“The happiness of your life depends on the quality of your thoughts.” Teach Different with Marcus Aurelius

Transcript

Dan Fouts (00:10)

Welcome everybody to the Teach Different podcast. We have some stoicism philosophy today. A quote from Marcus Aurelius, former Roman emperor from 161 to 180, who’s joining us in thought today on the Teach Different podcast. And we’re going to get to his quote, which is really powerful and something we can think about related to happiness and controlling thoughts, and it’s a good one. For those unfamiliar, we’re going to be working with this provocative philosophy quote about life and something thematic that is meaningful to us. And we’re going to then try to interpret it and look at the claim of the quote, and then work through the counterclaim of the quote. Disagree with it, see it from a different angle, hold two competing thoughts in our head at the same time. And then throughout the process, ask questions and be thoughtful and curious about the world. That’s what Teach Different is all about. These quotes, they can be used in any context with your classroom. You can use it in a family setting. You can use it at your job or just for, you know, with a friend to think deeply about life. So here we go, Marcus Aurelius, Stoic philosopher, Roman emperor. The happiness of your life depends on the quality of your thoughts. The happiness of your life depends on the quality of your thoughts. Steve, what do you think Marcus Aurelius is saying to us here?

Steve Fouts (01:57): We’re in control of our happiness, I think. It’s also saying that happiness is based in thought. It’s not based in external circumstances, so there’s no other need, there’s no other reason to search for happiness in your life, unless you’re searching internally and you’re trying to get ahead of your own thinking, and you’re trying to change your perspective. So happiness is in your own perspective in life. That’s what I’m getting.

Dan Fouts (02:49)

I like it. Happiness is in your mind. It’s something that you can generate and create for yourself inside yourself. It actually makes happiness seem like something that is accessible to everybody, you know, no matter what your situation and stoic philosophers, stoicism is very big on using your own mind and your own, the power of your own thinking to change your attitude and to have contentment and enjoyment and happiness in life. So this fits very well with stoic philosophy. You know, the question, whenever the word happiness is brought up, I find that at least with my students, they ask, well, what is happiness? Or that’s kind of a question that comes up that needs to be explored alongside this quote. And I think that could be a nice, I wouldn’t say tangent, but a direction for inquiry. Here.

Steve Fouts (04:02)

Definitely, and happiness is such a personal thing too. This is trying to generalize it in some way and provide a definition that could relate to everyone potentially. I’ve already got a question coming up about this quote, the happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts. My question would be, to what extent are your thoughts the product of your environment and what you’re going through? If you’re suffering and you’re going through a lot of travails, that’s affecting your thoughts. So, I actually could see this quote potentially applying to this idea that the quality of your thoughts is actually linked to your circumstances. It isn’t something you can think your way out of and be happy no matter what. So I think my question is, to what extent are the quality of your thoughts affected by your environment and not just your own mind that’s in some vacuum or void that you’re deciding to do all this on your own? Does that make sense?

Dan Fouts (05:26)

I think it does. Are you essentially stating a counterclaim then to this, that the quality of your thoughts lives in your environment. The environment produces your thoughts and it’s not just your ability to create happiness with your thoughts. The happiness of your life depends on your environment is what I, kind of putting together what you’re saying.

Steve Fouts (05:53)

Yes, and I wouldn’t even call it a counterclaim so much because he doesn’t give his definition of where the quality of your thoughts come from. So I think it could actually be worked in to what he’s trying to say here. That’s why I termed it as a question. I don’t know if that makes sense because he’s not saying that the quality of your thoughts is based in just the way you think and that you can overcome anything and think whatever you want at whatever point. You know, he’s just saying that don’t look to externals for your happiness. Look to the quality of your thoughts, you know? So if you’re going through it and you’re like, say, dealing with some trust issues and you’re feeling anxious, maybe you’re even fearful and you know, you’re struggling, those are thoughts. Those are not anything objective that we can look at and say, oh, I see why you’re struggling because this is happening. Oh, I see why you’re anxious because of this. I see why you’re fearful because of this. Marcus Aurelius would probably say, No, you’re fearful because you’re fearful. You decided to be fearful. That’s where your thoughts are. Same thing with all the other, you know, challenges. So I don’t know if I’m parsing this or not, but I don’t think I’m ready for a counterclaim. Maybe I started it.

Dan Fouts (07:34)

Let’s bring in, and I would love to introduce a guest we have, Siye, who’s here who might want to just weigh in on this. Siye, why don’t you introduce yourself, maybe your role with Teach Different, and we’d love to hear an idea that you have with this.

Siye Dlamini (07:51)

Yeah, thank you, Dan. I am Siye, and I am the producer of the Teach Different podcast. And the thing that comes to mind for me with this quote, actually, is another quote, which is, happiness is a state of mind. And I think this speaks to that idea that when you control your thoughts and what’s going on in your mind, then you can achieve a state of happiness regardless of what your current circumstances are, which is why we practice gratitude to look at the things to kind of reprogram our minds to look at the things that are going well and therefore achieve a state of happiness. And then also it brings up another quote, which is, you are what you think, and therefore, if you spend your time with a whole lot of negative thinking and thought processes, then you won’t be happy. But if you reprogram yourself to focus on more positive things you will achieve a state of happiness because your thoughts are more positive, if that makes sense.

Steve Fouts (08:57)

Great. Those quotes are very similar.

Dan Fouts (09:01)

I like that. To make the counterclaim. If we’re just thinking about a counterclaim here, the happiness of your life depends on your environment is what I would say the counterclaim is here. He puts a high value on the ability of you to use your mind to create your own sense of contentment and happiness, but sometimes your environment is such that no matter how powerful your mind is, it overwhelms your capacity to be happy. That’s what I would do to push back and that’s where my head is on this.

Steve Fouts (09:42)

Me too. This is one of those easier said than done philosophies, which is a criticism of stoicism at times. If you grow up and you have to deal with abuse, for instance, from people who should be looking after you, and you don’t have anywhere to go, and you’re stuck in an anxious state, in your own home environment and maybe it’s no better when you leave and you go to school and you get bullied and none of these things you chose. You didn’t decide any of this stuff. This stuff is happening to you. That to me is going to create a lot of drag on happiness. And I don’t know how your quality of thoughts can improve in that environment. And maybe it can’t. Maybe you have to wait till it’s over and you’re struggling with the memories of it, and the resentment you might have. Then it might be a little easier to switch up your game and have a positive attitude, etc. But when you’re in that moment, it’s hard to argue that you can think your way out of it, and that you’re the one that’s gonna decide whether you’re happy. You’ve got life happening. Life is lifing to you.

Siye Dlamini (11:10)

Yeah, and I would say it’s a very individualistic framework to say that you are in control of your happiness, whereas, you know, when you experience hanging out with your friends, with your family in a positive environment, and you have a good time, and you get those endorphins, that happiness is not a product of your environment. It’s a product of the positive experiences that you have around you, of other people, yes. So I think the counterclaim is that Happiness is a product of your environment, for sure, and we need other people to actually aid in our feelings of joy and happiness and to make our entire life experiences better.

Dan Fouts (11:54)

Beautifully said. A question that comes to my mind is, now, based on what you just said, Siye, is what role do other people play in my happiness in life?

Steve Fouts (12:08)

Yeah.

Dan Fouts (12:09)

That would be a nice one to put to your audience. And then they can talk about their family, their friends, and all of a sudden now the environment seems to have a pretty big influence on your happiness.

Steve Fouts (12:25)

That’s good. I don’t have anything to add. I actually like that essential question, how do people figure in. You know, and then it can, you can really get deeper with that and realize that, hey, you can choose your friends when you get older and you have a little bit more freedom, you can decide what types of people you want around you. And if you end up having negative people around you and you keep making those choices, I think that the argument that your environment is setting your happiness and other people are, starts to fade away a bit. And you have to acknowledge that some of this is your choice. But again, it’s not fair to say that all of it is your choice, especially when you’re younger, in my opinion.

Dan Fouts (13:19)

Also, some people are always in a bad mood, no matter what. And they could use this advice on a very micro level, walk into a room. And see the good, see positive intentions of other people, and don’t bring people down with your bad mood. I mean, control your thoughts a little bit. So, on that base level, I see the value of stoicism. But then when you extrapolate it out to something like happiness, I think it has some limitations.

Steve Fouts (13:50)

Yeah.

Dan Fouts (13:51)

Well, great. This has been a really good one. I love these stoic quotes. They’re very provocative, simple, and lend themselves to a claim and a counterclaim. And that’s the elixir, so to speak, for a really good conversation. Thank you everybody so much and we’re looking forward to our next quote and enjoy yourself and we’ll see you again on the next Teach Different podcast.