Epictetus’s Key Insight for Taking Back Our Lives
There's more than one way to be a slave
Will you be a slave?
This is Epictetus’s question for us. It echoes across the vastness of 1,800 years, but seems tailor-made for solving the 21st century’s greatest challenges.
The slave-philosopher deployed this tool — a kind of lens I think of as the Dichotomy of Enslavement — in his famous works, The Discourses and The Enchiridion. It’s a litmus test we can bring to every moment — should I say, think, or do this?
Many of us are awash in bullshit, struggling to find balance amid a tide of digital services designed to hack our reward system and extract our money and time. People are trying to enslave us without whip or shackle because it serves them. The cost is our focus and contentment. How many say, “I used to read 30 books a year but now can’t finish one”? We feel degraded, and we are.
And this atop the “normal” enslavements Epictetus warned his students about circa 135 A.D.
The Real Question: Will we go along with our subjection and offer up our wrists to be bound? Or will we fight back and remain free?
Then and now, Epictetus’s lens seems hard to swallow, but we can use it to reclaim our lives and be who we want to be.
The Slave Who Freed Himself
“Would you have a great empire? Rule over yourself.”
— Publius Syrus, Moral Sayings
Other Stoics spoke about the evils of metaphorical enslavement, but they were privileged men who’d never bourn the lash or labored under the hot sun for a master ensconced in luxury.
Epictetus was a literal slave, though well-educated and tasked with assisting an emperor’s secretary. His name means “acquired one.” Perhaps this tells us all we need to know about the suffering of his early life. One owner beat Epictetus so badly that his leg broke and never properly healed — he walked with a limp and a crutch for the rest of his days.
All this is to say that the philosopher had skin in the game and knew a thing or two about the evils of being property. He wasn’t just spouting off. When he speaks about slavery we should listen carefully.
And yet, although he goes on brief diatribes about slave owners, he finds metaphorical slavery the most reprehensible. This goes against our intuition. It seems wrong. Aren’t we now free? Haven’t we escaped this great evil? Aren’t our great innovations and pleasures accelerating freedom and the good life?
After being freed, Epictetus set up a philosophy school in Greece and became famous for his wisdom. Ironically, wealthy slave owners of the type he’d labored under sent their sons to learn from him. It was an opportunity for subversion that must have brought a smile to the old man’s face.
These privileged dandies washed up at the school already metaphorically enslaved, and Epictetus tried to convince them to free themselves. He leans into the task, sometimes calling them, “slave,” and “wretch,” to shake them from their complacency. Then as now, achieving freedom was no easy task. The allures of slavery are many and living up to our own standards sounds quaint and old-fashioned when shallow pleasures beckon.
Epictetus thought we could do better, and that we’d be happier for it.
Epictetus’s Slavery:
“And who is your master? Whoever has authority over anything that you’re anxious to gain or avoid.” — Epictetus, Discourses, 2.2
I read Epictetus’s ideas about self-willed slavery as falling into five buckets.
Emotional Slavery: Being reactive and controlled by fear, anger, or desire. These might leave us stupid or detached from reality.
Societal Slavery: Allowing social pressures and others' opinions to dictate our choices and values. This allows us to be led like sheep.
Material Slavery: Becoming dependent on wealth, status, or possessions for happiness and fulfillment. The hedonic treadmill will bring us back to baseline after achieving these things, forcing us to run ever faster.
Pleasure Slavery: Dependence on ephemeral, shallow pleasures for escape or fulfillment. This can look like immoderate internet and video game habits, spending our nights binging on Netflix, overeating, making stupid decisions in pursuit of sex, and inability to relax without alcohol/drugs.
Delusion Slavery: Holding onto irrational misconceptions that limit personal freedom and growth and lead to vice. Doubly so if we let untested beliefs into our identity.
What Slavery Isn’t:
Just because the body requires food doesn’t mean we’re a slave to food or the body.
A mother might spend much of her waking life attending to her newborn infant, but that doesn’t mean she’s a slave to her baby.
Pleasure is morally neutral and doesn’t need to lead to slavery.
We might utilize potentially enslaving services and substances and interact with our deluded society without becoming enslaved.
Emotions are not slavery; they’re normal and fine. It’s only when emotions run wild that they lead to something problematic.
What Freedom Looks Like
“No servitude is more shameful than the kind we take on willingly.”
— Seneca, Letters, 47.17
Epictetus and the Stoics have a revolutionary position: freedom is an internal state of mind rather than an external condition. Metaphorical enslavement is always something we choose.
People of any race, class, or social standing (including literal slaves) can free themselves. We just have to adopt the right internal orientation, though fate might hand us chaotic and unpleasant circumstances we seek to change.
The right practice allows us to control our judgments, accept what we can’t change, improve what we can, and live according to our values. Just as importantly, it allows us to spot and avoid mistakes, such as being enserfed by addictive internet services. When we do this, we can’t be enslaved in the way that matters most.
When we respect ourselves as free people we naturally align with excellence; to do otherwise would be disrespectful to ourselves. We recognize that it’s pathetic to be self-enslaved, and we break free.
Probing For Slavery:
“In a consumer society there are inevitably two kinds of slaves:
the prisoners of addiction and the prisoners of envy.”
—Ivan Illich, Tools for Conviviality
Chattel slavery has mostly vanished from the developed world, but the 21st century has brought more metaphorical slavery than ever. Watch the people who can’t look away from glowing screens, even when socializing around dinner tables. Study the lives squandered in pursuit of shiny things. Count the neglected relationships and unswerving allegiance to tribal affiliations. These people have been conquered and dominated, though no army deployed against them.
If we want to free ourselves we need to identify our enslavements. If you’re like me, you’ll find them lurking in unexpected places.
Begin by journaling like a philosopher and recalling how you spent your day. Note down anything you did for a half hour or more (collectively across the day). Ask yourself if there’s any part of your relation to this time commitment that has an aspect of slavery of the emotional, societal, material, pleasure, or delusional kind.
Be sure to consider “background enslavements,” or things you can’t stop thinking about as you do other things. These are often anxieties, fears, or desires.
If you regularly catch yourself doing things you didn’t decide to do, such as scrolling social media when you meant to be doing something else, you’re enslaved.
If your pleasures/escapes/hobbies interfere with living a good life, you’re enslaved.
If you can’t stop thinking about things outside your control, you’re enslaved.
If you’re unable to moderate your food intake, you’re enslaved.
If you can’t relax without a substance, you’re enslaved.
If you frequently lose your temper, you’re enslaved.
If you keep doing things that aren’t in your best interest, you’re enslaved.
How To Free Ourselves:
“That person is free who lives as he wishes, who can neither be constrained, nor hindered, nor compelled, whose motives are unimpeded, and who achieves his desires and doesn’t fall into what he wants to avoid. ” — Epictetus, Discourses, 2.1
You’ll likely find numerous enslavements in your life. There are certainly several left in mine, though I’ve made progress.
If you decide you want to be free, I have some ideas to help. But let’s note that most of us allow bullshit to hold us back because we’re not ready to change. We actually know what to do, but we make excuses, like needing more information and strategies. This is a kick-the-can-down-the-road escapism that’s easy to fall into. Start today! You probably already know what to do. I’d suggest tackling your enslavements one at a time. Divide your focus and you’ll conquer nothing.
There’s no way I can cover every type of enslavement, but here are some of the biggest.
Breaking Digital Chains
You probably can’t give up your digital life entirely, and probably don’t want to. This means we must attempt moderation. Unfortunately, moderation is harder than abstinence on platforms designed to hack our reward system.
Those struggling with digital sanity might want to do something like this:
Only use algorithmically-driven services on a laptop/desktop, and never on your phone.
Only use them during a pre-designated 30-60 minute block each day.
The rest of the time, chain yourself to a mast, i.e., utilize a program like Freedom on your laptop and phone which will lock you out of all or part of the internet not needed for work/what you deem acceptable.
Strongly consider creating a “void” 4-5 nights a week where you’re free of algorithmic hacking and can settle into deeper but less intense pleasures. As these regulate you, your relation to the digital realm will drift toward sustainability.
Hedonic Insurrection
Loving what we have instead of craving what we don’t is the ultimate luxury, a superpower of unimaginable leverage. We can achieve it at this very moment.
To get off the hedonic treadmill and find contentment with ourselves and what we have, we utilize a few tools:
Find gratitude in the little things and the hard things.
Identify the ugly side and the tradeoffs of all our desires to dissipate them.
The Sovereign Mind
Begin to know yourself through philosophical journaling and by recruiting a mental mentor to keep watch over you.
Cull labels and identitarian markers from your identity to think clearly.
Pass through worry and anxiety with this strategy.
Strive to live in your country like Socrates.
Keep Your Slave Rebellion off the Rocks
When you make your bid for freedom you’ll quickly notice most people aren’t on board. They gleefully fling away their sovereignty, window shopping for shackles with gold plating and jewels (or a camo pattern) that best express their personality.
If we’re free and society remains in bondage, we’re left with a void. Fail to fill it well and you’ll doom yourself to backsliding into slavery.
So how to fill our void? Here are some of my recent suggestions.
But what does this mean in a broader sense? It means replacing the shallow pleasures of enslavement for deeper pleasures. That means utilizing virtue to achieve happiness.
I hope you’ll give it a shot.
Thanks for reading Socratic State of Mind.
If you enjoyed this article, please like and share it, which helps more readers find my work.
Wow, so much to unpack here. Just sent to my spouse for dinnertime discussion.
This is great! thank you!