What is a philosophy of life?
This phrase ‘philosophy of life’ is used in the popular vernacular, but rather loosely and without a precise meaning. In more scholarly or academic contexts, its meaning is clarified or sharpened, but still remains a somewhat elusive concept.
A philosophy of life is different from moral philosophy and ethics. It is somehow more comprehensive. Each of them is inherently practical, insofar as it tells us what to do, how to be, what to admire and respect and aspire to, etc. Ethical theories are characterized by how they define or determine what is good and what is right, what we owe to others, and what we ought to do. But it is not clear if ethical theories are meant to tell us what to do at every waking instant, or how often we are to act in a deliberate manner. A philosophy of life, on the other hand, aims to guide everything one does at all times. It thus typically involves a small set of principles that can guide one’s every decision, like a handbook or map that can be pulled out anytime for instruction.
Living is an activity, and it can be a deliberate activity with increased awareness of what one is doing and why. One lives a philosophy of life. This is more than just an intellectual grasping of the truth, but the intellectual part is quite important, too. Living according to a philosophy somehow synthesizes intellectual and practical affairs, so that one’s actions proceed from tenets that have been rationally tested, and it is precisely the understanding and accepting of these tenets that commences and sustains one’s activity of living deliberately.
Living according to a philosophy of life thus becomes lived wisdom. People lived the philosophies of Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, Epicurus, and other Ancient Greek philosophers in the six centuries surrounding the start of the Christian Era, whereas nowadays they are studied as a mostly intellectual enterprise.
Philosophy, Religion, and Spiritual Practices
These pagan philosophies of life functioned in ways that we now associate with religion. Today’s Catholics, Episcopalians, and Muslims parallel the ancient Stoics and Epicureans, to choose only a few examples, in being cultures explicitly unified by an ideology and ethos.
Still, a philosophical way of living should be distinguished from religious ways of living, even if they can be similar, or tied to one another, in practice, and even if some ancient philosophical communities, such as the Epicureans, came to look somewhat cult-ish. As John Cooper’s Pursuits of Wisdom distinguishes things, religious living characteristically allows that sacred texts, tradition, prayer, divine revelation, feelings of conviction or of a personal relationship with the divine can play a fundamental role in organizing one’s life (p. 17).
Living according to a philosophy of life, on the other hand, will not grant a fundamental role or authority to such things. Only a reasoned understanding will do. There will indeed be important texts, but these are accepted because they exemplify “reasoned ideas about the world and one’s own place within it”, and have been “argued through, rationally worked out, rationally grasped, and rationally defended” (Cooper, 17). Religious and philosophical ways of living are not mutually exclusive, though. Early Christianity was framed as a philosophy, and it incorporated parts of Stoicism and Platonism. The Epicurean philosophical community developed cultural traditions that are hard to distinguish from religion. And Judaism is arguably a good example of both a religion and a philosophy that has unified a culture over many centuries.
Despite the need to distinguish philosophical from religious ways of living, one can speak of a philosophy of life as “spiritual”, if we keep in mind that ‘spirit’ can serve as a translation for Greek psuche or Latin animus, which also translate as ‘soul’ and ‘mind’.
Pierre Hadot expounds on the “spiritual exercises” of Greek philosophies of life, which we might understand more easily if we think of them as mental exercises akin to meditation and concentration. He claimed that ancient philosophy in Ancient Greece and Rome was “a method of spiritual progress which demanded a radical conversion and transformation of the individual’s way of being” (Hadot "Philosophy as a Way of Life", 265). Philosophizing was an activity that became indistinguishable from living, so that one’s actively practicing a philosophy of life became one’s life itself.
According to Hadot, “In Stoicism, as in Epicureanism, philosophizing was a continuous act, permanent and identical with life itself, which had to be renewed at each instant. For both schools, this act could be defined as an orientation of the attention” (268). In Stoicism, attention was oriented toward the purity of one’s intentions. In Epicureanism, by contrast, attention was oriented toward pleasure.
And you thought that mindfulness was a new, modern fad? No, of course, we all have known that meditation and the deliberate increasing of awareness of inner life are ancient practices. But you might have been thinking of Eastern religions or philosophies, and you might be surprised to hear that Ancient Western civilizations included rational-monks aiming at enlightenment through controlling their attention, inner life, and mental activity.
Stoic and Epicurean Philosophies of Life
Both the Stoics and the Epicureans advised us to live in the present, and to avoid the troubles involved with holding onto the past or dwelling on bad memories, as well as not to worry about uncertain future events. They emphasized that there is infinite value in each instant, so that lived wisdom was complete, in each moment, no matter when it is cut short by death. A philosophy of life must be practiced continuously at each instant. There is no reason to delay; this very moment is the time to begin.
Wisdom brings peace of mind (ataraxia), inner freedom (autarkeia), and the “cosmic perspective” of being aware of one’s place in the universe or cosmos, as a part of that cosmos.
Epicurus reduced it all to the pleasure of having eliminated all bodily pain and mental distress. This is the sole fundamental value and the goal of life, which can be achieved by rationally and prudently pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain and distress. The Epicureans were thus hedonists, though not at all the stereotypical hedonists that this name now evokes.
The Stoics claimed that excellence or virtue (arete) is the goal, while allowing for more complex instructions on how to live. They thought the universe is divinely ordered and inspired, with each part playing a unique and ineliminable role in the whole: “At each instant the ancient sage was conscious of living in the cosmos, and he placed himself in harmony with the cosmos” (Hadot, 265). The sage will perceive everything as happening in the universal context, and will never cease to have the whole in mind, while being aware of his or her particular place and part in it.
That’s not to say that the sage knows what will happen next, but instead that whatever happens next is placed into the context as fitting just so. It is greeted with open arms as a divine gift.
These ancient philosophies of life advise us to live in a way that could not be troubled no matter what happens. We can control our inner peace, and thus our happiness and well-being, no matter what uncontrollable forces come our way.
Cooper, John 2012 Pursuits of Wisdom: Six Ways of Life in Ancient Philosophy Princeton University Press
Hadot, Pierre 1995 "Philosophy as a Way of Life" translated by Chase, Michael in Davidson, Arnold (ed) Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault Blackwell Publishers
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