Stoic Dad

Applying stoic philosophy to parenting

[stoicdad-blog]

New year, new me

Thinking a lot about how, in terms of moving myself forwards, I may have completely wasted the first half of my 20s, and as such handicapped myself somewhat for the next ten years or so - despite my best efforts.

To 25 my focus was cramming sugar in my face, smoking and not doing anything to put myself in a position of having to take on responsibility at work. All the while religiously focused on my designated life-style - rugby three times a week, a bit of running, and lots of socialising. 

Now, many years later, despite having realised in my early 30s what had happened and made a commitment to making repairs, it is really only through adopting Stoicism in the past year that I’ve been able to properly consider my behaviour as a 20-something, recognise it’s in the past, and make decisions that will change things for the future.

[stoicdad-blog]

The cold

I have a really bad cold. Clearly the fact that I have it is something I can do nothing about. I am taking tonnes of drugs and keeping myself hydrated - the best I can do. However, at 2am when I wake up because I can’t breathe through my nose, my mouth has dried out, and I have a headache coming on because I’m dehydrated, the only think I can do is remind myself how some organism, that has evolved for the very purpose of being a parasite in human beings has ended up in my body, making me its host. I have to think, how cool is that?

The bug has nothing against me, it’s just doing what it has evolved to do, so I don’t see much point in getting upset about it. Eventually I’ll get back to good health and carry on, and likely before the end of this month, I’ll have forgotten how it made me feel.

[stoicdad-blog]

US Election

I’ve spent the last week or two visualising an election victory for Donald Trump, so when it came down to it and people opted to choose the nihilist, I wasn’t surprised. I was disappointed, but I didn’t feel the need to go into hysterics, because I was prepared. I think people made a very wrong decision, and I despair for my daughters’ futures. But negative visualisation techniques helped me prepare for a pretty crap outcome and view it for what it really is, rather than through a lens of what I feel.

I talked to my daughters this morning, particularly my eldest one, who seemed to care just a little bit about the outcome about the difference between things she has control over, and things she doesn’t have control over. She can control how hard she practices her swimming and gym classes, but she can’t control if someone else can run faster than her - nor can she control how 180 million Americans choose to vote. She nodded, and like you’d expect from a nearly 9 year-old, shrugged her shoulders and asked me when the pancakes would be ready.

[loganlikescats-deactivated20170]

Most of what we say and do is not essential. If you can eliminate it, you’ll have more time, and more tranquility.

Marcus Aurelius (via loganlikescats)

[stoicdad-blog]

Going to a conference

Went to a conference the other day. I’m usually shit at conferences. I like standing in the corner, pretending that I have so many things occupying me that I can’t possibly talk to anyone else. I avoid standing too close to the coffee station, and if anyone talks to me, I put on a front, and pretend like I’m an arsehole. 

I used to call this introversion. It’s only since I’ve focused on stoicism that I’ve taken an honest look at it and realised it’s social anxiety. So, before I went to the conference I ran through a few things:

i thought about what my boss would say if I flunked at the conference and returned to the office without a single lead.

I got comfortable with the fact that I had to go to the conference, so whilst I was there I would benefit from what I was supposed to do, rather than, as I’ve said before, hiding in the corner.

Lastly, whilst I was sat there in the conference, listening to the first panel discussion it occurred to me that the people in the room, if they were intentional or not, held stoic values. Knowing this reassured me that anyone I tried to speak to was not going to do what I feared - laugh in my face and ask why on earth I thought I should be talking to them. Like I said - social anxiety, not introversion.

[stoicdad-blog]

‘ckin’ Brexit

It’s been a few weeks.since the shit of the ages hit the fan. I didn’t vote for Britain to leave the European Union, and wouldn’t have voted to leave the EU. For a few days I was really pissed off and struggled to concentrate on much of anything or get work done.

I realise though that I did all I could to affect the result. I told everyone I knew why I thought they should vote to remain; I had arguments on social media with people who thought they would vote to leave, I canvased with the LibDems to remain, stuck a poster in my window, and a sticker on my bike. It doesn’t really matter if I changed anyone else’s mind, and I suspect, I probably didn’t opinions were pretty fixed. 

That’s all in the past now, and what matters is that going forwards, we retain all of the good things about being in the EU, access to the single market, the diplomatic clout, free movement, and get rid of the crap; the democratic deficit. What I can do to influence that, I’ll have to figure out. But at least the result, what seemed like a disaster a month ago, is no longer affecting my mood.

[essentiallystoic]

Not being able to govern events, I govern myself.

I can hear the echoes of epictetus in this quote.

[stoicdad-blog]

Brexit; Cock

Not the desired result. It changes completely the future of myself and my children. It means at least in the medium term we will have to live down to the expectations of small minded, petty and fearful people, who it appears are also racist and xenophobic.

There’s a tonne of uncertainty around the whole thing. It’s not clear who will be the Prime Minister, and therefore what decisions will be taken. It’s pretty clear that the future of the UK is now in the hands of a few people I wouldn’t trust with a hamster. I have to come to  terms with the fact that I can’t do much about this. I am working hard to that end. 

What I do worry about, and what I can do something about, is the ugly racism and xenophobia that has appeared in our country over the weekend. I hate racism. Having grown up in an extended family of mixed races and nationalities, I can’t abide it. I can stand up for what I believe, face down racism and xenophobia when I see them and do something good on this measure.. 

I don’t have to concern myself with the things I cannot control; who leads our country and what they choose to do with the Brexit vote last week - these things will not help me find tranquility. What I can do to proactively promote my tranquility is to play my part in pushing back against the ugly behaviour we have seen in our country in past days. Whatever I do in this area, where I see it, will constitute me doing my best.

[stoicdad-blog]

Nailing tranquillity, keeping shit cool

My daughter was struggling to go to sleep this evening, she was fussy and fidgets, and she was very very grumpy. Not with me, or her mother, with herself she said. She was feeling out of sorts. When she gets like this I have to adopt an attitude that is focused on helping her. I have to sweep aside all my short term goals, like getting her into bed so I can cook dinner, and get other stuff done. Flipping out at her will only result in her getting worked up, and the whole thing taking even longer.

So I have to realise, following stoic philosophy, what I want to do is maintain my own tranquillity. Getting vexed and yelling at her are not going to help me to do that. I need to stay calm, I need to avoid shouting, otherwise I’ll just end up feeling rotten for hours because I got angry. I hate that. The worst feeling in the world is when you have got unnecessarily angry, and it’s two fold. Firstly you feel angry at yourself for losing control, for allowing someone or  something to get under your skin so much that you lost it. Secondly you feel sad because that’s what anger does to you, it’s a strong negative emotion that makes you feel sad.

To avoid the first problem, I tend to consider whether the person or thing I’m getting frustrated or cross with, is worth it. Is any anger I might have towards them of any value. The main thing I use to complete this evaluation is usually whether I care about them. If I care about them, I don’t want to get angry, because it will hurt them, and that will make me sad. If I don’t care about them, what’s the point in getting angry, they’re worthless, and why should I break my tranquillity to show them the power of my emotion.

In the end, after much patience, my daughter told me she was really worried about a recital she is giving tomorrow. What if she makes a mistake. I tried get her to think about the recital from a different perspective, not just “I’ll be really proud of you darling”, but rather to consider what would be the consequences of something going wrong, and what expectations did people have of her anyway. I also suggested rather than being nervous and scared, she could be nervous and excited. I know she loves playing her violin, even though she finds it incredibly challenging, so I wanted her to realise that nerves didn’t have to be negative. She went to sleep happy and calm, about an hour after I first tucked her in.

[stoicdad-blog]

Losing my shit over swim club

I went to the pool to swim on Saturday, got to the pool around 7.15, for my weekly swim. Saturday mornings are about the only time that works, other mornings are just too crowded with trying to get the kids to school, on a Saturday I can get the swim done and get on with my weekend. So having swum at the same time on Saturday morning a fortnight ago, my first of the season, I was somewhat taken aback to be refused entry.

“It’s members only”; “bu...bu...but I swam two weeks ago.” “Well you shouldn't have” said the girl. Then her colleague said “unfortunately” and I lost it completely. “Forget about unfortunately” and I huffed off. What a prick. Me, not him. Though starting a sentence with unfortunately is a pretty stupid thing to do.

I’ve been refused entry to a pool before because a swim club has been using it, and it’s really annoying, so my system 1 thinking took over, delivering a knee jerk response. Instead of checking what they meant by members only and asking whether I could become one, I turned around and left, muttering expletives about swimming clubs.

I should have taken more time to consider the situation and think about what solutions there might be. I might then have thought to ask just what club I had to join to go swimming. Given it’s the only time I can go swimming, and it’s an open air pool only open for the summer, I either have to solve this one, or give it up entirely. I don’t want to do that, so I’m going to have to fix this before too long, but I could have fixed it on Saturday morning, if I’d taken a step back and considered the situation before losing it. Lesson learned.

[stoicdad-blog]

Playdates bloody playdates

There is only one thing I fear as much as kids’ birthday parties, and that’s playdates - not the looking after someone else’s kids. I don’t have to do that because I have to work. It’s the picking up bit I can’t stand. The same bit that makes my blood chill about kids’ birthday parties. 

I don’t really mind meeting the other parent. Who I invariably do not know, and who knows my daughter way better than I know theirs. Usually they are kind, friendly and really interesting. Usually they are older and more successful than me also, which makes the whole thing kind of fun. 

The bit though that I dread, is getting my daughter out of the house. Usually they are fantastic guests, really well behaved and polite. Not often are they a whirlwind, the nickname I’ve given to one of my daughters’ friends. The mother (even in this day and age they are invariably mothers), will say they have been wonderful, played beautifully, ate tea nicely, yada yada. 

So I’m picking the child up at 6, so it’s the end of the day, they are tired, and we really need to get going. Buuut, it’s also impolite to pick up, turn around and run off, if you don’t have to. So I’m stuck in this place, trying to be polite, trying to get my daughter to leave as well, so that we can get home at a decent time. And often the mother of the other child forgets to consider that she is on home turf, and doesn’t have to drive for 15-20 minutes just to get her kid home and closer to her toothbrush and bed. 

It’s right at this time that my daughter will decide she needs the loo. Then, she will have to have one last quick play with her friend before we can actually go. This all starts to add up, especially when I look at my watch for the fifth time, and realise I’ve been at the house for nearly 15 minutes now. 

The number one rule in this situation, is not to lose your head. Don’t get angry, don’t be impolite, and try not to let your vexation show. Which can be hard when all you can really do is yell up the stairs at your child every 30 seconds. You are going to look vexed. 

To avoid looking anxious, stressed or annoyed, I remind myself that short of going up the stairs and picking daughter up (which I’m not going to do), the only thing I can do is remind my daughter that I am here to pick her up, and that we need to go home. If I let these things escape my head, then I will start to allow my annoyance to truly show through. 

So I keep that in mind, I stay calm, and eventually, even though I can only control what I call up the stairs, my daughter decides to come down the stairs. It can be a torturous process, but it probably never lasts more than five minutes, and at the end of it, I can be pleased I haven’t got angry, or shown myself to be so in front of her friend’s mother. 

In the car, on the way home, the same rule applies. “It took a bit too long to get out of So-and-So’s house, we’ve things to do poppet”. Be fatalist about the fact that it took ten minutes more than I’d have liked, accept that fact and move onwards. Don’t imagine I can control my daughter’s decision to visit the loo before we leave, or have a final look at her mates doll house, and control my vexation. If my vexation gets out, then all is lost. I look like a fool to the other parent, and my daughter will get upset and move slower, leaving more time for me to embarrass myself in front of this nice person.

[stoicdad-blog]

Fat bastard

I have plenty of evidence that becoming a parent is a drag your fitness, and makes you put on weight. In one year after my first daughter was born, I put on seven kilos without even thinking, where before she was born I’d spent eight years struggling to put on the same amount intentionally.

Another seven years on, and after yo-yoing around, finding a fitness and nutrition programme that suited me, I have in the past year, added yet another five kilos. In all that time there are two things I’ve realised have a real effect on my fitness. 

First up is sedentarism associated with work - in the past year I’ve been working in a place that likes to serve up sugar on a daily basis, and complain if you don’t partake. I sit for around 7 hours a day at least.

Second is lack of time to train - when life is chaotic, time to train seems to get lost down the back of the sofa, or perhaps just on the sofa. 

I’m trying to use a few tools to over come these two barriers and get back on a more sustainable path of fitness. 

First up is negative visualisation - I can still imagine what I used to be like when I was fitter and healthier, before I hit the downward spiral of parenthood (which as I’ve just outlined above, isn’t actually the problem). By visualising how I used to feel, how I feel now, and how much worse I could feel in the future, I find the motivation to do something about it. If I don’t like where I am now, on the downward slope, then I need to turn around and start back up the slope before it gets even steeper.

Secondly I try to be fatalistic about how I got here. There’s not much point griping about the fact that I haven’t put the work in in the past, or that my base of fitness built up over a ten years or so as an adolescent has deteriorated. The only thing I can do is pick up from where I am and move forwards.

I also look at the people that complain to me about the fact that I don’t eat cake, and realise that they don’t share the same goals as me - which is for me to be fit - so for whatever reason they might actually want to stop those goals from being achieved. If that’s how they feel, then their views are of no value to me, so I don’t worry about them. 

Lastly, I accept that if I get at least some physical exercise in today, I will be in a better position to do more tomorrow. I should focus on the task I put before me, that is, to exercise. For the few minutes, five, ten or 20, when I want to exercise, nothing else exists. 

Using these tools, following these practices won’t make me super fit. But it will stop me being a fat bastard and get me moving in the right direction again.

[stoicdad-blog]

Getting away for the weekend

Being a dad, my job mainly revolves around throwing spiders out, mowing the lawn, and coming up with brilliant games whenever required. I am not required in a strategic capacity. Problem at school, they’ll pitch it to their mother for a solution; learning to do ballet, or some other complex and endless series of weekly classes - mother will sort that out as well. So when it comes to holidays, I’m usually frozen out. I can choose between France and Italy, Europe and North America. But I’m not allowed to book, I’m not trusted with actual decision making.

This doesn’t have to mean I can have no influence. But I have had to realise that actually booking the holiday is one of those things that I have no control over. The city we live in is recognised as an amazing city by lots of people, but it’s actually a bit of a crap hole, so the fact that most people nod and say nice makes you even more uncomfortable about living here. So there comes a point when you are desperate to get out. I reached that point about three weeks ago. But there’s not a lot I can do about it, because in the end, if I book somewhere, I’ll never here the end of it, if it goes wrong. Not only that, but that failure would colour every future holiday decision. Instead, I decided to promo a weekend away to the wife, so that we would actually get away in the end.

I worked hard at this, outlining the many benefits to getting away for the weekend. One of the girls missed out on a birthday party - fuckit, there’s one every week, it’ll be great to miss one, I said - best thing about getting away will be no demands on our time other than our family. And that’s exactly what it was. I deluged her with a long list of places to stay, detailing pros and cons for each covering activities, distance to drive, probable weather.

In the end she went with none of my recommendations, and found somewhere on a site I’d never heard of - like I say, I’m not trusted with decision making. But when she emailed me that she’d found somewhere. The first thing I did, was check out Trip Advisor, and send her a summary of our entire itinerary for the three day jaunt. Including how far away things were, where we could it, what the costs were, and how we could be flexible if the weather turned against us - dad’s your man when it comes to that tactical side of things. Nailed it, we did everything I suggested we should, we had a brilliantly relaxing time together as a family, and I got out of the hole that is my home town. Result.

The key philosophical point behind all this was doing the all that I could and the best that I could, to influence the outcome.

[stoicdad-blog]

Dealing with Shit Ugly Crap from Grandad’s Wife

Your father’s wife-to-be wants your daughters to try on their outfits for the up coming wedding. The problem is the woman is a Per Una try hard, and the outfits are frighteningly unpleasant to look at - do you really want your daughters dressed up like a hooker with no taste? The outfits are so unattractive you aren’t even sure your daughters will like them. If they liked them, you’d be less bothered, because at least it would put smiles on their faces. 

Your old man is in his seventies, and you can understand how he is lonely since your mother died, so of course your delighted that he has a new partner. You’re just not sure that he actually has to marry her. 

Being a stoic, you realise that there is nothing you can do about the whole situation. It’s entirely beyond your control. The only thing you can control is how you react to the facts of your father’s new relationship, and how you react, is how you will feel. So choosing to feel pleased for your father in his new relationship is a good thing, he’s happy, and being pleased means you can be at least content as well.

The other thing that really drives this is the realisation that you began to worry about how much longer your father would keep on keeping on. You reflect on the things you would miss if your father was no longer around, and what a hole in your life it would be. 

You’ve gone through the negative visualisations of life would be like without him, so you can be positive that his new relationship has stopped him going down that road. You can enjoy more of the time you have with him, whilst accepting that you aren’t going to change the way he feels about the Per Una model. 

[stoicdad-blog]

Go  the fuck to sleep

If you are a parent, you know the frustration of getting your kid to bed, laid down, tucked in, settled, with teddy, and a sufficiently empty bladder. The pillows properly plumped, the covers not too lumpy and the light perfect to within fractions of a nano lumen. If this is you, and you're just walking out the door, the waft of a Heineken beginning to excite your mind, when with perfect timing your child says “Daaad?”, then you are familiar with Samuel L Jackson’s brilliant spoken word version of Adam Mansbach’s “Go the fuck to sleep”.

You turn around, and you smile sweetly, so it comes through in your voice, and as steady as you can make it, pushing that Heineken you almost had your lips round to one side in your brain, you say “Yes, my love?” But now it’s a quarter of an hour later, and the third time they’ve called you back, and that Heineken isn’t getting drunk. Your kid, who promised they only had one thing to tell you, has strung out their story with about a bjillion “and thens” and you just want to cry, because there’s a cold beer in the kitchen with your name on it, and there’s football on the TV, and if only they would “go the fuck to sleep”, you could go and enjoy it. 

As a great and committed Dad, you’ve played with them before bed time, and got some enjoyment out of that, but now is your time. You’ve earned this chance to collapse on the sofa in an uncoordinated heap like a Woody doll. So you huff and you sigh and you roll your eyes, and your kid, who isn’t a block of wood, realises that you are some way down the continuum of being pissed and so they begin to get pissed themselves. And things being to spiral downward.

Well done! You congratulate yourself, you’re now locked in for a full half hour ear bending and a heart to heart that will make you feel terrible. In fact you already do. 

What you should have done, right at the start, was realised that this is your kid’s bedtime, and whilst you set the parameters of when it happens and what you expect, you can’t make them go to sleep. You don’t control that part of the process. It’s out of your hands, you are just along for the ride. Trying to force it, or responding negatively, is only going to wind them up and mean it takes longer. Your kid, who isn’t a stoic like you, will get distracted from going to sleep and want to loudly discuss why you are such a terrible parent, bringing up everything from how badly you read their story, to the fact that three weeks ago they got fewer jelly babies than their sister. 

Instead, as a stoic, what you are going to do is recognise that you don’t control when you kid is ready to go to sleep, that all you can do is your best to get them to go to sleep by reading to them brilliantly, listening to them attentively and tucking them in as only you know how. Try to go beyond that and you will get vexed, your child will get vexed, and you will both come away from the bedtime experience miserable. Realise as a stoic dad that all you can do to give them a good bedtime is do the best you can, and don’t sweat anything beyond your control. What’s one less Heineken anyway, it’s a week night, right?