Follow The Logos

The Daily Stoic for November 30th, “Follow The Logos”.

“The person who follows reason in all things will have both leisure and a readiness to act—they are at once both cheerful and self-composed.”

—MARCUS AURELIUS, MEDITATIONS, 10.12b

The logos. The stoics believed there was a powerful force governing the universe, and that force was the logos. A reasonable guide or entity that ruled that things should obey the natural law of reasoning.

Follow The Logos

Today’s stoic uses a helpful analogy to explain the logos: “We are like a dog leashed to a moving cart. The direction of the cart will determine where we go. Depending on the length of the leash, we also have a fair amount of room to explore and determine the pace, but ultimately what each of us must choose is whether we will go willingly or be painfully dragged.”

There are lots of forces acting on our life. Our environment, family, friends, our beloved ones. Our jobs, our duties, and chores. What we are supposed to do or be, how we are supposed to act. The image that others have of ourselves which, in turn, influences how we show ourselves to them. Those are the forces pulling of our leash.

We have some room to explore, and we all try to make the most of it, but eventually, we feel the pressure around our neck when we are getting too far. I think that we all try to look for ways to avoid feeling we are tied to the cart. We kind of deceive ourselves to make it look like the cart goes in the direction we want to go.

And probably the most important point. It doesn’t matter if we go willingly or are dragged painfully… We will probably get to the same destination.

Conclusion

Today’s Daily Stoic, “Follow The Logos”, discusses this force called logos, or guided reason, that stoics thought governed the universe. The natural law.