Courage

Hypomnemata

If you had perfect knowledge and foresight, you would have no need for courage. What you must secure for yourself is the answer to the question: "ought this thing to be done?" If the answer is yes, then pursue and persist.

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I would revise the Serenity Prayer thus:

God grant me the desire to love my fate which is "not up to me";

the wisdom to know what I must influence;

and the courage to pursue and persist.

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In the movies, Aragorn says, "then I shall die as one of them!" Qui-Gon Jinn says, "I shall do what I must." And Obi-Wan Kenobi says, "I will do what I must."

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Thermopylae

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Understand who you are - what you represent and must pursue; then stick to your reasons and persist.

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The children had no need of courage because they knew no fear, when they laughed at the emperor with no clothes. But the adults feared repercussions or perhaps they wanted kingly favors and this is why they lacked the courage to speak up when the emperor was wearing no clothes. They but needed to minimize or release the grip of indifferents and exercise a bit of courage, and so too, their mouths would have opened and spoken the truth.

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Thoughts

I'm not sure sure I will ever be placed in a situation where I have to fight alongside King Leonidas against the Persian hoard. Nor do I think I'll be called upon to fight tyranny like Cato was. As I've reflected on courage in the position I occupy in both time and space, I find I need courage to speak up more and not abandon the daily problems I face.

When a manager or a peer uses faulty logic, do I speak up and make it known? Or should I "fall in line" and not cause a stir? When management holds an "ask me anything" session, do I hide behind anonymity, or do I ask the challenging questions and face possible repercussions? Is it wise to stay the course and stick with the company which has invested in me for 20 years or should I consider abandoning my employer to find a different career path? Should I still invest time in a given activity when, in the grand scheme of things, this activity is pointless?

I find myself often reflecting on what the wise course of action is; and if I have enough time for reflection and I see a path forward, then having the courage to proceed and stick with it is easier. Far more difficult is being forced to make a decision or to go down a path of reasoning where the outcome is very uncertain. Chrysippus said "courage is scientific knowledge of matters requiring persistence" and that makes sense to me. But what of matters where the scientific knowledge has not been acquired or we are in a wait-and-see mode? To me, sometimes it is hard to separate courage and faith; and whenever someone tells me to "just have faith" or "trust me", all sorts of red-flags go up and the task turns into one of determining if they are telling me the truth or not.

On a matter of less importance, but still one that requires some degree of courage, is facing a friend of mine in repeated battles of chess. He has been playing it for about 10 years longer than I and he is quite good at it. We play almost every week and he consistently beats me, despite my best efforts and after lots of studying and practice. Over the course of the last year, we have played close to 60 chess games and I have only won 4 times! Every week, when it is time to play, I face the prospect of losing again. Losing is almost so certain, that I have since pivoted my goal to simply putting up a good fight against him! My sentiment is not unlike Rocky Balboa, who didn't want to beat Apollo Creed in their first match, but simply to go the distance with him. Rocky did go the distance and endured all the rounds of the boxing match without being knocked out. Despite losing, Rocky considered it a victory for himself.

As for me playing chess with my talented friend, I'm often confronted with whether my time playing him is a good use of time or not. And if it is a good use of time, whether I care enough to try to challenge him and whether I'm committed to giving him my best or not. In this space, I simply try to scrounge up the courage to practice, study, remember and then to have a good attitude to do my best when I play him and to commit to learning from my losses. A recent playing session with my friend produced a draw, a win and a very close loss against him; and compared to the normal results (all losses), I consider this recent encounter proof that exercising courage is helping.

I think we just have to do our best; pick and choose the hills we are willing to die on. Perhaps there is a bit of needing to listen to our daimon and then following that path. If we do so, then the hills we are willing to die up become clearer and the courage to persist is worth the price of living according to Nature and our unique nature.

Quotes

how, then, does Chrysippus define it? 'Courage,' he says, 'is scientific knowledge of matters requiring persistence.' Or 'a tenor of the soul fearlessly obedient to the supreme law in enduring and persisting' (Long, Sedley, 192).

Epictetus Discourses 4.4.19-23

But as it is, we don’t realize that we ourselves, though in a different fashion, are coming to be just like everyone else. Someone else is afraid that he won’t gain office, while you’re afraid that you will. In no way should you be afraid, man! [20] But just as you laugh at someone who is afraid of not gaining office, so also laugh at yourself. For it makes no difference whether one thirsts for water because one has a fever, or one has a dread of water because one has rabies. [21] Or how could you still be able to say along with Socrates, ‘If this is what God pleases, so be it!’* Do you suppose that if Socrates had wished for nothing other than to spend his time at the Lyceum or Academy,* and engage in conversation every day with the young men there, he would have been as happy to set out on the campaigns on which he so often served?* Wouldn’t he have wept and groaned, saying, ‘Poor unfortunate man that I am, I’m now in misery and misfortune when I might have been sunning myself in the Lyceum!’ [22] Was this your task in life, to warm yourself in the sun? Wasn’t it, rather, to be happy, and be free from hindrance and obstruction? And how would he still have been Socrates if he had lamented in that way? How would he still have been able to write hymns of praise* in prison?

[23] In a word, remember this, that if you attach value to anything at all that lies outside the sphere of choice, you’ve destroyed your choice. Not only is office outside that sphere, but also freedom from office; and not only want of leisure, but also leisure itself.

And so I commanded myself to live. For sometimes it is an act of bravery even to live (Seneca, Moral Letters 78).

Bravery takes the greatest care of itself, and likewise endures with the greatest patience all things which have a false appearance of being evils. 29. "What then?" is the query; "if the sword is brandished over your brave man's neck, if he is pierced in this place and in that continually, if he sees his entrails in his lap, if he is tortured again after being kept waiting in order that he may thus feel the torture more keenly, and if the blood flows afresh out of bowels where it has but lately ceased to flow, has he no fear? Shall you say that he has felt no pain either?" Yes, he has felt pain; for no human virtue can rid itself of feelings. But he has no fear; unconquered he looks down from a lofty height upon his sufferings. Do you ask me what spirit animates him in these circumstances? It is the spirit of one who is comforting a sick friend (Seneca, Moral Letters 85).

Citations & Further Reading

Long, A. A., & Sedley, D. N. (January 01, 1987). The Hellenistic Philosophers.

Seneca, L. A., & Gummere, R. M. (1917). Ad Lucilium epistulae morales: London: Heinemann.

Commentary on Epictetus' Discourses 3.26 (https://www.rockyrook.com/2019/07/epictetus-discourses-326-to-those-who.html)