I'm writing about secrets in this post, that's why I will be using vague language (real secrets here!). I hope it will still be comprehensible, and you can substitute the vague parts with your own secrets that you hopefully have.
Seneca's third letter starts with an admonition for Lucilius. Apparently, Lucilius asked a friend to deliver some letters to Seneca on his behalf. He informed Seneca about it and asked him not to tell the friend about some affairs of his. Seneca comments:
Thus in one and the same letter you have said both that he is your friend and that he is not.*
(ita eadem epistula illum et dixisti amicum et negasti.)
Seneca's standards for friendship are set very high; he thinks that we should be able to converse with our true friends in the same way that we converse with ourselves. We should choose our friends carefully, but once that choice is made, there's no place for secrets between friends. There's no reason to hide our joys, sorrows, and doubts from people whose mind is like an extension of our own.
Thus in the third letter, I finally come across another aspect of Stoicism with which I don't agree. As much as I admire this ideal of friendship, I have to defend my right to keep secrets. There are two points of Seneca's reasoning. Firstly, a real Stoic shouldn't have secrets at all:
Live in such a way that anything you would admit to yourself could be admitted even to an enemy.*
(Tu quidem ita vive ut nihil tibi committas nisi quod committere etiam inimico tuo possis)
Secondly, even if there are things about which you wouldn't talk to everyone, you should be able to do that with your true friends.
The life of a Stoic is evidently a life of integrity. But life is complicated, and even with the best intentions, keeping your affairs secret may be the best option before you clear out your situation. It makes me think of a friend of mine who had a love story with a priest, some years ago. She was keeping the affair secret from most people. Years passed and today, he's still a priest, while she's happy with someone else. Love happens when you least expect it, and before you return to the "right" path, or at least a path about which you can speak freely even to your enemies, there can be some turmoil and you may need the calm of secrecy to resolve it.
Sometimes people close to us have secrets that bind us and that we cannot tell to our other friends, in order to protect those people. In my own case, I have a few examples of this situation regarding gender identity. Some people struggle with that and they need privacy before they decide (or not) to proceed to a transition.
Another example will come from my own life. There's something I have done in the past that would upset a close member of my family very much, very probably to the point of rupture. This isn't anything bad or illegal, it's quite the opposite in my opinion: I think that by having done it, I did something beautiful and morally right. But this thing goes against a very strong conviction of this person (and concerns their personal affairs). There's no chance I could convince them (I tried). I think the best way to do is to continue keeping this deed secret from them, that way we can retain our relationship, which is beneficial and welcome for both of us. It means that every time I tell the story of this deed to a friend, I have to ask them to keep it secret, because my relationship with that family member depends on it (as you can guess, I do it rarely).
Should you stop being friends with people who wouldn't understand your struggles? Should you refrain from doing (or even thinking) things that you cannot tell about to everybody?
There are parts of yourself that can be in conflict. It's fine to keep this conflict secret, if you need time to resolve it. You can decide to confide in one person and ask them for secrecy. That way you both have a secret from your other friends and everyone should accept it. But you can also keep the secret to yourself and deal with it alone, which is harder, but that way you spare other people a possible burden. You may need to keep some information from someone in order to keep them in your life. Of course, the Stoic would say that this is all wrong. A wise person doesn't have internal conflicts and doesn't have friends who don't share the same ideals. To me, it's almost as if the Stoic was dead: with no internal struggles, no conflicting aims. I think that conflicts, obstacles, and doubts are part of life, and getting rid of them would be a too easy way out. It's like stoicism was trying to cut us off from some parts of existence. For the sake of what? The tranquility of the soul? I'd choose a full life, with its conflicts and secrets. Uma vida de desassossego**.
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*Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Letters on Ethics, translated by Margaret Graver and A. A. Long, University of Chicago Press, 2015.
**A life of disquiet.
Previous parts of my reading notes: Letter 1, Letter 2 (part one on reading habits/ part two on poverty and wealth).
Such an interesting take! I also agree that Stoicism is a kind of euphoria esque ideal that cannot be fully achieved due to the complexities and limited rationality of the human mind and emotion. I do believe that on a surface level you should surround yourself with like-minded people, however when it comes to deep relationships with people we start to see their flaws and actions that we may strongly disagree with (rightly because they are human), however there absolutely comes a point when your affection towards a person becomes stronger than all other normal requirements for friendship. I do also believe that secrets, especially in the short term, can sometimes do more good than harm. Additionally, what I believe is more important than always being around like-minded people (which in my opinion can actually stifle growth due to lack of diverse perception around you), is to be around people how's minds you understand, so that when they do certain things that you may not 100% agree on, you can still understand why they did that and what circumstances brought them there.
@Coral you and Lokus have a common friend and didn't know it.
In Italy, we say chi trova un amico, trova un tesoro. You know Italian, but I'll translate it for the rest of the community, who found a friend, found a tresaure. The fact is that we automatically consider the people who we hang out with to be our friends. That's the truth. Real friends are those who understand you and offer constructive criticism.
@chlsa_ee Thank you for your comment, and especially for pointing out the role of affection in friendship! As regards the ideal of the Stoics, I think not only that it is unattainable (as ideals are, but that doesn't make them less useful), but also that it is not desirable ;) One of my goals in my reading of Seneca is to understand better my dislike of stoicism. It's very interesting what you say about people whose minds we understand. I think when they choose different paths than we do, they enlarge our experience in the sense that we can see on their examples the different ways we could have lived. In any way, it's great to have a varied bunch of good friends 😊
@Simone I wouldn't be surprised if I had more than one friend in common with Coral, as her stories are so relatable 😁 But not this one, as in the case of my friend, "her" priest was ordained many years before they met. I wish I could tell you more details, it's an incredible story 😄 But I have to keep the secret 😅 I wish she'll write her memoirs one day... In any way, my friend's story made me sensitive to the topic 😅