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Question

How do the Stoics say to manage anger?

A look at how Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius trace anger to judgment, not to what other people do.

Updated

The short answer

The Stoics say anger comes from a judgment you make, not from what another person does. Epictetus holds that it is your opinion that a blow or insult is insulting, not the act itself, that provokes you, and Marcus Aurelius applies the same principle when he tells himself that removing the opinion that something is grievous removes the anger with it. Both treat wrongdoing as a kind of blindness about good and evil, which makes pity, not anger, the fitting response. The practical method is to catch the impression before you assent to it, since that pause is where anger can still be stopped.

Key points

  • Epictetus locates the cause of anger in your own opinion about an act, not in the act or the person who did it.
  • Marcus Aurelius applies the same principle to himself, arguing that removing the judgment that something is grievous removes the anger.
  • Epictetus treats wrongdoers as mistaken about good and evil rather than as deliberately choosing evil, which makes pity more fitting than rage.
  • Marcus works through a list of considerations, including that most wrongdoing is involuntary and that we ourselves often do wrong, to soften a rush to anger.
  • The concrete practice both point to is catching the impression before assent, since that pause is where you can still choose not to be provoked.

The longer answer

Epictetus puts the mechanism in a single line: it is not the person who insults you or strikes you who does the insulting, but the judgment that these things are insulting (Handbook 20). Anger, on this view, is never caused directly by another person's words or blow. It is caused by your own opinion about what happened. That opinion is up to you, so anger is up to you too, at least in the sense that it can be undone the way it was made.

The popular misreading treats this as a trick for staying calm: count to ten, take a breath, and the anger will pass. Stoic writers are after something deeper. Marcus Aurelius, working through a list of considerations for when someone has offended him, states the principle directly: it is not men's acts which disturb us, but our own opinions, and if you take away the opinion that the act was something grievous, your anger is gone (Meditations 11.18). The claim is not about managing a feeling. It is about seeing that the feeling rests on a judgment, and that the judgment can be false.

What is that false judgment, specifically? Epictetus argues that everyone acts toward what they believe is good for them: no one desires one thing while judging another to be proper. So when someone wrongs you, they are not choosing evil with open eyes. They are mistaken about what is good and bad (Discourses I 18). He pushes this all the way to people we normally call thieves and adulterers. Call such a person a thief, he says, and look at what you are actually claiming: that this man has been deceived and blinded, not in his eyesight, but in the faculty that distinguishes good from bad. Put that way, Epictetus asks whether we should be angry with him or pity him. He compares the demand to destroy such a person to demanding we destroy a man for being blind or deaf, and calls that comparison inhuman when said plainly.

This is a hard teaching, and Epictetus does not soften it. He is not saying that wrongdoing does not matter, or that thieves should go unpunished. He is saying that the wrongdoer has already lost the greatest thing, a will or faculty of choice in good working order, and that this loss is the real harm, greater than anything he can do to you. Anger adds a second casualty to the situation: you.

Marcus works through the same territory with more patience, offering himself a sequence of considerations to run through when someone has offended him. Human beings are made for one another, so a wrongdoer is failing at something you have a stake in fixing, not merely enduring. Most wrongdoing is involuntary, since every soul is deprived of the truth unwillingly, which is why people are stung when they are called unjust or ungrateful. You yourself do wrong often enough, and refrain from other faults only through cowardice or concern for your reputation, not through a clean will. And you rarely have enough information to judge another person's act correctly, since so much depends on circumstances you do not see (Meditations 11.18). None of this asks you to pretend the offense did not happen. It asks you to check whether your judgment about it is accurate before you let it govern you.

The practical instruction that follows is modest and specific. Epictetus tells you to notice the moment before assent, the instant when an impression arrives and you have not yet agreed to it: try not to be swept away by the appearance, because if you gain that pause, you gain command of yourself (Handbook 20). That is the one move worth practicing. Not suppression, and not a breathing trick, but a habit of asking what judgment you are about to make, before you make it.

Primary passages

Remember, that not he who gives ill language or a blow insults, but the principle which represents these things as insulting. When, therefore, anyone provokes you, be assured that it is your own opinion which provokes you. Try, therefore, in the first place, not to be hurried away with the appearance. For if you once gain time and respite, you will more easily command yourself.

Epictetus, Handbook 20 Read in context

The core mechanism: what provokes you is your own opinion, and a pause before assent breaks its grip.

it is not men's acts which disturb us, for those acts have their foundation in men's ruling principles, but it is our own opinions which disturb us. Take away these opinions then, and resolve to dismiss your judgement about an act as if it were something grievous, and your anger is gone.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 11.18 Read in context

Marcus states the same principle plainly, as advice he is giving himself.

They are mistaken about good and evil. Ought we then to be angry with them, or to pity them?

Epictetus, Discourses I 18 Read in context

Epictetus reframes wrongdoing as error about value, which changes the fitting response from anger to pity.

This man who has been mistaken and deceived about the most important things, and blinded, not in the faculty of vision which distinguishes white and black, but in the faculty which distinguishes good and bad, should we not destroy him? If you speak thus, you will see how inhuman this is which you say

Epictetus, Discourses I 18 Read in context

The hard edge of the doctrine: even calling for a wrongdoer's destruction, examined honestly, looks inhuman.

you also do many things wrong, and that you are a man like others; and even if you do abstain from certain faults, still you have the disposition to commit them

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 11.18 Read in context

Marcus turns the same scrutiny on himself before judging others.

Important distinctions

Managing a feeling versus examining a judgment

Modern anger management often means techniques to cool down once anger is already present, such as breathing or counting. The Stoic method Epictetus and Marcus describe is different in kind. It asks you to locate and inspect the judgment anger rests on, the belief that this act was grievous or that this person is beneath you, and to check whether that judgment is true. If the judgment falls, the anger falls with it, not because you suppressed it but because its ground is gone.

Pity is not permission

Saying a wrongdoer is mistaken about good and evil and deserves pity rather than rage is not the same as saying nothing should be done about the wrong. Epictetus is diagnosing the fitting emotional response and the state of the wrongdoer's faculty of choice, not ruling out correction, consequence, or self-defense.

Objections and replies

This sounds like it excuses wrongdoing

If wrongdoers are simply mistaken and deserve pity, it can sound like the Stoics are letting real harm off the hook, especially when Epictetus applies this to thieves and adulterers and asks whether we should really want them destroyed.

Reply

Epictetus is not defending the act. He argues the wrongdoer has already suffered the deepest loss, a will or faculty of choice not working as it should, which is worse than what he can do to you. Seeing this clearly is meant to change your response, not to deny that correction or consequences may still be needed.

Some anger looks justified and even useful

A person might object that anger at genuine cruelty is not confused, it is accurate, and that removing it removes a signal worth keeping.

Reply

Marcus does not ask you to ignore what happened. He asks you to check whether your judgment about it is accurate, since he notes plainly that you often lack enough information to judge another person's act correctly. The claim is that anger tracks a judgment, and judgments can be wrong even when the underlying wrong is real.

Practice this in Stoa

Guided courses in the Stoa app that put this into daily practice.

Related questions

Podcast discussions

Concepts

  • Assent (synkatathesis) Assent is the mind's power to say yes or no to an impression, and the Stoics treat training it as the whole work of philosophy.

Philosophers

  • Epictetus Epictetus argues that freedom does not come from your circumstances but from correctly sorting what is up to you from what is not.

Works

  • Handbook by Epictetus A short, blunt manual for telling what is up to you from what is not, and building your life on the first.
  • Meditations by Marcus Aurelius A Roman emperor's private notebook of Stoic exercises shows what it looks like to practice philosophy under real pressure, not just write about it.

Sources

  1. Epictetus, Discourses I Primary text, Stoa library
  2. Epictetus, Handbook Primary text, Stoa library
  3. Marcus Aurelius, Meditations Primary text, Stoa library