Epictetus and Krishna on Action

Is there an alternative to angst or withdrawal?

In today’s world, at least in Canada, it is common to hear people talk of chronic anxiety and stress, over-work, over-business, over-parenting, fragile relationships, indecision, and overwhelm.

I was recently talking with a Sikh guy in his twenties who grew up on a small farm in the Punjab, in conditions most Canadians would consider relative poverty and precarity. “Life was much easier there,” he said, “Much less stressful than in Canada.”

So much for “progress”?

Aside from overhauling our techno-capitalist-industrial society, is it possible to act without suffering?

Probably not, at least not all the time. Is it possible, though to suffer less while we act? Can action be joyful, or at least- calm?

Epictetus thought so, and so does the Bhagavadgita. Like Arjuna in the Bhagavadgita, we may dream of giving it all up, or we may try to actually do so- though probably not through becoming a forest dwelling yogin. More likely through binging netflix/Youtube reels/ Tiktok, intoxication/sedation, or some other activity on the shadowy borderline between “relaxation” and temporary suicide. Yet after such refreshing diminutions of the intensity of awareness (which may, granted, sometimes be chosen as the only available approximation to medicine), the need to act, and the suffering entailed, remain.

Action and Suffering

Epictetus argued that suffering comes from misdirected desire. We desire things we can not will into being or control, and thus we are frustrated. This category of things includes our health, our looks, how other people treat us, our wealth, our status, and other people’s behaviour. So what is within the sphere of our will, and how does this dovetail with the teachings of the Gita?