It is surprising to learn just how much of the world’s philosophical & spiritual advances happened at roughly around the same time period of 600 BCE. Some of the greatest spiritual leaders of this time period are Buddha in India, Confucious in China, Thales, Anaximander in Greece, and Pythagoras in Italy.

Deep in the pandemic (Sept 2021), I started my own spiritual journey with the reading of A guide to good life: the ancient art of stoic joy by William B Irvine. I read the book from cover to cover, and resolved to try and be tranquil at all times. To that end, I follow periodic Stoic exercises such as weekly/ monthly checkins. I saw my mood and general ability to cope with the world around me improve. Since then, I have navigated setbacks in my career, health issues with loved ones, and seen value of my savings fall precipitously. As a framework for managing damaging life events, and changing your perspective, Stoicism is a great start.

However, I feel that something is still missing, and my life journey remains scattershot and random. There is some drama (grass is greener on the other side), a little bit of emotional upheaval (you wronged me), and loss of motivation (what is the point of working, living?).

The old world advise of Stoic virtuosity as the goal of life well lived does not speak to me. Times have changed, and its now over 2800 years since the epic teachings of buddhism and stoicism. I am still awed by discovered techniques, but question the goals. I tried studying more recent works by Pema Chodron and even interpretations of the teachings of Wu Hsin, but did not connect with either of them.

Recently, I ran into a blog: How to do hard things by Casey Rosengren, and connected with their struggles of being an entrepreneur and a techie. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT, pronounced as the word “act”) is a new science backed framework, which is an offshoot of another more established Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) framework.

Both ACT and CBT agree that rigidity of our views on situations and events is one of the main inhibitors of our growth, they diverge on what to do about it.

CBT wants us to change our viewpoint on things. In this sense, CBT is a modern take on Stoicism.

ACT wants us to accept both good and bad life events and build psychological flexibility. ACT wants us to identify our values, and build our life around them. This advise is similar to what I read in Principles, Ray Dalio’s excellent book as well.

Psychological flexibility is the ability to think and feel with openness, to attend voluntarily to your experience of the present moment, and to move your life in directions that are important to you, building habits that allow you to live your life in accordance with your values and aspirations. It’s about learning not to turn away from what is painful, instead turning toward your suffering in order to live a life full of meaning and purpose. — Stephen C. Hayes, A Liberated Mind

I am going to study ACT and psychological flexibility more deeply, so that I can better:

  1. Understand my values
  2. Figure out how to cope with avoidance (events that are cognitively difficult for me to process/ handle)
  3. Lead my life in accordance with my values

Wish me luck!