Mindset and manifestation

But the Stoic endorsement of mindset ends there. They would have us put more space between input and output; that is to say, they didn’t think that mindset led to manifestation. No, for Stoics, the right mindset involves admitting that an extraordinary number of things are out of our control, way more than are in our control. Epictetus thought we would only be truly happy when we stop trying to control “externals”, like our jobs, health, reputation, and loved ones. Worldly success is simply “not up to us”, so our energy is better spent practising how we will handle what’s about to blow our way, instead of how to strain ourselves willing goodies into being. If my son were a Stoic, it would matter more to refrain from gloating or sulking than to win the chess match. For Stoics, being a virtuous person is incomparably greater than succeeding by external measures. “Mindset”, in a Stoic context, means going with the flow of life as gracefully and with as much self-possession as possible, neither raging against your flat tire nor revelling in worldly recognition. And when a Stoic ‘believes’, it’s not because they think life will unfold as they wish, but that they can handle whatever comes.
Manifestation is the opposite of Stoicism; logically, it’s why Stoicism had to be invented. Epictetus, Seneca, Marcus – they were talking to people who injured themselves trying to twist fate’s arm, who made themselves miserable chasing trophies over tranquillity. We are far from the realism – non-Stoics call it pessimism – that Stoics preached. So how could citizens of a country in the middle of a Stoic renaissance, where bumper stickers read “Life’s a journey, not a destination,” simultaneously rub the hairy underbelly of manifestation as they tell loved ones: “With an attitude like that, no wonder you didn’t get the job!” How were Americans seduced into believing that we attract the award by rehearsing the acceptance speech? The cheery chess-mom was closer to manifestation than to Stoicism when she insisted that the kids adopt a “winning attitude”. She was channelling the voice of Norman Vincent Peale, pastor of the six-year-old and now 78-year-old President-elect Donald Trump.
In 1952, Peale published The Power of Positive Thinking, and it was a bold formula for transforming self-confidence into material accomplishments. He advised readers to “staple indelibly on your mind a mental picture of yourself as succeeding”. This man, whom they called “God’s salesman”, was an early proponent of prosperity gospel, the idea that God doesn’t want his followers (or pastors) to fail. Peale was building on the ideas of Dale Carnegie, who sixteen years earlier had published How to Win Friends and Influence People. In Carnegie’s formula, not only can I control my attitude, but other people’s as well.
Whereas the Stoic sphere of control is quite small – it clocks in at exactly one person – the sphere of control that Americans are offered by Carnegie, Peale, and today’s manifestation apologists is limitless. In my local elementary school, there is a mirror mounted at child-height, surrounded by the words “Meet the person responsible for your words, success, choices, actions, grades.” Not only are we giving children the Stoic message that they can control their hands, temper, and moods, but we are also convincing them that they control their fate.
There is zero luck in this equation, zero circumstances, leaving only one person to blame if things don’t turn out right. Stoics made happiness a choice; now winning is, too. Whoever looks in that mirror and reads those words is bound to conclude that their success or failure comes down to how strongly they believe.
As was made painfully visible around the world on November 6th, 2024, the United States is deeply divided – and deeply mixed. We are the land of mindset AND manifestation, a curious and impossible mix of Stoicism and Positive Thinking. We reject any hint of “I can’t” or “stop trying”, calling those ideas and their proponents pessimistic or weak, and decidedly un-American. Instead of taking the Stoic warning seriously, which would leave us simply (simply!) trying to get a hold of our moods, we have added “New Mindset, New Results.”
It’s the greediest philosophy imaginable, one that promises insides and outsides, virtue and trophies, God and mammon. We are doomed, but even to say this breaks the first commandment of the outlandish American religion that brought us a second term of Donald Trump.
At nine years old, I wasn’t playing chess; I was playing Trump: The Game. The tagline next to his face? “It’s not whether you win or lose, but whether you win!”