Stempathy
Stoic problem-solving plus non-judgmental empathy — the magic combination.
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~ongoing to results
- Steps
- 3
- Confidence
- 86%
Stempathy is Dreeke's coined fusion of stoicism and empathy. The stoic half is human problem solving — being extremely thoughtful about the cause and effect your behaviour has on others, with self-regulation and contemplation, and nothing to do with pessimism. The empathy half is understanding what other people see through their own optic and lens, without judging it. Used alone, stoicism gives you thoughtfulness but misses their perspective; empathy alone gives you their view but no discipline in acting on it. Combined — a thoughtful understanding of what motivates humans plus a genuine desire to see their world — you get what Dreeke calls a magical combination for engaging people productively. His code of trust, he says, is really a code of empathy.
Origin
Dreeke coined the term as his favourite combination of everything in the world, drawing the stoic half from Ryan Holiday's Ego Is the Enemy, The Obstacle Is the Way and Stillness Is Key, and the empathy half from a career spent understanding people he was never going to agree with.
Core principles
- 01Stoicism is human problem solving, not pessimism.
- 02Empathy is understanding others from their point of view without judging it.
- 03Either half alone is insufficient — stoicism without empathy misses their optic; empathy without stoicism has no self-regulation.
- 04Understanding cause and effect of your own behaviour on others is the stoic contribution.
- 05The code of trust is really a code of empathy.
How to run it
- 1
Adopt the stoic half — self-regulate
Treat stoicism as human problem solving. Understand the human condition and be extremely thoughtful about the cause and effect your behaviour has on others. Self-regulate before you engage.
Pro tip Dreeke's sources: Ryan Holiday's Ego Is the Enemy, The Obstacle Is the Way, Stillness Is Key.
Watch out This has nothing to do with pessimism — that's the common misread of stoicism.
- 2
Adopt the empathy half — see their optic
Understand what they see through their own optic and lens. Empathy is understanding other people from their point of view without judging it.
Watch out If you use the stoic half alone you'll miss the crucial thing — their perspective.
- 3
Combine them
Put the thoughtful, cause-and-effect way of engaging humans together with the desire to understand what they see. That combination is what lets you engage people productively rather than merely analyse them.
In the wild
Asked about his career path, Dreeke takes a deep breath and immediately names it: 'that's called a pacifying behavior, because it's stressful.' He observes his own stress response with detachment while engaging honestly.
→ A live demonstration of stempathy — stoic self-observation running alongside open engagement, without judgment in either direction.
Common mistakes
Reading stoicism as pessimism
Stoicism has nothing to do with pessimism. It's human problem solving and understanding the human condition — misreading it as gloom discards the self-regulation the framework depends on.
Judging what empathy reveals
Empathy means understanding their point of view without judging it. The moment judgment enters, you've stopped seeing through their lens and started defending your own.
Is it for you?
Best for
Anyone who needs to engage humans productively under pressure — leaders, negotiators, investigators, salespeople.
Not ideal for
Situations demanding immediate unilateral action with no time for contemplation.
From the transcript
“the stoicism part is the stoic philosophies which is problem solving it's human problem solving has nothing to do with pessimism it has to do…”
“my code of trust is really a code of empathy which is understanding other people from their point of view without judging it”
“when you combine the thoughtful way to engage human beings with cause and effect of human behavior because you understand what motivates human beings and…”
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