Being Active Rather Than Passive

For Spinoza, the essence of human beings is appetite, and the conatus is the basis and is expressed by means of our appetites, desires, and emotions. This chapter is an exploration of these appetitive dimensions of human life. Perhaps the most crucial distinction is that between active and passive emotions. Passive emotions are passions, and the behaviors they prompt are mere reactions; active emotions are those we experience as coming from us and as expressing our nature, and the behavior they prompt is genuine action. Only by living actively can we succeed in realizing ourselves. How to deprive our passive emotions of their power in our lives? The Stoic answer is to get rid of them and replace them with active emotions. The chapter questions the attractiveness of this ideal and suggests instead that we not get rid of passive emotions but transmute them into active ones, thereby achieving more agency in our emotional lives. As we learn more of who we are and what we need to realize ourselves, our emotions can be less the product of forces other than ourselves and more expressions of who we are. Achieving agency by turning our emotions from passions into actions is thus a crucially important dimension of realizing ourselves.