to fall for all kinds of conspiracy theories, or other untruths.

“They who know truth in truth, and untruth in untruth, arrive at truth, and follow true desires.” — Verse 12

When I was younger, I used to think that the point of life was to get a good job, get money, and rise up in position, gaining more power. I have come to realize that the quest for fame and fortune that many people undertake is actually poison.

There are much more important things in life. It doesn’t matter how many Rolls Royces you drive, or how many famous people you took selfies with. When you realize that, much of the stress that you are feeling evaporates as if by magic. You start seeing value in the simple things, and are much happier as a result. Find what truly matters, and you are half-way there to feeling satisfied.

“Let the fool wish for a false reputation, for precedence among his peers, for lordship in the convents, for worship among other people!” — Verse 73

Lesson 4: Meditation Can Help to Open Up Your Mind

“He who is earnest and meditative, obtains ample joy.”
— Verse 27

Many Buddhists have made meditation a part of their daily routine. It helps them to keep a stable mind, and get leveled in a world full of distractions and pain. As noted by Robert Wright, lecturer at a popular online course on Buddhism and psychology, there are different types of meditation. The Tibetans focus on mental images, Zen Buddhists think about koans, and Thai Theravada adherents follow their internal mental processes.

While the techniques might be different, they all try to achieve similar goals. The aim is to stop your mind from ruminating, worrying about the past and the future, and instead allowing it to be free. You are supposed to be in the moment: be here now.

In recent years, scientists have started noticing the benefits that meditation brings to a person’s mind. Research has discovered that your brain can change. This is called neuroplasticity. In her TEDx Talk, neuroscientist Lara Boyd described that the best driver of changes in your brain is your own behavior.

For example, a study on taxi drivers in London has discovered that due to their need to be constantly orientated in space, and know all the different streets in the city, their posterior hippocampi region of the brain had grown much larger in comparison to normal people.

Studies have proven that meditation works in a similar way. It changes your brain. Not only does the structure of your brain change after thousands of hours of intense meditation, you also develop some cool powers. When advanced Buddhist practitioners were examined, their brains experienced intense surges of gamma oscillations. Of course this doesn’t mean that you can crush buildings just with the power of your thoughts. Instead this allows you to feel intense awareness.

Another study showed that you don’t even need to be an advanced practitioner to have benefits. A group of people went through an 8-week meditation retreat. At the end of the experience, they were given influenza vaccinations. When compared to the control group, their bodies showed increased levels of antibodies. This could be an interesting finding very relevant for the current pandemic times.

Regular meditation and mindfulness training can also help you to better regulate your emotions. The amygdala is a part of your brain that plays a huge role in stress responses. In this particular study, once again a group was tested after an 8-week meditation practice. The people in the group showed reduced perceived stress levels. Further studies have found other similar types of benefits.

While meditation can be very beneficial, the fact is that it is difficult. Sitting down every day and concentrating on being mindful is incredibly hard. However, doing hard things is how you learn the most. According to Lara Boyd’s scientific research, the more you struggle at practice, the more you learn, and the more your brain changes:

“And in fact, my research has shown increased difficulty, increased struggle if you will, during practice, actually leads to both more learning, and greater structural change in the brain.”

This of course applies not just for meditation, but any activity. Unfortunately, I have still not had the discipline or willpower to make meditation a part of my daily routine. However, I have tried to incorporate mindfulness in my life in other ways.

For me, I found that I experience mindfulness, or being present in the moment, when I go on hikes in the mountains. As you go higher and higher, things become progressively harder. In order to progress, you need to put thoughts away from your mind, and be in the moment. You could call it my own walking meditation.

Lesson 5: All Created Things Perish

“All created things perish. He who knows and sees this becomes passive in pain; this is the way that leads to purity.” — Verse 277

One thing that you should always keep in mind is your own mortality. As the Buddha in the “Dhammapada” said, all created things perish. The Stoics had a similar technique called “memento mori” or remembering that you will die. They would use it to ground themselves.

Buddhism teaches that the world is constantly changing. This is at the root of the Buddhist concept of impermanence. You are never the same self. You were different when you were small, and you will be different in the future. You are constantly changing. Your mind is constantly changing. Even the cells in your body are constantly changing. On average, your cells are replaced every 7 to 10 years! Keep that mind in order to gain perspective.

The main lesson to take away from Buddha’s teaching is to let go of your ego. Different Buddhist traditions view the final way to look at the “self” a bit differently. From “no self” to the “big mind”, the idea is to change how you view your being.

Lesson 6: Don’t Let Hatred and Anger Overcome You

“”He abused me, he beat me, he defeated me, he robbed me,” — in those who harbor such thoughts hatred will never cease.” — Verse 3

I bet that you have uttered the first part of Verse 3 of the “Dhammapada” quite a few times in your life. You got mad at someone, and kept repeating to yourself all the bad things that they did to you, sometimes real, but often imaginary.

The brain has the tendency to exaggerate things out of proportion, and that is usually at the root of the conflicts that you engage in. Certain people can get angry at the slightest provocation. You might even be a person who is prone to chronic anger. This type of behavior can lead to hate. And as Yoda has often stated, hate leads to the Dark Side.

Buddhism is all about letting go of this dark side. It teaches you to acquire balance and mental peace. Techniques like meditation can help you to become a more level-headed person, one at peace with themselves and the world. Forgiveness and gratitude are the things you need to cultivate.

“Conquer anger by non-anger. Conquer evil by good. Conquer miserliness by liberality. Conquer a liar by truthfulness.” — Verse 223

Those who try to get ahead by hurting others, will never be happy.

“He who seeks his own happiness by hurting or killing beings, never finds happiness and will not escape from his sufferings.” — Verse 131

The thing about anger and hurting others is that while it might feel good temporarily, in the long run it is counter-productive. You become an angry hateful person. This will bring you more and more mental anguish and suffering, something that Buddhism says is the bane of existence. If you want to be truly happy, then you need to escape this cycle of anger and hate.

Lesson 7: Better Than A Thousand Hollow Words is One Word that Brings Peace

“Better than a thousand hollow words is one word that brings peace.”
— Verse 100

During the last few years, our planet seems to be descending further and further into chaos. There are countless conflicts around the world, and even the streets of the United States have been mired in violence. Nature is disappearing at an alarming pace. In the last year, we have been faced with images of the Amazon burning, Siberian forests being chopped down, Australian nature disappearing in an apocalyptic blaze, and the oceans being full of plastic.

David Attenborough’s 94 years on Earth have allowed him to witness how fast nature has receded. In his Netflix documentary “David Attenborough: A Life on Our Planet”, he produced some frightening statistics. One frightening fact is that throughout his lifetime the entire animal population on our planet has been reduced by half!

People have said that one aspect of achieving enlightenment in Buddhism is through realizing how interconnected everything is. For Zen Buddhists, this is the essence of the “big mind”. Rather than focusing on how different we are, and always looking out for our own selfish interests, we need to start looking out for each other. Humans love to argue. They love drama and conflict. However, that should not be the way. We are all connected at the end.

One of the most powerful lessons I have taken away from the “Dhammapada” is that it is better to say one word that brings peace, instead of a thousand hollow words that bring turmoil.

How I Apply the Wisdom of The “Dhammapada” in My Life

“Better it is to live one day wise and meditative than to live a hundred years foolish and uncontrolled.”
— Verse 111

I am a person who likes to read a lot. My goal is to learn about the world and myself. I try to pick and choose different things from various traditions. Buddhism has been one of the pillars of my mental toolbox. I don’t consider myself a Buddhist, but I have adopted much of the wisdom that comes from that philosophy.

The “Dhammapada” is one of the books that I like to read from time to time. When I am facing a difficult period in my life, I find that it helps me to gain perspective. I take certain passages, and then combine them with other things that I have come across in order to find a solution to my problem.

I keep a journal, and write down in it the passages that speak to me. This might be the way to go for you. Or it might not. The great thing about reading the “Dhammapada” is that every experience is different. Reading the text with a particular problem in mind can illuminate certain passages. As is often said, the answer you get depends on the question you ask.

Maybe you want to gain a deeper understanding of the teachings of the Buddha. Remember that in order to gain a fuller view of the meaning, it is always good to consult various sources. That’s what I usually do.

The translator of one of the editions of the “Dhammapada” advises the same thing:

“As always when studying Buddhism, it is recommended to compare different editions, and read related texts if you want to understand what the Buddha really meant to say.”

This story was originally published on “Medium” here.

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“Taoism extols the virtue of flexibility. What survives on Earth is what effortlessly adapts to the changing environment and changing circumstances.” — Ernie J. Zelinski

Founded around 500 BC, Taoism is a Chinese philosophy that focuses on living in harmony with the “Tao”, which can be translated as “the way”, “the path”, or “the road”.

In many ways, it is a perfect guide to a person’s journey through life. Taoism is all about floating effortlessly amid the different things happening in the world. It is a mindset that allows you to adapt to your changing environment and your shifting circumstances.

American spiritual teacher Frederick Lenz described Taoism as having no rules:

“It’s a suggestion for perceiving life in its wholeness, without unnecessary categorization, yet enjoying the beauty of categorization.”

Tao is a paradox. It’s about not having categorization but enjoying the beauty of categorization. It’s like Schrodinger’s cat problem of quantum physics, where the cat is both dead and alive inside the box.

For a modern, logic-based mind this is hard to comprehend. However, to physicist Fritjof Capra this paradoxical view is the very essence of nature.

Only now with the advent of quantum physics has science started to analyze the paradoxical nature of the universe.

As Capra states: “Whenever the essential nature of things is analyzed by the intellect, it must seem absurd or paradoxical. This has always been recognized by the mystics, but has become a problem in science only very recently.”

The founding of Taoism is traditionally attributed to Lao Tzu, a Chinese philosopher, and mystic. He is credited with writing the “Tao Te Ching”, the fundamental text of Taoism.

Lao Tzu is often regarded as an ancient sage, whose wisdom transcended the ages. His sayings have served as a guide for people who wanted to know how to conduct their life.

In many ways, contemplating the teachings of master Lao Tzu will open up your mind, and allow you to gain a new perspective on yourself and the world.

Master Yourself

“Knowing others is intelligence, knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength, mastering yourself is true power.” — Lao Tzu

Lao Tzu’s teachings reflect the lessons that many wise sages from around the world have discovered. You are your greatest friend, but also your greatest enemy.

If you want to master others, first you need to master yourself. While knowing others might make you smart, knowing yourself will bring true wisdom.

Self-reflection is what will lead to self-mastery. Engaging in meta-cognition, and being aware of your thoughts and why you think them is a crucial skill to have.

Attaining mastery over yourself is both physical and mental. However, most people make excuses not to do it.

The thing is not to remain complacent. Life isn’t about comfort zones. Don’t tell lies to yourself. Better yourself instead.

“A self-willed man has no other aim than his own growth.” — Bruce Lee

If you go to public parks in China, you will see groups of old people doing exercises. Many of them will be practicing t’ai chi, while others are engaging in some other form of exercise.

They are working on attaining physical and mental mastery over themselves, even in old age. This type of mindset is what gives you true power.

Gain wisdom

“To attain knowledge, add things every day.
To attain wisdom, remove things every day.” — Lao Tzu

Learning about the world happens in paradoxical ways. In order to attain knowledge, you need to add things every day. You have to be constantly reading, writing, and discovering.

However to attain wisdom, you need to remove things every day. At first this might be hard to grasp, but you will get a picture of what this means once you look at some Zen stories.

In one such famous tale, an important man used to being in charge, came to a Zen master wanting to learn what it is all about.

Looking sternly at the master, he said: “I have come today to ask you to teach me about Zen. Open my mind to enlightenment.”

The Zen master just smiled at him and said that they should discuss the matter over a cup of delicious tea.

The master then set a cup in front of the man and started pouring. The tea rose to the rim, but the master kept on pouring.

Soon, the tea was overflowing, spilling all over the table, until it started getting onto the important man’s clothes.

“Stop! Enough! Stop pouring! Can’t you see that the cup is full?” yelled the man.

This instantly brought a smile to the master’s face. He stopped pouring and said: “You are like this tea cup, so full that nothing more can be added. Come back to me when the cup is empty.”

Zen (Chan) Buddhism was greatly influenced by Taoism and reflects many of the key precepts of the Way of the Tao. Several of the things you learn in Zen, also apply for Taoism.

One concept in Zen is the beginner’s mind. You need to let go of your preconceived notions and open up yourself to the world.

Get rid of your anger, biases, and ego.

When you attain wisdom, you will see that you need less, not more. You don’t need to chase after riches or fame. Life is about living simply.

Several more of Lao Tzu’s quotes show what it means to be wise:

* “Wise men don’t need to prove their point. Men who need to prove their point aren’t wise.”
* “The mark of a moderate man is freedom from his own ideas.”
* “The wise man is one who knows, what he does not know.”

Practice without practicing

“Act without act. Work without work.” — Lao Tzu

If you want to go on a journey, you always need to take the first step. As Lao Tzu said: “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”

It is practice that is the important part of your life journey. The destination itself doesn’t matter that much.

However, in practice you need to separate hard work from smart work. Smashing about mindlessly might be hard work, but it is not smart work.

As the first part of Chapter 64 of the “Tao Te Ching” reminds us, you need to solve problems when they are still small. If you want to succeed you have to do the difficult things when they are still easy.

Act without acting, and work without working.

For Taoism, this means going with the flow. Alan Watts, the British author who popularized Eastern religions and philosophy in the West gave the example of boats in water in order to illustrate what going with the flow means.

If you have a rowboat, you need to struggle and use all your power to go against the water. However, if you have a sail, then you don’t need to strain anymore. You have the wind do all the work for you.

This example shows well the concept of “wu wei” or effortless action. It’s about being spontaneous in a free-flowing way, doing action through non-action.

The point is to just do, not try. This kind of sounds like what Yoda said to Luke in the swamps of Dagobah, but in reality it is an old Taoist precept.

Edward Slingerland who wrote the book “Trying Not to Try: The Art and Science of Spontaneity” is of the opinion that trying too much can in fact have the opposite effect from what you want to achieve: “Thinking that you are good can make you bad. Talking about positive behavior can encourage negative behavior. Lao Tzu is clearly on to something when he warns us that consciously trying to be righteous will, in fact, turn us into insufferable hypocrites and that anyone striving to attain virtue is destined to fail.”

Life is often unpredictable and can get in your way even in the best of times. You make plans, and then something unexpected happens.

At times like this, it is when the principle of wu wei really shines. Just roll with the punches. You might have wanted to throw a right hook, but your opponent surprised you with a jab.

Duck away from the punch, and continue with your game plan. If the game plan isn’t effective, change it up for another. It’s no big deal.

Don’t think too much about doing things, just do them. Psychologist Jonathan Schooler believes that Lao Tzu had the right idea: “Particularly when one has developed proficiency in an area, it is often better to simply go with the flow. Paralysis through analysis and overthinking are very real pitfalls that the art of wu wei was designed to avoid.”

Paradoxically getting the ability to look like you are not trying, often requires a lot of effort at the beginning. It takes practice to become a master.

In martial arts, the masters of these disciplines often look like they are not engaging in any effort and dispatching their opponents with ease. However, in order to get to that level, they had to undergo years of training.

In many ways, “wu wei” resembles the state of “flow” described by modern psychologists. This is all about being in the zone, immersed in the activity you are doing, and even forgetting the passage of time.

Keep your cool

“Respond intelligently even to unintelligent treatment.” — Lao Tzu

As you live in a society of people, and most people are not very enlightened, you are bound to encounter uncomfortable situations.

Many people will treat you in an unintelligent manner, shout at you, or put you down. You have to keep your emotions in check in such situations and respond intelligently.

One way to do that is to “be like water” as Bruce Lee says. The concept of water is very important in Taoism.
According to Frederick Lenz, water is the most used metaphor in the philosophy: “Taoism is the way of water. The most frequent element or symbol referred to in Lao Tzu’s writings is the symbol of water.”

While water may seem soft and weak, in fact it is very powerful. It can fit in any space, and over time, it changes all the nature around it.

For Lao Tzu, water shows how the principle of softness can overcome hardness. “Water is the softest thing, yet it can penetrate mountains and earth. This shows clearly the principle of softness overcoming hardness.”

The lesson to take from this is to always keep your cool. In practical terms, this can take many forms.

One technique that I like to use is one that I took from improv. It’s called “Yes, and…”

The way it works is easy. If someone insults you, you just confirm the insult, and add another thing to it, seemingly making it even worse. This way you show that you don’t care. In an instant, this disarms your attacker’s power.

This is in fact an ancient technique used by the likes of Stoic master Epictetus.

“If you learn that someone is speaking ill of you, don’t try to defend yourself against the rumors; respond instead with, ‘Yes, and he doesn’t know the half of it, because he could have said more.” — Epictetus

The quote on responding intelligently is from one translation of chapter 63 of the “Tao Te Ching”. In other versions, the part is translated as “respond to resentment using kindness” or “return animosity with virtue.”

However, no matter the translation, the lesson stays the same. Turn the other cheek, and show that you are the better person through your actions.

Stay humble

“Accomplish but do not boast, accomplish without show, accomplish without arrogance, accomplish without grabbing, accomplish without forcing.” — Lao Tzu

If there is one thing to remark about many of the greatest ancient sages is how humble they were. Humility is an important trait that you need to have if you are to live a happy life.

Humility is a key ingredient for wisdom. Lao Tzu, just like Socrates, knew that despite all the learning and thinking that he did, in reality he knew nothing.

In the “Tao Te Ching”, Lao Tzu described how much power staying humble actually gives you. He talks about how all the streams flow to the sea, because it is below them. This is the secret to its power: humility.

A wise ruler doesn’t boast or tries to place himself on top of others. In fact, he follows.

In a striking passage, Lao Tzu reveals the secret of a good ruler. “If you want to govern the people, you must place yourself below them. If you want to lead the people, you must learn to follow them.”

You should stay humble, just for the sake of staying humble. However, the paradox is that by doing that, you will accomplish a lot more than by boasting.

Your Take-away

Taoism is full of paradoxes, but paradoxes are the basis of existence. By keeping this in mind, you will have learned one of Lao Tzu’s greatest lessons.

Master yourself
Gain wisdom
Work without working
Keep your cool
Stay humble

Remember to put these insights into practice. For as you know, practice is the key that unlocks life’s treasures. Just do it.

This story was originally published on “Medium” here.

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Emperor Marcus Aurelius turned to philosophy as his guide to lead a moral life and to overcome the challenges of ruling such a vast empire, always weighting his options and considering his actions carefully. This did not rub off on Commodus, who had zero inkling of even trying to solve the problems of his people. Instead, he would routinely pretend to be Hercules, and dressed in a lion’s pelt, go down to the gladiatorial arena and slaughter countless victims.

The times of Marcus Aurelius and Commodus were also some of the most productive decades of the life of Galen, one of the ancient world’s greatest physicians. In his lifetime, Galen started off as an ordinary physician in a school of gladiators, and ended up as the personal doctor to numerous emperors. He was also one of the most prolific authors of Antiquity, passing onto us hundreds of his works, mostly in medicine, but also in subjects such as philosophy.

In medicine, Galen tried expanding upon the work of Hippocrates, the ancient Greek physician who was born in the 5th century BC on the island of Kos. From his work, Galen took on board the four humors theory, and surmised that these humors not only caused most bodily functions, but also had an influence on the temperament of the person.

What characterized Galen as a physician was his flexibility. At a time when medicine was divided into sects, which often had bitter disputes between each other, Galen tried to focus on what works. His method was a mix of theory, observation, and experimentation.

While Galen prided himself on not being an adherent of any one sect or philosophical school, one of his greatest influences came from Plato. Plato had divided the brain into three parts (rational, spirited, and appetitive), and Galen took this division on board. The physician later expanded upon this work by doing some practical experiments. What came out of this is quite revolutionary. While his predecessors were not really sure in which part of the body the soul resided, sometimes placing it in the heart or other organs, Galen placed the rational part of the soul firmly in the brain.

Galen in several of his philosophical works engaged in what could be termed as psychology. He tried observing how the mind works, and how that affects human behavior. What he describes in many ways resembles the discussions of cognitive biases and logical fallacies that modern scientists have proposed plague the human brain when it goes about its daily business.

During Roman times, philosophy was heavily focused on practical application, and Galen true to this way of working, attempted to describe remedies that could free humans of these bad consequences of emotions and errors of reasoning.

While intellectually Galen was an opponent of the Stoics, there are many overlaps between their teachings. It has even been noted noted that there are significant similarities between Galen’s method for self-improvement and that of Marcus Aurelius. However, maybe that should not be such a surprise considering the fact that Galen served many years as Marcus’ personal physician.

“There is a striking similarity between the recommendations of Galen and Marcus Aurelius to exert oneself intellectually and morally in order to become “better”.”

The surviving work of Galen that deals specifically with human emotions, false reasoning, and self-improvement is called “On Passions and Errors of the Soul”. This treatise has an extensive description of what you need to do to in order to not be swayed by emotions, and not fall for errors, and could be termed one of the earliest works describing the practice of psychotherapy.

An English language translation of the work by Paul Harkins and Walther Riese summarizes Galen’s approach in this way:

“It was Galen’s thesis that passion and moral error were diseases, but diseases of the soul and not the body, and that the physician treating a patient suffering from a “diseased soul” must attack the passion or error directly and immediately—an approach that has had a profound infiuence on the subsequent treatment of mental disorder.”

Galen wrote his work in what was becoming an increasingly turbulent time. The Empire was still in its heyday, but first shocks to the system started to be felt. Barbarian tribes were pressuring the state from the north, and there was constant threat from the Parthians in the east. However, what was probably the most significant factor that undermined the Empire was the coming of the plague.

What has been called the Antonine Plague, based on the family name of the ruling emperor, struck suddenly from the east and ravaged the countryside and the cities. Millions of people died from it, and when it went away, it left a dark mark on not only the economy, but also the souls of the people. With Commodus succeeding Marcus Aurelius in becoming emperor, and the country in turmoil after a disease pandemic, the Roman Empire started to experience its first significant crisis in over a hundred years.

Many historians have marked this crisis as the beginning of the end of the Empire. While after Commodus, some of the emperors were quite capable, they were often succeeded by rulers who were even worse than that son of Marcus Aurelius. This resulted in the so-called Crisis of the Third Century, where emperors and rival emperors battled for power and succeeded one another in rapid succession.
From this blow, the Empire was to never recover. While it eked on for two more centuries, the decline became quite evident, until it finally died.

In many ways, Galen’s time has many parallels to our own times. Incessant wars on the borders in the east and north, a plague devastating the economy and frightening the people, the end of the 2nd century AD was a turbulent time. While the human mind is always under pressure, the chaos of those times probably added more to the overall stress that the people were feeling.

Similar factors are taking place in our times, as the political system seems to be unraveling, some parts of the world are experiencing endless war, and the fear of a global pandemic (coronavirus) is keeping the population on the edge. Galen’s practical advice offered remedies to the people of his own times, but they can do the same thing for you as well. If applied, they can kick-start your journey of self-improvement.

What to do

What do you need to do? Galen wrote an entire discourse where he summarized the main faults of humans, but also tried figure out ways to get rid of these faults.

“At one time he will seem to be urging us to consider how we ourselves are falling into many errors just as others do, and at another time, how a man may recognize each of his errors, and again, in addition to these considerations, how a man may withdraw himself from his errors. This last seems to me to be the object of his whole discourse, since neither of the preceding considerations has any point unless referred to this end.”

Know yourself

For Galen, the ancient saying to “know yourself” was incredibly important, and at the core of any journey of self-improvement. Before you proceed onto doing things, you need to know yourself.

“When I was a young man, I thought that the Pythian dictum to “know thyself” was held in praise without good reason because it did not enjoin some great action. In later life, I discovered that this dictum was justly lauded because only the wisest man could know himself with accuracy. No other man could do this, although one man might have better or worse knowledge of himself than another man.”

Knowing yourself takes a lot of effort, especially if you want to know your inner workings deeply.

“For if a man wishes to have a knowledge of his inner self, he must work very hard to obtain it; if he desires only a surface knowledge, this will be his with practically no effort at all.”

One big part of knowing yourself is observing other people. For by observing other people and seeing how they behave, you can see what types of bad behaviors you yourself might be doing. Observe others in order to know yourself.

“Therefore, we ourselves must pay attention to each of the diseases which we notice in our neighbors to see if any of these ills are in our own soul. For this disease must be cut out while it is still sprouting and before it has become so large as to be incurable.”

Together with self-knowledge, you need to remove stupid pursuits. This is the only way, if you want to arrive at the truth.

“If, then, by the method I mentioned, vain boasting, self-love, ambition, concern for reputation, conceit of wisdom, and love of money are removed from the heart of the man who is going to search for truth, he will certainly arrive at it.”

The power of reason is better than being a slave to passions.

“Obviously, I mean the power of reason. When this becomes vigorous through exercise, these men enjoy themselves more than those who are slaves to bodily pleasures.”

Striving to better yourself is a life-long journey

However, he knew that this effort of self-improvement will not be an easy task. It’s a lifelong journey.

“For each of us needs almost a lifetime of training to become a perfect man. Indeed, a man must not give up trying to make himself better even if, at the age of fifty, he should see that his soul has suffered damage which is not incurable but which has been left uncorrected.”

Even if you don’t succeed, it is the journey itself that is important. You need to try. Success isn’t always up to you, but what you do to achieve is are within your control.

“Therefore, let us continue striving to make our souls more perfect, even if we cannot have the soul of a wise man.”

Work on taming your irrational passions, even if it takes a long time.

“Can you not take and tame this thing which is not some beast from outside yourself but an irrational power within your soul, a dwelling it shares at every moment with your power of reason? Even if you cannot tame it quickly, can you not do so over a longer period of time? It would be a terrible thing if you could not.”

Human nature vs Individual nature

There are some things that are common to all humans, that is their human nature, and there are some things that are specific to each human, their individual natures.

There are certain tendencies that all humanity shares, but each individual has a different mix of these tendencies and behaves in a different way.

“That our individual natures are entirely different we can learn clearly from the children who are brought to our attention. Some of them are always radiant and smiling, others are always sullen and sad. Some are ready to laugh at everything, others are ready to weep at the least pretext. Some share everything they have, others hoard everything.

Some become angry over the smallest things so that they bite and kick and take vengeance on their neighbors with sticks and stones when they think they have been unjustly treated. Others are forbearing and mild, neither growing angry nor crying until they have suffered some great injustice.

And so Eupolis, the comic poet, represented Aristides the Just as being asked this question: Through what influence did you become so outstandingly just? and then showed him replying: Nature was the strongest factor, but then I lent nature a ready hand.”

Galen was a proponent of the four humors theory of temperaments. This probably came down to us from Hippocrates, the ancient physicians from the island of Kos.

This theory stated that human personality is dependent on the mix of the different bodily fluids that you have. While, the humors theory has been falsified by later scientific research, the personality theory does have some explanatory power.

Galen divided up people into four basic categories.

• People with a sanguine temperament. These are usually courageous, hopeful, and amorous.
• People with a choleric temperament. These are short-tempered, and very ambitious.
• People with a melancholic temperament. They are usually sentimental, and introspective.
• People with a phlegmatic temperament. They are usually calm, and unemotional.

Passions, cognitive biases, and logical fallacies

Galen took on board the tripartite model of the mind that Plato came up with. In this model, the brain was made up of three parts: one rational part, and two irrational parts. In many ways, this model reminds us of the way that modern researchers like Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman thought about the human mind and how it works. They divided it into System 1, the irrational, emotional part, and System 2, the rational part of the brain.

Galen saw that both the rational and irrational parts can sometimes make mistakes. Passions were failures of the non-rational parts of the brain – System 1.

Errors or logical fallacies were on the other hand failures of the rational part of the brain – System 2.

In order to control the mistakes of System 1, a person has to work hard at not having emotions control them. While for the errors of System 2, the rational part of the brain must be educated (especially in things like logic).

This is how Galen described the difference between passions and errors:

“But he should have revised what he wrote, especially when distinguishing between passions and errors. For sometimes his discourse seems to concern the passions alone, often it seems to concern errors, and there are times when you will think he is discussing both. But as you know, I started by making this very distinction when I said that error arises from a false opinion, but passion from an irrational power within us which refuses to obey reason; commonly both are called errors in a more generic sense.”

Everyone makes these mistakes. All people fall for false logic and cognitive biases. And those who think themselves without fault, usually fall for them the hardest.

“It is likely that we do err even if we ourselves should think that we do not, and we can infer this from what follows. We see that all men suppose that they themselves are altogether without fault or that their errors are few and mild and at great intervals. This happens especially in the case of those who, in the eyes of other men, err the most.”

Galen described two main ways that you can be fooled by your emotions. One is anger. The other is instant gratification, that is falling for things that you think pleasant right now, without thinking of the long-term consequences.

“We have in our souls two irrational powers. The one easily angered has for its task to become angry and wrathful on the spot with those who seem to have treated us ill in some way. It is also a function of this same power to cherish its wrath for a longer period since the passion of anger is greater in proportion to the length of time it endures.

The other irrational power in us, the lustful and desirous, is the one by which we are carried forward to what appears to be pleasant before we have considered whether it is helpful and good or harmful and bad.”

Errors are basically logical fallacies that people make.

“I begin now with what is the best beginning—as all agree, even if their actions do not demonstrate their agreement—by explaining what the term error means, in order that we may find no ambiguity in the following discourse, and by showing how all the Greeks are accustomed to use this term.

They use it sometimes in the specific sense of things which have not been done according to right reason, so that error is an act of the soul’s intellectual power alone; at other times, they use it in a more general sense so as to fit the irrational power.”

Things like 2+2=4 are facts. Probability of knowledge is something that also needs to be kept in mind. There are some things which are more probable than others, and so probably more likely to be true. The probability of Earth being round is basically 100%, since we have so much evidence pointing to that fact. While the probability of the planet being flat is basically 0%. Thinking in probabilities (sometimes known as Bayesian thinking) can be incredibly helpful in determining the truth.

“At any rate, the knowledge of the geometrician with respect to the things which have been proved by Euclid’s elements has the same degree of certitude as does the knowledge of the majority of men that two plus two makes four.

The geometrician has this same sure knowledge of the theorems on spheres (which are taught following the elements), as well as of all problems solved by these, and of conic sections, and of the theorems concerning sundials.”

The problem is that most people don’t look at facts or probabilities, but instead elevate their opinions above all else. Many people make mistakes in their judgments and give false assents to them.

“However, in the case of a man who has erred throughout his life, his mistaken judgments in matters concerning the knowledge, possession, and avoidance of good and evil stand side by side with false assent or an assent that is reckless or weak. Hence, there is a danger in this matter that a small error does the greatest harm if we give a false assent in our judgment on good and evil.”

Facts vs. Opinions

You need to distinguish between opinions and facts. People make arguments without actually understanding how the scientific method works, supporting their opinions with facts, and understanding the difference between opinions and facts.

“Are they not clearly reckless who attempt to discover things of the greatest importance without first convincing themselves that they understand scientific demonstration?

I think they are quite reckless, since they are acting very much like those who make bold to declare some opinion about the theorems of practical and theoretical arithmetic before they have persuaded themselves to practice exercises with numbers.

These men must of necessity fall into many blunders; in the same way, those who try to prove something before they have exercised themselves in the method of demonstrations cannot fail to fall into error.”

The best lies have a grain of truth in them. This is very useful to keep in mind to understand what is happening today. Demagogues take real problems and twist them to make them seem appealing to the masses.

“The large number of philosophical sects makes it clear that some charlatans are winning disciples; it is also clear that these charlatans would not have convinced anybody to accept their teachings as true unless they bore a certain similarity to the truth.

Nor should we think that this similarity is a slight one. If the resemblance between the false and true were only slight, it would very easily have been detected over the long period of time during which both experts and ordinary people have examined it closely.”

Knowing about methods of false argumentation and cognitive biases can help you in determining what is true and what is false.

“Those who are well acquainted with twins readily distinguish between them even though they are much alike, while those who do not know the twins well cannot distinguish between them.

So, too, those who m long and daily practice has not made experts in argument cannot distinguish between similarities in argument in the same way that the brothers of twins who live with them and know them well are able to distinguish one twin from the other.”

Some people deceive themselves, while others deceive others knowingly. Both are problems.

“As regards those who recklessly have made some pronouncement about what is good or bad in human life, their first and greatest error is the one which springs from self-love, or vain boasting, or conceit of wisdom, or ambition.

For we see that some have misled themselves to believe that they are judging correctly; but others, for the sake of honor or for business reasons, have convinced their neighbors while they themselves remained suspicious of their own statements.

Clearly, both groups are in error: the latter err with knowledge, and their evil would be one of passion; the first, however, would err through want of knowledge, and their fault would be properly called an error.”

There are different techniques that you can use to check whether people understood what you said and meant.

“I have observed that this is the case; hence, whenever I say something, I ask them to repeat what I have said. As with the asses listening to the lyre, the clear truth is that they have not actually understood what I said.”

Fake news is nothing new. It circulated widely in Antiquity as well.

“For if, as I said, the similarity of false arguments to true is the reason for false doctrines, and if it takes an expert in each subject matter to diagnose them exactly, the man who has suddenly become involved in a debate cannot possibly distinguish and separate the false arguments from the true.

We have a positive proof of this in the so-called sophisms, which are false arguments which have been cunningly changed so as to bear a similarity to arguments which are true. The falsity of these is clearly evident because the conclusion is not true.

Since, at any rate, the arguments are false, they either have something false in the premises or the conclusion is badly drawn; these defects, however, are not readily seen in the sophisms; and on this account, it is difficult for those unskilled in argument to detect them.”

There are different ways that you can use to recognize false arguments.

“The solution lies in showing the similarity of the false argument to the true, one must first have understood the nature of arguments which are true. For if a man has become so experienced in true arguments that he accurately and quickly recognizes their nature, he would still have no difficulty in recognizing those which are false.

I proved this when I took lads who had previous experience in learning and taught them to recognize true arguments. If any of those present wished to do so, I asked them to propose sophisms to these young men; immediately the students recognized the absurdity of the sophisms, either from a fault in the form of the syllogism or because something in the premises was false.“

It is hard to get rid of prejudices and falsehoods that people have accumulated for many years.

“Why, then, in heaven’s name, do you think that the ignorance and pretense of wisdom of people such as these can easily be cured? If a man has a tumor which has hardened over a period of three or four years, his induration is indissoluble.

Who can cure the induration of thirty or forty years’ standing which grips the soul of such old men? Suppose, if you wish, that cure is possible; consider, then, whether the cure of such a tumor will require days or months or years.”

Most people see the faults of others, but are blind to their own

Most people see the faults of others, but remain blind to their own.

“As Aesop says, we have two sacks suspended from our necks; the one in front is filled with the faults of others; the one behind is filled with our own. This is the reason why we see the faults of others but remain blind to those which concern ourselves.”

It is very difficult to discover a person’s own errors.

“Even if a man should make, by himself, as extensive an examination into his own errors as he could, he would find it difficult to discover them.”

Just keep in mind that no one is perfect, least of all you.

“But you do judge that you are something other than a human being if you mislead yourself into believing that you have done nothing but good actions for a whole day, much less for a whole month.”

That is why you need to listen to others who will critique you and tell you about your faults. This is something incredibly important. Galen states that the best way to find your own faults is to listen to other people who tell you about them.

Don’t overestimate yourself

It is important to never overestimate yourself.

“When those who have spent their entire lives training themselves to be free from emotion do not believe that they have perfectly acquired this goal, you should be all the more convinced that you are not free from emotion since you have never devoted yourself to this training.”

Many people fall for the Dunning-Kruger effect, thinking that they are more competent than they really are in reality.

“For, as I said, because of self-love, or because of conceit of wisdom, or because of ambition, or concern for personal reputation, or vain boasting, or money-making, some convince themselves that they possess sure knowledge, and others even convince other men of this same thing.”

Unfortunately, this is quite common. Most people instead of keeping humble,  like to flatter themselves.

“That they choose to flatter themselves and that they are not seeking the truth we can recognize from the fact that they argue individually against an opinion only among their own followers, but accuse all others of being in error.”

You always have to watch out. There are many charlatans out there. They believe in their own greatness, but also use the fact that most humans don’t engage in critical thinking in order to cheat them.

“It is not strange if each teacher convinces his pupils by his own discourses, since some of these disciples are naturally dull, while others are keen-witted but untrained in the elements of learning. It suits braggart teachers to have such students since a disciple who is naturally intelligent and has had previous training in the elements will straightway look with scorn upon these charlatans.”

You don’t always need to be the best in the world, but second, third, or even fourth is usually good enough

You will probably never be the best in the world at something, but being second, third, fourth and so on best is still good. The important thing is not to measure yourself against other people.

“Suppose, when we were coming into existence, we could talk with the one superintending our birth; suppose we were to ask him for the most healthy body and he were to refuse; would we not, at all events, ask him successively for the body which was second, third, or fourth healthiest?

If we cannot have the healthy body of Hercules, the body of Achilles is satisfactory; if we cannot have the health of Achilles, then let us have that of Ajax or Diomede or Agamemnon or Patroclus; if we cannot have any of these, then, at least, let us have the healthy body of some other hero whom we admire.

In the same way, then, even if a man cannot have the most perfect health of soul, I think he would accept being second or third or fourth from the top. Nor is this impossible for one who has made up his mind, if he has been in continuous training over a considerable period of time.”

You are standing on the shoulders of giants

Keep in mind that you standing on the shoulders of giants. Knowledge progresses little by little. Learn from others, and piece together different building blocks of knowledge from different areas.

“No one man discovered these in his lifetime. First, the elementary theorems were investigated and discovered; then came men of a later day who added to these theorems that most marvelous reasoning which, as I said, is called analytic; thereafter, both these men and others who were willing to learn exercised themselves in this analytic reasoning to the greatest extent. Thus, little by little, the theory of geometry progressed.”

There are only a few things that you really need in life, the rest are just nice to haves

There are just a few basics that you need in order to have a good life.

“This is what he laid down as the basic standard for possessions, namely, not to be hungry, not to be cold, not to be thirsty. If you should have more than is necessary for these, you must, he said, use that surplus for good works.”

Moderation is best

Moderation is best. The Golden Mean was a principle that was preached by philosophers since at least the time of Aristotle.

“Since errors come from false opinion while the passions arise by an irrational impulse, I thought the first step was for a man to free himself from his passions; for these passions are probably the reason why we fall into false opinions.

And there are passions of the soul which everybody knows: anger, wrath, fear, grief, envy, and violent lust. In my opinion, excessive vehemence in loving or hating anything is also a passion; I think the saying “moderation is best” is correct, since no immoderate action is good.”

Temperance is very important. After all it is one of the cardinal virtues.

“Just as those men practice and pursue the height of the objects of their zeal, so must we zealously pursue the peak of temperance. If we shall do this, we will not compare ourselves to the undisciplined and intemperate, nor will it be enough to have more self-discipline and temperance than they.

First, we will strive to surpass those who earnestly pursue this same virtue of temperance, for such rivalry is very noble; after them, let us strive to surpass ourselves, so that from long-continued custom we may enjoy using the foods which are both the most healthful and the easiest to provide as well as the most nourishing.

Let us remind ourselves that this is one of the proverbs which is well said: “Choose the life which is best; living with it will make it pleasant.“

Greed is bad

Love of glory, lust of power, and greediness are bad.

“For obstinacy, love of glory, lust for power are diseases of the soul. Greediness is less harmful than these, but it, too, is, nevertheless, a disease. And what must I say of envy? It is the worst of evils. I call it envy whenever someone is grieved over the success of others.”

Greed grows bigger the more you have.

“The Greeks sometimes call it insatiate desire and at other times covetousness. They call it insatiate desire from the greediness with which one yearns, (and covetousness because) the greedy always desire (to grasp a larger share) of what lies before them—so much so that, even if (they have) twice as much, they are eager to acquire (three times as much;) if they have three times as much, they desire four times as much.”

Don’t be materialistic.

“I think, therefore, that you have no w clearly seen the standard for the extent to which w e should possess these goods. Just as a cubit-long shoe is perfectly useless, so too it is superfluous and useless to have fifteen shoes rather than the two shoes w e are using. Why are the two w e already have not altogether sufficient for our use? It is enough to have two garments, two slaves, and two sets of household equipment.”

Don’t desire fame.

“If you will free yourself from this same greedy desire to be held in honor, you will be free from distress in this respect as well. But not only are you dissatisfied with the honor paid you by your close friends, but you wish everybody in the city to praise you. And yet, how very few of those who live in all Asia Minor know you at all?”

Live a life of virtue

Live a life of virtue.

“He also maintained that I must strive, no w and throughout my life, to pursue those practices which all me n praised and which the philosophers agreed must be emulated. He asked me to learn and wax strong while seeking after justice, temperance, fortitude, and prudence.

All men praise these virtues and, even if they themselves are aware that they do not possess any one of them, they strive, at least, to appear in the eyes of other me n as brave, temperate, prudent, and just; however, when it comes to grief, they try to be truly free from it, whether they appear so to their neighbors or not.

Hence, he told me that I must, above all things, practice this serenity which all men pursue more eagerly than they pursue virtue.”

Don’t fret about money and honor.

“My father also accustomed me to look with scorn on glory and honor and to hold only the truth in esteem. But I see many men grieving when they think that someone has dishonored them or because of the loss of money. In a matter of this sort, you would never see me grieving, unless I incurred a loss of money so great that I was no longer able with what was left to take care of my bodily health.”

Practice makes perfect and builds good habits

Practice makes perfect, and it builds good habit. This applies in anything, including in managing your emotions. If you practice, over time you can learn how to keep your emotions in check.

“A man cannot free himself from the habit of anger as soon as he resolves to do so, but he can keep in check the unseemly manifestations of his passion. If he will do this frequently, he will then discover that he is less prone to anger than he formerly was.

Things which are unimportant or less important will not rouse his wrath; and even if he does become angry over matters which are of great importance his anger will be slight. And he will achieve this result, namely, that at some later date he will become only a little angry over serious matters, if he will follow a practice of mine.”

It takes hard work and a long time to improve. Just like it takes a long time to become a good doctor, or a good public speaker, it takes a long time to become a good person. The law of deliberate practice applies here too.

“Even if you should not become much better, be satisfied if in the first year you have advanced and shown some small measure of improvement.

If you continue to withstand your passion and to soften your anger, you will show more remarkable improvement during the second year; then, if you still continue to take thought for yourself, you will notice a great increase in the dignity of your life in the third year, and after that, in the fourth year, the fifth, and so on.

A man does everything, for many years in succession, that he may become a good physician, or public speaker, or grammarian, or geometer. Is it a disgrace for you to toil for a long time that you may one day be a good man?”

There are several kinds of exercises that you can do in order to cease being a slave of your passions. A reflection each morning can greatly help in this. It’s always much better to be driven by reason.

“As I see it, this is by far the better course to follow: first, if a man wishes to keep as free as he can from the passions I mentioned, as soon as he gets up from bed, let him consider for each of his daily tasks whether it is better to live as a slave to his passions or to apply reason to each of them.”

You should create a daily routine.

“A man must remind himself of these things each day— if he does so frequently it will be all the better, but if not frequently, at least let him do so at dawn, before he begins his daily tasks, and toward evening before he is about to rest.

You may be sure that I have grown accustomed to ponder twice a day the exhortations attributed to Pythagoras—first I read them over, then I recite them aloud.”

You need to use willpower and self-control at first, but after a while discipline takes over.

“The chastisement of the lustful and desirous power consists in not furnishing it with the enjoyment of the things it desires. If it does attain to this enjoyment, it becomes great and strong; if it is disciplined and corrected, it becomes small and weak. The result is that the lustful and desirous power does not follow reason because it is obedient but because it is weak.”

The road to temperance is through self-discipline.

“The road to temperance is through self-discipline. It is in this very way that the temperate man holds an advantage over the man who has no command over himself: the temperate man no longer yearns for delicacies of the table, either because of long-standing habit or because of his self-control—as the very name shows, since it is derived from controlling and conquering one’s desires. To practice it is toilsome and difficult, at least at the beginning, but this is the case with every practice of a noble pursuit.”

The battle of nurture versus nature can be won by daily practice. Even if your nature at the beginning is bad, by constantly battling against it, you can win.

“He wanted to know how I excelled him in this, whether it was the result of practice, or of principles I held, or because I was such by nature. And so I told him the truth. I told him that, in the age of boyhood, nature is in all cases a great factor, as is also imitation of those about us; later on, principles and practice are important influences.”

At the beginning the progress of self-improvement will be slow, but don’t give up.

“Consequently, in the very beginning of the program of exercises, it would not be right for a man to be disheartened because he sees that the progress he makes in curing his passions is slight.

As time goes on, he will make great progress if only he will submit to hearing an account of his errors because he loves himself with a true love and because he desires to become a good and noble person—not merely to appear to be such.”

Be open-minded and learn from everyone

Don’t be partisan to one group, but instead learn about them for a long time.

“He went on to say that I must not be hasty in proclaiming myself a member of one sect, but that I must inquire, learn, and form my judgment about these sects over a considerable period of time.”

Think before you act

Think before you act, for you cannot undo what you have done.

“The Emperor Hadrian, they say, struck one of his slaves in the eye with a stylus; and when he learned that the man had lost his eye because of this wound, he summoned the slave and allowed him to ask for a gift which would be equal to his pain and loss.

When the slave who had suffered the loss remained silent, Hadrian again asked him to speak up and ask for whatever he might wish. But he asked for nothing else but another eye. For what gift could match in value the eye which had been destroyed?”

Don’t be a slave to anger, reason things out.

“If you will never be a slave to anger, if you will always reason things out and do everything you think best after dispassionate consideration, you will be a good and noble man.”

Keep it in check while small, because if it gets too large, you will never be able to vanquish it.

“Strive to hold the impetuosity of this power in check before it grows and acquires an unconquerable strength. For then, even if you will to do so, you will not be able to hold it in check.”

There will always be someone who dislikes you, learn to live with it

You can’t have everyone like you, there will always be people who dislike you no matter what you do.

“If I should hear that some men find fault with me, I oppose to them those who praise me, and I consider that the desire to have all men praise me is like the desire to possess all things.”

Luck is important, but you always need to keep a perspective on things

Luck is important. That’s for sure. However, luck is relative. Don’t always look at those who have more than you, but keep in mind that there are many who have less than you and wish that they were in your position

“Hence, they keep looking at those who have more than they and not at those who have less, and they seek to surpass those who surpass them and to have more than they do.

If you will look in this way, I said, at all our fellow citizens, you will not find thirty who are wealthier than you.

Hence, you are richer than all the rest of the citizens; in addition to these, it is obvious that you are richer than the slave population and the great number of women residents.

If, then, our fellow citizens number about forty thousand and if you add to these the women and slaves, you will find that you are not satisfied with being richer than one hundred and twenty thousand, but that you also wish to surpass those thirty men who are richer than you; you are eager for yourself to be the very first in wealth—even though it is much better to be first in self-sufficiency and frugality, which is within your power.

Yet preeminence in wealth is not a work of virtue but of fortune, which makes both slaves and freedmen richer than are we who bear the name of noble birth.”

Summary

Why do people fall into error? Galen summarized it well, when he said that there are different reasons for that. However, all of these reasons have one thing in common. They are done in rashness, without a careful reflection and the use of critical thinking.

“For some men fall into error because, in their rashness, they give their assent to objects as clearly evident which are not yet clearly evident.”

The key words to remember from Galen as the key to self-improvement and right thinking are: moderation, habit, practice.

Another thing to keep in mind is that you usually can’t notice your errors yourself, but use others to give you feedback and notice them for you. That’s why it is always good to stay humble.

Galen’s thought is one of the earliest works of psychotherapy. It is meant to help people who are having mental problems.

You can see how helpful this guide from Galen was. The man himself was a true genius, a polymath who was primarily focused on medicine, but also left many works in other subjects such as philosophy.

He used inductive reasoning, which works by first making observations, then putting them together to make a generalization, and out of that creating a general theory of how things work.

Galen (just like Aristotle) believed that the different parts of the body were created for specific functions, so his thinking was teleological. This would also imply that humans individually have a higher purpose as well.

This was opposed to the more nihilistic thoughts of the Epicureans, and also our own modern understanding of science. Just like any man, he made mistakes and some of his own theories ended up not being true. However, even today Galen is remembered as a true giant of human thought.

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In many ways, Galen’s thoughts were similar to those of Marcus Aurelius. Although this should not be surprising, as Galen served as the personal physician of several Roman emperors, including Marcus.

Marcus Aurelius: how to survive in adversity.

Plutarch: how to keep a tranquil mind in a turbulent world.

“Happiness then is the best, noblest, and most pleasant thing in the world.”
— Aristotle

If you ask anyone what they want most out of life, their answer will almost always return to one word: happiness. This can come in many shapes and forms, but underlying all of them are certain principles that separate true happiness from the mere illusion of it.

The problem is that many people don’t really know what will make them happy. They believe that true happiness is the ability to sit on a beach all year sipping cocktails. However, in reality this will not make them happy. You can do it for a bit before the inner workings of your brain come in and make you miserable again.

Ancient philosophers pondered a great deal on the subject of happiness, looking at it from different angles, but the most powerful answers to this conundrum always involved something counter-intuitive: challenges.

Many of their myths and legends exemplified this idea of struggle as the road to happiness.

Hercules chose virtue over vice

Hercules (Heracles in Greek) was one of the most famous mythical heroes, worshiped in Greece and Rome as the man who became a god.

His life was used as an example to teach moral lessons. For the Stoics, but also for some other philosophical schools, Hercules was the model that they pointed at, when asked how you should live your life.

Ancient mythology contains many stories of his exploits, but in terms of the power of its message, one story stands above the rest.

It is the Choice of Hercules.

According to the legend, as a young man, Hercules was walking on a road, when at one point he reached a crossroads.

There is strong symbolism in that beginning. As humans, at various periods of our lives, we also reach a point where we need to take a choice on which direction to take.

These things happen not only to us mere mortals, but also to heroes, and even the gods themselves. So it was with Hercules.

The young Hercules sat down and pondered whether he should go left or go right. In that instant, as he was deliberating on the choice in his head, two goddesses appeared out of the sky.

The first one came up, and gave him a sweet sounding offer. If Hercules, went in her direction, he would live an easy life, full of luxury and pleasure. He would not have to lift a finger, and everything would be provided for him by others. It was a life of lavish dinners, drugs and alcohol, and constant parties that she proposed.

After the first lady spoke, the second one outlined her own proposal. What she said was totally different. She offered Hercules a life of struggle, where he would be tested by many hardships. It was to be a very long and arduous journey.

However, that journey would be full of honor, and require virtue, hard work, and discipline to finish. Hercules would face adversity, and many obstacles, but could show courage, willpower, and determination in order to overcome them.

Hercules realized that anything that is really valuable has to be gotten through hard work. This was also the road to pride, and real happiness. For what you get easily, you never value, but what you struggle to earn, you treasure.

Hercules didn’t hesitate. He chose the second path. He chose the road of virtue, over that of vice.

Don’t choose the easy road

“It is self-discipline, above all things, that causes pleasure.“
— Socrates

The moral of this allegory rings true in many ways. While many people in today’s world choose the easy road, one of instant gratification, never challenging themselves, never testing themselves, it doesn’t give them happiness at the end.

They end up always chasing cheap thrills, and vain things like fame, flashy cars, or expensive handbags. This leaves them feeling hollow and empty inside, and devoid of empathy for other people.

This leads to depression.

They don’t realize that the true road to happiness doesn’t lie in doing easy things, but in doing hard things, in having accomplishments to be proud of.

In a Ted Talk given at Rio de la Plata, behavioral psychologist Dan Ariely, explained how overcoming challenges actually leads to true happiness.

He uses the example of mountain climbing in order to illustrate how this happens. “And if you think about mountain climbing as an example, it suggests all kinds of things,” says Ariely.

He then continues, “It suggests that we care about reaching the end, a peak. It suggests that we care about the fight, about the challenge. It suggests that there’s all kinds of other things that motivate us to work or behave in all kinds of ways.”

This example speaks to my heart. This is exactly what I discovered when I started climbing mountains. It’s a horrible experience when you are doing it, full of pain.

It makes you feel sick, tired, and sometimes even injured, but at the same time, you get a certain thrill of doing something hard, of doing something that most people would never even consider doing.

The sense of accomplishment that you get after you reach the peak, and then safely reach the bottom (for you have to remember that reaching the top is only half the journey), is indescribable.

And the thing is that the feeling of having achieved something extraordinary, of having overcome something difficult, stays with you forever.

Years later, you still remember what you have done. In those instances pain is only temporary, but the glory lasts forever.

And unlike those people who have spent their entire lives being fake, drinking, and partying, you actually have something to look back at and feel a sense of pride.

These people might laugh at you, call you weird, and disparage your choices, but the joke is on them.

You have done something real. You have done something hard. You have done something extra-ordinary.

They haven’t.

Making things with your hands gives you much more satisfaction than simply buying them

“Do you exist then to take your pleasure, and not at all for action or exertion? Do you not see the little plants, the little birds, the ants, the spiders, the bees working together to put in order their several parts of the universe?”
— Marcus Aurelius

The thing about happiness is that it lies in intrinsic motivation, in doing things that you enjoy doing, and that are above all, real.

Psychologists doing experiments with people have even discovered a weird effect to illustrate this. They dubbed it the Ikea effect.

They found that the people who bought products from Ikea and assembled them themselves, felt much more pride in their furniture and treasured it over the furniture that they bought and just brought home without doing anything.

The mechanism behind this effect is the same one as why you might still keep that crappy drawing you did back in elementary school, or the crooked piece of pottery that you kept after having tried pottery class once.

People who have constructed something with their hands show much more pride in their work, than ones who don’t.

Just like the little bees, ants, and spiders go about their ways, building their little spaces, you also need to create your own little part of the universe.

How to be truly happy

“Man conquers the world by conquering himself.”
— Zeno of Citium

The secret to true happiness is to do things. It is to do things that are hard, that challenge you, that give you a sense of accomplishment.

In this way, you also take matters into your own hands.

The ancient Stoics used to say that you need to separate things that you can control, from the ones that you don’t.

You cannot control things like fame. It is dependent on other people.

Much of our life, day in and day out, the actions of other people affect how we feel.

Our moods change based on what other people do, or think. The problem is that most people only care about themselves.

A lot of times, they will try to trip you up for no reason. They will tell you that you are ugly, stupid, or useless.

That kills your mood. However, ancient Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius reminded himself every morning of the way people are. He accepted it, and it didn’t bother him.

Instead, he focused on doing other things. Things that depended on him, and things that were hard.

He knew this is how you reach true happiness.

For by doing things by yourself, you gain control over your life.

Doing that martial arts class, painting that picture, or climbing mountains are things that no one can take away from you. They are your wins. You struggled to attain them, and you did at the end.

The victory was yours.

What do we want from life? Most people think that it is the first road, the one of partying and pleasure. The one that Hercules didn’t take.

However, those of us in the know, we know the secret. We know that the real road to happiness, is the second one. The one that Hercules took.

Note: I first published this post here.
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Note: I first published this post in a publication on Medium called Live Your Life On Purpose.
Images: 1

However, as Thetis was dipping her son into the waters of that magical river, she was holding him on his heel. That spot was the only point on the body of the young Achilles that the water did not touch. The small boy grew up to become a strong man, the greatest fighter of his time, and took part in many battles. Wishing to win eternal glory for himself, he joined the expedition that the Greeks launched against the city of Troy, his great skills proving a great asset to the allied forces. His fame grew larger still when he slayed Hector, the son of the king of Troy and the Trojan’s main commander.

Seemingly invincible, he did have one weakness, and that was his heel, with that part of the body never being touched by the magic waters of the River Styx. Believing himself immortal, Achilles would sometimes launch himself heedlessly into adventures. Yet one day, all that came to pass. As he was scaling the gates of Troy, a poisoned arrow shot by Paris and guided by the invisible hands of god Apollo himself, pierced his heel, killing him on the spot. Thus ended the life of one of the greatest heroes of ancient Greek mythology.

Character flaws are a person’s Achilles’ heel

The term Achilles’s heel in modern language has come to signify the fatal flaw of a person who on the outside appears strong and powerful. It is this weakness, that can cause that person’s eventual downfall. Many a person was brought down from the heights of success by a hidden fault that they had. Often it is a character fault that makes them vulnerable to certain actions, and which certain triggers can unchain.

A person’s Achilles’ heel is that part of their character which is the weakest link in their personal chain. It is a deficiency that is often unacknowledged, or lies deeply hidden beyond a seemingly impenetrable body of outside armor, the person’s strengths. While that person might seem on top of things on first look, when this hidden deficiency is poked, it can make everything come crashing down.

When looking at movies, many of the main characters meet their downfall due to a huge character flaw. In “Back to the Future”, Marty McFly gets triggered by being called a “chicken”. He cannot walk away when someone suggests that he is too afraid to do a certain action, which often lands him in trouble, sometimes significantly derailing his life.

In the first seasons of “The Game of Thrones”, the main hero of the story is Eddard Stark, the head of the Stark family, the ancient rulers of the North. He is pictured as an honest, and honorable man, one who always keeps his word. The problem is that he is too trusting, believing that others will honor their words like he does. This fatal flaw costs him his life.

These fatal flaws are not only in the domain of fiction, but come up again and again in real life. Everyone has weak spots. This can be hubris, honesty, or even things like a tragic childhood which had created demons in your soul, that you cannot get past. These weaknesses can strike at any time, sometimes getting triggered by the most innocent looking situations.

History is full of tragic heroes brought down by their fatal flaws

In history, many powerful leaders were destroyed by their fatal flaws. Julius Caesar is remembered as being a great general and politician of the ancient Roman Republic, but his downfall came because of his faults. One of these was anger. In his work “On Anger”, Seneca described how Caesar would get angry from one instant to the next, and was often not able to control these outbursts:

“Gaius Caesar, who when angry with heaven because it interfered with his ballet-dancers, whom he imitated more carefully than he attended to them when they acted, and because it frightened his revels by its thunders, surely ill-directed, challenged Jove to fight, and that to the death, shouting the Homeric verse: — “Carry me off, or I will carry thee!”

How great was his madness! He must have believed either that he could not be hurt even by Jupiter himself, or that he could hurt even Jupiter itself. I imagine that this saying of his had no small weight in nerving the minds of the conspirators for their task: for it seemed to be the height of endurance to bear one who could not bear Jupiter.”

If you are not aware of these weak spots, and even more importantly, if you cannot control them, then you risk being a tragic hero brought down by their passions. The problem is that the way your brain functions, with its cognitive biases, can make you blind to these vulnerabilities.

How to overcome your fatal character flaws?

If you know that this is true, then what should you do in order to get rid of your fatal flaws or at least diminish their influence? The answer to this question once again comes from ancient times.

Over two thousand years ago, the temple of Apollo at Delphi was known far and wide for its oracle, which could allegedly predict the future. People from all walks of life would go there to see what would happen to them and what they should do.

As these people would enter the temple, they would pass around a series of maxims inscribed on the walls, giving them advice on how to live life. The foremost of these maxims was one that the great philosopher Socrates dedicated his life to: know thyself.

The only way you will know what your strengths and weaknesses are is if you spend some times studying yourself. This should start with a general study of the human condition, how your brain makes decision, how it falls for cognitive biases, and how these can affect a person’s behavior.

Then you should move onto your own person, and think about what types of values you hold dear, how you behave in certain situations, and what you need to improve. Based on this self-examination, you can then draft a vision for your life, determining what things you need to work on, as well as what potential pitfalls you should always be aware of.

Once again, you can turn to ancient tools to help you in this endeavor. The ancient Pythagoreans were a group who believed in the power of numbers, and engaged in many mystical practices. However, they also left us with some techniques which are quite beneficial, and were later adopted by other groups such as the Stoics.

One of these is a practice of daily self-examination. Early in the morning, they would plan out their day, thinking about what they wanted to achieve that day, and about the actions that they needed to do. The day would end with an evaluation of their actions, and whether they fulfilled their goal or not.

In order to help them with this, they would ask three questions:

“Where did I go wrong? What did I do? What duty is left undone?“

Benjamin Franklin, a great scientist and one of the founders of the United States, also adopted a similar practice in his daily routine. He kept a virtue journal, where he wrote down 13 different virtues (like temperance, industry, sincerity…etc.) that he wanted to practice and kept track of his progress each day.

What you need to keep in mind is that there will be a lot of challenges to overcome and you won’t always do it in a perfect way. You will falter on the journey, but the important thing is to be able to get up. Instead of failures getting you down, you need to re-frame your thinking, and think of them as learning opportunities. Every time you make a mistake, learn from it and use it to grow stronger.

My fatal flaw that has often undermined me on my personal journey through life

Everyone has an Achilles’s heel, which often prevents them from achieving fulfillment and throws logs under their feet in their journey through life. My fatal flaw is depression linked to being sad about things in the world that I cannot control.

For me, my dealings with other people often bring me down and I have trouble controlling my reactions to this. I am often disappointed with people, and with the fact that they don’t hold themselves to the higher standards that I hold myself to. However, this is something that everyone has had to face it. I remind myself of this by going back to this quote from Marcus Aurelius, ancient Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher:

“When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: the people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous and surly. They are like this because they can’t tell good from evil. But I have seen the beauty of good, and the ugliness of evil, and have recognized that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own — not of the same blood and birth, but the same mind, and possessing a share of the divine. And so none of them can hurt me. No one can implicate me in ugliness. Nor can I feel angry at my relative, or hate him.”

The ancient Stoics said that the event itself doesn’t matter, but it is your reaction to that event that matters. This advice is something that I always try to keep in mind. However, this is harder to implement in practice than thinking about in theory.

My coping strategy has been to try to live more closer to nature, going on strenuous hikes in the mountains, practicing martial arts, and generally learning about the world. My recent health problems have put a dent in that, but I have refocused a bit in order to compensate. Hopefully this way, I can keep my fatal flaw in check, and grow stronger on the way.

One thing that I have implemented is a daily self-examination, just like the ancient Pythagoreans and Stoics. Every day, after I wake up and brush my teeth, I try to reflect a bit on what I need to do that day. This helps me to put the challenges of that day in perspective and if I foresee some challenges to think of some mitigation strategies.

I have tried to make a habit out of it, although my struggles with depression sometimes end up derailing me. Last year, I was going strong, keeping up my routine, hitting my goals and then some.

This year I faltered, circumstances caught up with me. The fact that 2019 was especially hard in terms of health and people problems, made me put my eyes off the ball. I am struggling now to get back on track, but hopefully 2020 will get me there.

The ancients used to say that character is destiny, but it doesn’t have to be that way. I find that circumstances often push you in one way or the other, so luck has a big effect on your life. However, you can’t always blame things on outside factors. I am trying to keep in mind the ancient Stoic mantra to focus on what you can control and forget about the rest.

There are many thing that you can do to get around the circumstances that you find yourself in. One thing that keeps me grounded is keeping a blog, but also now sharing my thoughts on Medium. Putting your ideas on paper, well digital paper, has the amazing effect of helping you to think about things in a different way and to find connections where you didn’t see connections before.

Character does not have to be your destiny, but you need to work hard at it. Know your flaws, and don’t let them keep you down.

What is your Achilles’ heel, the fatal flaw that keeps you down? And more importantly, what do you plan to do about it?

This article was first featured on “The Ascent” publication on “Medium”.

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In history, it is usually not the individual actors who are important, but instead the processes themselves. This is because similar processes can lead to similar outcomes. In these types of situations, analogies can be quite illuminating. They can help us to recognize the problems and pick potential solutions.

Mapping Step

When coming up with analogies, the first thing you always do is to map the source system to the target system. This means you take concepts from the initial phenomenon that you know well, and then fit them to the things you are trying to analyze. While doing this, you always need to be careful about what you are comparing. When people make historical comparisons, they usually head down the road of comparing individuals that appear similar in these different eras. While mapping the different individuals from the ancient era to the modern era (is Trump the modern Clodius or Crassus?) might be fun, it does not really tell us much about the current world. Instead, it is mapping the underlying processes at play in the two eras that is interesting. This can enlighten us on what is happening in our society today.

When taking lessons from the past, there are certain key things that you should look for. When examining the modern era and Roman times, there are some apparent similarities. Certain actions and conditions lead to certain paths. These are processes that are linked to the conditions in society, and include the widening gap between the segments of society, certain segments of society getting relatively poorer, the process of anger creation, and similar things.

• I described them in more detail in the article on lessons from the ancient commentators that I wrote previously.

The fall of the Republic happened when Rome became the hegemon in its part of the world. The Roman society became richer than ever, with the level of material goods skyrocketing. However, a gap between the richest and the poorest members of society widened, with many of the people on the lower rungs feelings as if their situation was worsening. The state of affairs today is similar, we are living in an era of overall prosperity, however wide sections of the population are feeling as if they are losing out.

When working with historical analogies, what you can map are different behaviors. While culture and technology influence how these behaviors are displayed, the mental processes behind these behaviors are very similar. In one of his iconic statements on the basic nature of the world, Cicero stated that while the Egyptians might worship cats and dogs, the fundamental processes of superstition are the same in all nations. The particulars don’t matter, it is the underlying process that does.

To illustrate this statement with another example, we can look at vanity, a behavior that many humans engage in. In his work, Late Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus described how people were infatuated with creating statues of themselves in ancient Rome. This behavior we can map to the modern trend of people posting selfies of themselves. While, the way the process is implemented is different (statues vs. selfies), the mental behaviors that lead to this stem from the same place.

Moving on, let’s take the process of anger creation as an example for continuing the mapping. What I am mapping here is not particular circumstances of how anger was created, but instead the general patterns. In ancient Rome, the initial process that led to anger, then outrage, and then political violence is the one between the Optimates and the Populares, as the positions between these two factions drifted apart. The similar process today is the battle between the alt-right (and other far right elements), and the alt-left (sometimes joined by other far left elements).

While the ancient process was based more on economic conditions, and the modern one is more about ideas, there are many parallels. What drove both these processes in the background was a perceived fall in status, perceived relative gains and loses, as well as similar structural elements.

Both these processes led to increased polarization in society, with the likelihood of compromise drifting further and further away. These situations also have parallels in how certain individuals are using them to gain power for themselves. Populism was on the rise then, and it is on the rise now.

The reason why these processes can wreak havoc on the political institutions of the countries of the northern hemisphere (like the US, but also the EU), is that the institutions of the Roman Republic have striking similarities to our modern institutions. Whether this was by design (as in the US) or by heritage and evolution (mostly in other countries), the way the state is set up today is close to the way it was set up in the Roman Republic.

Basically, here we are mapping the old Roman institutions to the modern political institutions. The people, the Senate, the executive, the division of powers, all these have parallels in both systems. This means that the processes are quite likely to have similar effects in both cases.

Application Step

With the last statement, we are already moving to the Application Step. With this step, we are applying the mappings to learn something about the system we want to study. And the system we want to study in this case is the current political situation.

However, to be able to apply the mappings correctly, we also need to keep in mind the main differences between the two situations we are studying. These differences will determine which things from the analogy are relevant and which aren’t.

The first factor to keep in mind is the difference in the level of technology in the two societies. This had a huge impact not only on how people lived, on transportation between places, but also on the spread of information. There were also many cultural differences, with one huge difference being that in ancient Rome people had a fundamentally different view of the set up of society. There was the institution of slavery, and women had much less rights than they do now.

One significant element was that the Roman Republic was a libertarian paradise. Everything was provided by private contractors and many things we take for granted now (like a police force or a fire squad) were not there. For example, Crassus used this hole in the market by making his own private fire squad and sometimes using it for nefarious purposes. Some of these things were corrected under the Empire. When he consolidated his rule, Augustus set up a sort of police squad, as well as a fire squad, which were under the control of the state.

There were also differences in the work structure. The population outside of the city of Rome consisted mostly of agrarian farmers, and the presence of slaves was also significant in all aspects of society. Today, the places of work are either in the industry, but more importantly in offices, where people sit all day in front of the computer screen.

While these differences are significant, in my opinion, they do not negate the main point of the argument that the Roman Republic could be used as an analogy for current times. The key to this is that different processes can produce the same mental effects. This means the same outcomes.

People might argue that the institutions of Roman Republic and today are not the same. This might be true, but only on a physical level. On a more conceptual level, the institutions are incredibly similar.

Here we can use concepts from computer science to illustrate. Data modeling in computer science divides data models into conceptual, logical and physical levels. The conceptual level is all about the concepts and ideas, while the lower levels are about how these are implemented in practice. The logical and physical levels are where the actual set-up of the institutions shows up.

For the political system, the conceptual level has things like the people, legislative power (even though in theory the people made the laws, in reality it was the Senate), or the executive power (consuls). The system in the Roman Republic was set up as a way to check the powers of the different institutions and make sure that no one person becomes too powerful. This resulted in a division of powers, which inspired the way modern governments (such as in the US) are set up. While, in ancient Rome, there were consuls, and the US has a president, this does not really matter. On the conceptual level, these institutions are quite similar, as they are the executive powers in the state.

Another interesting parallel is powerful individuals hiding their business dealings behind front men (and making policy to benefit their business dealings). How this process worked was described in some of Cicero’s letters. Reading these writings, it is almost eerie to realize how similar corruption of yesteryear was to that of today. Powerful business interests are often tied to politicians and have quite a big influence on policy.

One important lesson that has parallels in both eras is norm breaking. Since the institutions are similar, the breaking of norms by politicians can destroy the institutions in similar ways. There is an interesting parallel in the strategy used in ancient Rome and the UK a few years: going to the people to decide. Gracchus and other Populares started going around the Senate and implemented people’s plebiscites on many issues. This is quite similar with what happened with the Brexit Referendum in the UK. These processes were easily manipulated.

There is one further point which I would like to map, and which in many ways is a quite abstract analogy. However, it could give clues to why a system that weathers numerous storms for hundreds of years, suddenly falters. There was one fundamental difference between the Rome of 100 BC when things were beginning to unravel, and the Rome of 300 BC or even 200 BC, when things seemed to be functioning.

In 100 BC, Rome was no longer a city-state, but ruled a vast empire, becoming the hegemon of the Mediterranean world. While even in earlier times, it had ruled territories outside the city, even outside of Italy, the scale and circumstances became fundamentally new and different.

These circumstances changed the rules of the game. Rome becoming an imperial power was something so fundamentally new, that the institutions that worked well in the old times were not able to adapt fast enough. A paradigm shift was occurring in the ways the world worked and the Republic collapsed under the strains. The Romans were not able to handle all the different things that were suddenly thrown at them. Chaos was the result.

A similar type of paradigm shift in how the institutions work is happening in today’s world. This is due the changes of technology, with the rise of the internet. Even more radical changes like artificial intelligence are just a stone’s throw away. Systems that are designed to work well in predictable circumstances, can get strained and cease to function properly when a curve ball is thrown at them. For the Roman Republic, this curve ball was empire, for us this curve ball is technology.

Learning Step

In the Learning Step, we come up with a generalization of what this all means for the evolution of human societies. What can we learn from history? There is a common saying that you never step in the same river twice. This is true. The water and everything floating in in is not the same. However, the underlying processes of how the rivers flows, how it deposits sediments, as well as other things are pretty much the same.

So yes, the way the sediments look after they are deposited will not be the same, but you need to look at processes. You examine one spot of the river at one time and then come back a year later. It will look a bit different. While you might not know the specificities, you can describe what general processes made it look different. You won’t be able to predict the precise way that spot will look one year from now, but you can guess what processes will affect it (sediment deposits, wind, water erosion…etc.). Of course, we also need to keep in mind the possibility of big unpredictable events, which can mess all this up. Maybe a major storm might hit and destroy everything. As history often reminds us, “black swan” events can often out of nowhere and totally change the course of history.

There is also the question of the inevitability of outcomes. What we need to distinguish here are the role of trends versus human agency. Here you can use counterfactuals to judge what if scenarios. What would have happened if Sulla had not taken his army to Rome? It is likely that at some point some other general would have done it. This is because there were strong trends in place, which made this quite inevitable. With armies in the field after the Social War and these armies becoming more loyal to their commanders than the state after the reforms of Marius, it was just a matter of time before one or the other ambitious general used them for his own interests.

What role can you attribute to humans in the course of events? Some events are likely to happen no matter which person actually triggers it, but some are highly dependent on the person. For example World War I. was triggered after the assassination of archduke Ferdinand, but even if that had not happened, something else would have triggered it. The conditions were ripe. Once the tipping point is reached, almost anything can set off the spark to start the conflict.

However the conquest of the Persian Empire by Alexander were highly dependent on Alexander, since he was the one who came up with the idea (or rather his father Philip). If Alexander had not been in charge of Macedonia, it is quite unlikely that another person would have attempted to conquer the Persian Empire.

Another important thing to keep in mind is the question of causes versus symptoms. What is the cause of an event and what is its symptom? This can be quite hard to distinguish, but causes are usually large processes, fed by feedback loops, while symptoms are specific manifestations of these processes. For example, Trump is a symptom of the current malaise. This means that even if he didn’t show up, someone else like him would likely have come along and taken advantage of the situation. There are different brands of populists across the world today, but they are all using similar underlying processes that carry them to power.

However, the arrival of someone like Trump further destabilizes the situation, which then creates greater chaos. This is because the different feedback loops working in the background are reflexive, meaning that they reinforce each other. Both the causes and effects affect each other, with no one being able to tell which is the cause and which is the effect after a while.

What is the answer to all these problems? For the ancients it was using reason (using system 2 in the words of modern psychology researchers). However the questions remains, can we beat out the pitfalls of human nature by using the brain?

There are specific conditions in our modern societies today, that are giving rise to specific behaviors. This is quite similar to what was happening in the ancient Roman Republic. People argue whether nature or nurture is more influential in human behavior. The bell curve model that I explained is agnostic to whether character comes from nature, individual willpower, or nurture.

I believe that all these have an effect on how a human behaves. Nature gives each individual human certain predispositions for behavior and certain traits, however individual willpower and nurture can push these to the background and sometimes even change them.

I am a big believer that as an individual you are not just a slave to your genetic predispositions, but through your own willpower can rise above them to a certain extent. Virtuous character and acting right for the right reasons can be maintained under any circumstances. Yes, it can be shaken, and you will sometimes have to make some moral concessions, but overall there is never a need to descent to the pits of evil.

What is key is to build a resilient system, one that can withstand the swings of human nature. History has cycles, but with certain measures it should be possible to stop these cycles or at least diminish them. According to Polybius, the mixed form of government of Rome was able to diminish the functioning of these cycles, and prevented wanna-be kings from arising.

Turns out that this wasn’t enough. Even the most resilient systems can succumb to powerful forces. The separation of powers in the US has been able to keep the country stable for a long time, however as can be seen from things like the Civil War, certain processes can overwhelm even the best of systems.

Things don’t have to only go from bad to worse. There is precedence for societies changing for the better. One example is the lessening of corruption in Sweden. Sweden went from one of the most corrupt countries in Europe, one where everything was for sale, to one of the least corrupt ones.

On the other hand, the Roman Republic entered a vicious cycle, where it went from one of the least corrupt societies in the Mediterranean, one based on honor, to a corrupt, hedonistic cesspool. Decadence took over, which had a negative effect on how people behaved in society.

This brings us to the concept of a behavioral sink. The environment around you has a huge influence on how people act, which can be seen from some pretty unusual experiments that were undertaken in the 1950s and 60s. Researchers built a series of rat and mouse paradises, habitats which were meant to provide all the food and housing needs of its inhabitants and keep them free from predators. Then they introduced a small number of rats (in some experiments it was mice) into these habitats and watched what happened.

After a time of exploration, the rats settled in and started reproducing. Since all their needs were provided for, their populations exploded rapidly. However, after a time, weird things started happening. Dominant males built their harems, which consisted of a lot of females and a small number of select males who completely withdrew from doing anything productive and just ended up spending the entire day grooming themselves. The rest of the rejected males started congregating in some sections of the habitats. Some of them withdrew from society entirely, while others became violent and attacked anything that moved.

Decadence set in and rat society started disintegrating. The differences between the males were huge. Some had access to harems of females, while the majority did not have access to even one. With many of the rats congregating around a select number of feeding stations, social interactions became stressful.

After a while, all out war erupted, and even the alpha males had trouble defending their harems and territories. In these chaotic times, the females stopped building nests and even threw out their babies. At one point, no more babies survived into adulthood. Society disintegrated and collapsed.

Yet, there was no problem with food, predators, or shelter. These habitats provided for all of them, creating a prosperous society. Instead of calming everyone down, stress pervaded everywhere. The same rats that acted normally before, started behaving in abnormal ways.

The Roman Republic also underwent its behavioral sink. After the Punic Wars, it became a prosperous society overall, and its outside threats were eliminated. The population increased exponentially. Yet the social divisions grew worse too. The rich hoarded all the money and resources, while the poor got poorer. The select number of alpha rats monopolized most of the females and the best locations, while most of the other male rats ended up with nothing. The elites in Rome monopolized the farmlands and other resources, while many sections of the populations were kicked off their lands and couldn’t even find work.

The fact that the population skyrocketed and the space was limited, meant that the population had to battle over limited space and resources. The historians who came up with the theory of cliodynamics proposed that elite competition was an important factor in the downfall of the Republic. The population of the nobles grew, yet the number of places at the top was as limited as ever. There were still only a limited number of senators, and a small number of magistrate positions, including two consuls every year. While in the past, many of these nobles would be able to satisfy their ambitions in rising up the hierarchy, in a situation where there are a lot of them, this was no longer guaranteed. Battles for positions started.

We might be experiencing a behavioral sink now. While, there are significant differences between humans and rats, what happened in the rat utopias can serve as a warning sign. Certain conditions changed the behavior of the inhabitants, which led to a collapse of the society. Even though the utopias had all the resources needed for their inhabitants and protected them from outside predators, decadence set in and social interactions helped start a vicious circle, which spiraled down until society was destroyed.

We live in societies which are the most prosperous in history, yet the conditions seem to be stuck in a vicious cycle which is spiraling down. Social interactions are stressful, causing many people to withdraw from society, while others become more aggressive. The differences between the haves and have-nots are getting wider and wider, not just in terms of money, but also in social dynamics for many guys (a small percentage has harems of women, while others struggle to even get a date). City life is further adding to the every day stresses of large parts of the population, and the rise of social media is taking over social interactions.

This all leads to more and more frustration, which can lead to anger, and the rise of dark forces like populism, which further polarize society, leading it down to potentially bad places.

Read More:
This is Part 2 of a series on using historical analogies to describe current events. Read Part 1 here:
Why the fall of the Roman Republic is a good analogy for today’s chaotic time – Part 1.

Further articles to read:

Article 1:
The dangerous trends that are shaking up the world today.

Article 2:
11 lessons from the fall of the Roman Republic. It is disturbing how relevant they are for today.

Article 3:
At what point of the fall of the Roman Republic are we?

Article on forming analogies:
The method to create good analogies.

Images: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,

In August 2002, Donald Rumsfeld, the then US Secretary of Defense, drew a parallel between Saddam Hussein and Adolf Hitler. This is the type of thinking that drove the decision to invade Iraq in 2003, with colossal consequences.

A bad historical analogy can blind the thinking of the decision makers and put them on a path for disaster. Comparing Hussein and Hitler gave the leaders a set path to follow. Either bring down Hussein or be faced with a genocidal world war in the future.

Turns out, Saddam, the homicidal maniac that he was, was no Hitler. He had no weapons of mass destruction and barely controlled his own country. However, the fact that the decision makers in the US administration thought of him as Hitler, gave them tunnel vision. It was certainly a huge factor for the fatal decision to invade Iraq.

Leaders, whether in the government or business, are often faced with tough decisions. A strategy that they frequently employ to get out of this conundrum is the use of historical analogies. This can be a flash of brilliance or a complete disaster. The success of the decision these leaders make is very dependent on the analogy picked.

Some analogies are very close matches, while other analogies might seem very enticing, but in reality are far from similar. Under the surface, there could be many crucial, underlying differences. It is deciding which analogy is a close match, and which is just a mirage, that will determine whether you succeed or fail.

The historical analogies that are often thrown around when describing certain situations are vast. In the US, the most common ones are Vietnam (and being stuck in an unwinnable war), the Marshall Plan (giving aid to countries to rebuild them after a catastrophe), or even the Thucydides Trap (to describe the power relationships between countries).

Especially the Thucydides Trap has been getting a lot of traction lately to describe the current relationship between China and the US. This analogy is based on this quote from ancient Greek historian Thucydides when writing about what caused the Peloponnesian War.

“What made war inevitable was the growth of Athenian power and the fear which this caused in Sparta.”
from “History of the Peloponnesian War” by Thucydides

The danger here is that this type of thinking can drive US policy on a collision course with China. Whether it applies in this case or not is up for debate.

However, in today’s world we are faced with many other problems. One of these is the increasing polarization of societies, and the rise of populism, which could spell danger for democracy.

Here, I have tried to use the fall of the Roman Republic analogy in order to inform us on the situation of today. Sometimes, people use the analogy of the fall of the Western Roman Empire for this, but for me, there are some distinctions between the two cases that don’t make it a perfect analogy (although some things are relevant for today as well). The fall of the Roman Republic is a much better analogy to use.

So far, I have written three articles that use the analogy of the fall of the Roman Republic as the basis.

The first article, of over 20 thousand words, has a more direct comparison and a detailed description of today’s situation, with lessons learnt.
The dangerous trends that are shaking up the world today.

The second article, of over 40 thousand words, goes back to the ancient sources themselves, and tries to look at the fall through their eyes, drawing lessons from their insights. Here I have gone through many of the writings of the authors that survived from Antiquity and gather their wisdom, so that we can benefit from it even today. It is worth the read.
11 lessons from the fall of the Roman Republic. It is disturbing how relevant they are for today.

The third article, is a short and fun one, where I try to situate the current events on a timeline of the fall of the Roman Republic.
At what point of the fall of the Roman Republic are we?

Why is the fall of the Roman Republic an incredibly relevant analogy for today?

In an article on how to solve problems using analogies, I described the different steps needed to form a good analogy in order to solve a problem. Most people do this subconsciously in their heads, but you can sometimes do these steps overtly as well.

When you do this more overt deliberate reasoning, it is easier to determine whether the analogy you are using is the right one or not. However, before doing that, let’s take a step back and look at the initial assumptions that are key to this. These assumptions are very important in judging whether the analogy makes sense or not. You always have to keep in mind the assumptions that you are making when drawing up your model.

My first assumption is that humans are not rational actors. This can be proven quite easily by the fact that we still buy lottery tickets (despite the fact that the probability of winning the jackpot is miniscule), we still gamble (despite the fact that the game is rigged in the casino’s favor), and we still fall for bubbles (despite the fact that in the past few decades we have been burned by real estate bubbles, Dot.Com bubbles, and financial stock bubbles).

My second assumption is that human nature is the same as it was 2000 years ago. Sure, technology and society has changed, but the underlying processes in the brain haven’t. Sure, culture does have an effect on how you act, but the underlying processes of human nature still have a much stronger, determining pull.

Even if some aspects of culture are different in the different eras, the way humans work is still fundamentally the same. As Cicero stated, it does not matter that the Egyptians worship cats and dogs, and the Romans something else, the underlying process of superstition is the same in both nations.

The third assumption I am making is that due to the fact that human nature is quite irrational, and that there is a heavy negativity bias in the actions of most humans, there is a tendency for conditions in society to degenerate.

The way this works can be shown using game theory. When you have two people, they have two options either to cheat or not to cheat. In the first round of the game, one person cheats, and the other doesn’t. The person who cheats wins. This then pushes the other person to cheat in the next round of the game as well, since by staying honest, he would lose.

Another example of this type of process is the so-called tragedy of the commons. As Aristotle already noted millennia ago:

“What is common to the greatest number has the least care bestowed upon it. Everyone thinks chiefly of his own, hardly at all of the common interest.”
from “Politics” by Aristotle

In each of these examples, a race to the bottom starts and negative forces keep on gaining momentum. At some point, there is so much cheating in the system that the system collapses and resets itself. However, that takes a long time.

Human nature doesn’t change, just different traits and behaviors get activated based on specific situations. Similar types of processes can also be used to model the rise of altruistic behavior. Unfortunately as this type of behavior rises, cheaters will start popping up, which once again will start a race to the bottom. History is just a continuous cycle of these ebbs and flows.

Another model that we can use to show what happens in society during a fall is the bell curve. Let’s imagine that the different traits of human nature are spread out in a normal distribution, with a small number of selfish psychopaths on the total extreme right of the curve, and the selfless altruists on the extreme right of the curve. Most people would tend to be spread around the middle, neither too selfish or too altruistic.

The conditions in society at this time are normal, and so they don’t activate the more extreme behaviors among most people. Recent research on epigenetics has shown that even if you have a gene that gives you a certain tendency, it doesn’t mean that this tendency will arise. Usually an outside push from the environment around you is needed to trigger it.

Then, something in the outside environment changes, which awakens these traits among certain people in the population, which pushes the bell curve to the right. The result is more people in the population with more extreme traits and behaviors, which can have unforeseen negative consequences on society. If you apply the principles of chaos theory to this situation, you can see that a slight shift can have a huge effect in what happens next.

Let’s use the analogy of climate change to get a better picture of what can happen. You start off with a bell curve where you have a certain number of very cold days, and a certain number of very hot days, but most days tend to fall into the middle range. However, noxious gases and pollution in the environment changes things and pushes the bell curve to shift to the right.

Now you have a larger number of really hot days, the number of really cold days goes down, and the average is slightly more overall. However, this change can have a huge impact on the environment. Rivers can dry up, fields can yield less crops, which all then has an effect on nature and the humans living in that area. These changes then further accelerate the negative environment around, and degrade everything even more.

Slight shifts in the bell curve of normal human behavior can have huge impacts on what happens in society. Just like a slight shift of the temperature bell curve produces big changes in the environment, so can slight shifts of the way humans behave in society have a big impact on the course of events in a country.

Some series on TV explore this really well. In “The Walking Dead”, the series starts off in the normal world. The main characters have normal jobs as accountants, lawyers, policemen, or storekeepers. However, when the zombie apocalypse hits, they are forced to trigger some traits that in a normal situation would never get triggered. So a quiet accountant in normal society ends up being a sadistic dictator in a zombie infested world.

Experiments on human psychology, especially on social influence, have demonstrated how things like this can happen. In the Milgram experiment, the subject was told to push buttons to give electric shocks to people. Just because an authority was telling them to do that, many people complied. Even more striking is the Stanford prison experiment, which divided up students into groups of guards and prisoners. These roles ended up triggering many latent traits and encouraging some despicable behaviors among the different participants, including some of the guards turning quite sadistic.

There have been more recent experiments, which have looked at the impact of corruption. A group of researchers conducted a game of dice in 23 countries in order to measure the propensity to cheat among different societies. There was a strong correlation between the propensity to stretch the truth and the level of corruption in the country where the player comes from. The conclusion was that it was likely that the pervasive corruption in a society had an influence on how people viewed it and on their behavior.

All these studies and experiments show that it is not just the normal every day personality that defines how a person acts, but the situation and the environment have a huge effect as well. This is quite important for further developments in a society. Even if overall, some people might have a strong character, and despite situational and environmental pressures manage to keep it, other people might falter under these pressures.

Even if the number of additional people who succumb to these influences is small, this can have a huge effect on the overall state of affairs in society. This is due to the fact that numerous feedback loops create themselves, further reinforcing the effect, piling on top of each other, just like a snowball piles on more snow as it rolls downhill.

When you are looking at the fall of the Roman Republic, or the current state of affairs in politics in the modern world, you are looking at systems. Numerous factors and players are interacting in different ways, causing changes. The feedback loop is an important concept to keep in mind. A positive feedback loop amplifies the changes in a system, while a negative feedback loop tries to keep the status quo.

Let’s take an example from ecology in order to illustrate these two concepts. Imagine a population of rabbits is introduced into a territory where it didn’t exist before. They find the environment promising, with plenty of food and good weather. The rabbits start breeding, the kids grow up, and produce more rabbits. The more adults you have, the more kids you will have, which then creates a loop that keeps reproducing itself and reinforcing the exponential growth of the population. This is a positive feedback loop.

However, at one point the population outgrows the food supply, which causes mass starvation among the rabbits. Furthermore, the rabbits are easy food for predators, which attracts plenty of them to the area. These factors then start working on lowering the population of the rabbits. This is a negative feedback loop.

What you need to remember about feedback loops is that the causal relationships between the different parts of the system are often hard to determine. One part of the system reinforces another part of the system, which then reinforces a third one, which then ends up augmenting the first one. In this way, the different factors work together to create a final effect.

Positive feedback loops can create vicious circles, which make bad things even worse. Humans have often been compared to herds, since they frequently behave like one. Just like in any herd, one small thing can be the start of a massive panic. In a cattle herd, a small number of cows can get freaked out and start running, seeing this, other cows start running. The more cows are running, the more of an effect this will have on the other cows, who will start running as well. All this works on reinforcing the panic.

Just like in the environment, feedback loops are behind what happens in human societies. Some of these feedback loops work to keep the status quo, while other ones cause massive changes to the society. With positive feedback loops, different factors come together to magnify the shifts. These feedback loops are the mechanisms which move the bell curve to the left or right, or keep it stable.

This is how we can explain what happened in Roman society at the time that led to the fall of the Republic. In previous times of Roman history, human traits like greed, envy, ambition, but also altruism were all there. They still drove how people behaved, but the bell curve was shifted to the left, so the overall environment tended to trigger more positive behaviors. The situation in Rome after the Punic Wars shifted the bell curve to the right, which ended up triggering negative behaviors much more, with the resultant chaos bringing about the fall of the Republic.

This analogy of the Roman Republic has an incredible demonstration power for what is happening in the world today. In the past decades, the bell curve has shifted to the right, which has triggered more negative traits among large sections of the population. The bone-headedness was always there, but now it is just more prominent. This could spell trouble for the future.

What is interesting for us to observe, is how things in Roman society degenerated and led to the rise of one man rule. It was not a quick process, but took over a hundred years of gradual change, with small changes, such as the breaking of norms, piling up on top of each other, until at one point the country ended up in civil war. In no way does this mean that we are heading to a civil war as well, instead we should look at the events of that era as a warning sign and adjust course so that history does not repeat itself.

This is Part 1 of the series on using historical analogies for current events. Read Part 2 here:
Analogy fall of Roman Republic and current events – Part 2.

Read More:
Article 1:
The dangerous trends that are shaking up the world today.

Article 2:
11 lessons from the fall of the Roman Republic. It is disturbing how relevant they are for today.

Article 3:
At what point of the fall of the Roman Republic are we?

Article on forming analogies:
The method to create good analogies.

Images: 1, 2