Eugen Weber in his great book, A Modern History of Europe: Men, Cultures and Societies from the Renaissance to the Present remarks in the introduction of the book that history evolves. History changes.
History is discovery. And the historian report opinion and fact. Opinion and fact are to knowledge like salt and pepper are to cuisine.
Great historians make every effort to confirm what they write, but much of what they write is opinion. Again Eugen Weber writes in A Modern History of Europe: Men, Cultures and Societies, from Renaissance to the Present that the historian is a person who searches and aims for the wind. The reader too must search and aim for the wind. The reader must also question. “What I write and the avenues I take should be questioned, but the facts not”.
What does Eugen Weber mean with this statement? It is simple really. What he means is he may study, for example, the life of Abraham Lincoln. Facts are that Abraham Lincoln was president, the interpretation is subject to question. As a historian he may interpret to you that Abraham Lincoln was a great president because he built America. Built America? That is opinion and is subject to questioning.
Look at America today, it so much divided across the blue states and the red states. If Abraham Lincoln could have backed off, America could have been divided into two countries for the better. And both two countries would have been great and became client countries in the way America is with United Kingdom, that is Britain.
Think about it even today. If we have two presidents Joe Biden and Donald Trump, things will be easier as the two work together.
So, you see, history changes, based on the interpretation. A person living today and seeing so much division, could start thinking differently than a person who lived in the 1930s when there was a semblance of one United States of America.
I believe journalists could learn from traditional historians, and their traditional approach to history.
What Eugen Weber says is how each person should view his or her own personal life. Your personal life and your self interests are subject to your own interpretation. You get into love and relationship even marriage full of love and laughter.
You interpret that love, relationship and marriage and share your experiences with friends how that relationships and marriage are such a great thing. However three years after, the relationship and marriage turn bitter and you find yourself drowning in an ocean of sorrow and unhappiness, even the food you eat have no flavor anymore. You have a different interpretation then. But the fact still remain, you are still in the relationship or marriage.
How does stoicism approach this context? Stoicism says that you must harden your mind. As you harden your mind things will eventually change.
As you harden your mind, two things will happen. Either the relationship or the marriage will collapsed naturally or the wounds affecting it will heal.
Is it hard to understand this stoicism application?
No, it is not hard to understand. But let me explain again, this time I do so slowly. When your relationship or marriage is becoming something else, like things going ugly or bitter, you harden your mind. To harden your mind means you do not allow what is happening affect your peace. That is it! That is what hardening your mind means. You take things calmly. You do not collapse into stress and depression. You become a stoic, unmoved. Nothing is static in life. So all the ugliness and bitterness going on around you are not eternal. You harden your mind because you know this, that they will die. They will die with the relationship or marriage or they will die alone.
If they die with the relationship or the marriage then it shows the marriage or relationship was built on sand, otherwise will not be washed away by those ugliness or bitterness. And so you accept the relationship break up or divorce. Again you harden your mind. You take it calmly.
