Self-sufficiency occupies a contested and generative position across the depth-psychology corpus. Far from designating mere independence, the term carries a long philosophical genealogy — from Platonic and Aristotelian ethics through Stoic askēsis to modern depth-psychological critique — in which the question is always whether, and at what cost, the self can be rendered immune to contingency, luck, and relational need. Nussbaum charts the central tension most rigorously: the Greek tradition simultaneously pursued self-sufficiency as the guarantor of the good life and recognized that the most human goods — love, friendship, political belonging — are constitutively vulnerable, resisting any sealed autonomy. The Stoics, as Sharpe and Ure document, elevated self-sufficiency to a therapeutic ideal of complete inner completion, an 'old age' attained before death; yet Foucault's counter-reading exposes how that ideal occludes the Stoic demand for relational role-fidelity. Giegerich introduces a hermeneutically distinct register: the self-sufficiency of mythic and fantasy images, which need no external referent but contain their own interpretive sufficiency. In addiction-recovery literature, self-sufficiency appears as a pathological defence — a fantasized omnipotence that conceals emotional dependence and blocks genuine differentiation. Seaford grounds the concept economically, tracing its philosophical articulation to the abstraction of value in the monetized Greek polis. The concordance thus reveals self-sufficiency as simultaneously an ethical aspiration, a hermeneutic principle, a spiritual ideal, and a psychological symptom.
How far a life can and how far it should be made self-sufficient, what role reason plays in the search for self-sufficiency, what the appropriate kind of self-sufficiency is for a rational human
Nussbaum frames self-sufficiency as the central ethical question of Greek thought, asking how far and in what form immunity to luck is both possible and desirable for a human life.
, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy, 1986thesis
Self-sufficiency, 195, 217, 233, 246, 366, 380-1, 417; of eromenos, 188, 192, 210; and ethics, 8; and good life, 3, 331, 341, 343, 344-5, 352
This index entry maps self-sufficiency's pervasive role in Nussbaum's argument, showing its connection to the good life, Platonic conceptions, love, eudaimonia, and the stability of ethical character.
, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy, 1986thesis
Plato develops a deep criticism of the Luck and ethics 19 ambition to self-sufficiency itself; this criticism continues the criticism of human ambition that we find in tragedy
Nussbaum argues that Plato's later dialogues turn against the very ambition for self-sufficiency, aligning this critique with the tragic tradition's suspicion of human overreach.
, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy, 1986thesis
The “self-sufficiency” of myths and fantasy images... An image, a myth, a dream, has t[he] everything it needs
Giegerich, following Jung, posits a methodological principle: the fantasy image is hermeneutically self-sufficient, requiring no external allegorical referent to complete its meaning.
, The Soul’s Logical Life Towards a Rigorous Notion of, 2020thesis
the self-sufficiency of eudaimonia must be such that all by itself the life described will be 'choiceworthy and lacking in nothing'... philoi and philia will be parts of human eudaimonia
Aristotle's criterion that eudaimonia be self-sufficient is shown to require the inclusion of friendship as a constitutive element, not a mere supplement, thereby redefining self-sufficiency as relational completeness.
, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy, 1986thesis
Foucault’s analysis of the Stoic goal of self-completion and self-sufficiency reveals exactly how his own version of askēsis, which makes a virtue of constantly seeking to become other to oneself, is at odds with Stoicism’s fundamental normative and therapeutic orientation
Sharpe and Ure demonstrate that Foucault's own practice of self-transformation is structurally opposed to the Stoic ideal of self-sufficiency as achieved completion, exposing a foundational tension in his appropriation of ancient philosophy.
, Philosophy as a Way of Life: History, Dimensions, Directions, 2021thesis
Foucault’s analysis of the Stoic goal of self-completion and self-sufficiency reveals exactly how his own version of askēsis, which makes a virtue of constantly seeking to become other to oneself, is at odds with Stoicism’s fundamental normative and therapeutic orientation
In a parallel formulation, Sharpe and Ure identify Foucault's askēsis as a structural inversion of Stoic self-sufficiency, from the perspective of which it appears as a failure of self-care.
, Philosophy as a Way of Life: History, Dimensions, Directions, 2021thesis
Michel Foucault shows how Hellenistic philosophers characterized their ideal of complete, untroubled self-sufficiency as analogous to ‘old age’... we must complete our life before our death: ‘consummare vitam ante mortem’
The Hellenistic ideal of self-sufficiency is given its biographical register — the completion of life in inner wholeness before death — through Seneca's dictum, grounding the abstraction in an existential imperative.
, Philosophy as a Way of Life: History, Dimensions, Directions, 2021supporting
Michel Foucault shows how Hellenistic philosophers characterized their ideal of complete, untroubled self-sufficiency as analogous to ‘old age’ (2005: 108). In Seneca’s terms, we must complete our life before our death
Seneca's formulation, cited by Sharpe and Ure via Foucault, presents self-sufficiency as a temporal ideal — a completeness achieved within life that renders one existentially independent of fortune.
, Philosophy as a Way of Life: History, Dimensions, Directions, 2021supporting
Self-sufficiency, 190-91, 249-50, 253, 276, 363, 395-9
Nussbaum's index to The Therapy of Desire confirms self-sufficiency as a recurring concern in Hellenistic ethics, indexed across Epicurean, Stoic, and other positions within the therapeutic tradition.
, The Therapy of Desire: Theory and Practice in Hellenistic Ethics, 1994supporting
'being self-sufficient it would be better than lacking anything'... a sufficient acquaintance and friend for itself. Value separated from circulation is self-identical
Seaford reads Plato's Timaeus as encoding the economic logic of monetary self-sufficiency: the universe's autarchy mirrors the self-identity of value withdrawn from exchange, linking philosophical cosmology to the ideology of money.
, Money and the Early Greek Mind: Homer, Philosophy, Tragedy, 2004supporting
These adult children usually see no need to ask for help in their lives, believing they are self-sufficient and beyond such a need. They feel powerful in their self-sufficient control.
In the ACA recovery framework, self-sufficiency is reframed as a pathological adaptation — a defensive omnipotence rooted in childhood trauma that precludes authentic help-seeking and genuine self-differentiation.
, The twelve steps of adult children steps workbook, 2007supporting
When we are emotionally dependent, we rely on environmental support to feel good about ourselves and to meet our needs... self support
Berger draws on Gestalt therapy's distinction between environmental and self-support to argue that genuine self-sufficiency in recovery means internal grounding rather than defensive isolation.
, 12 Smart Things to Do When the Booze and Drugs Are Gone: Choosing Emotional Sobriety through Self-Awareness and Right Action, 2010supporting
in order for there to be movement, exchange, there had to be things that were kept out of exchange, stable points around which the rest – humans, goods, services – might revolve and circulate
Seaford's discussion of premonetary gift economies implies that self-sufficiency — things kept outside circulation — is structurally necessary for exchange itself, offering an anthropological underpinning to philosophical autarchy.
, Money and the Early Greek Mind: Homer, Philosophy, Tragedy, 2004aside
People believe that they must meet their needs themselves, instead of reaching out to others in healthy direct ways. So they substitute a substance or behavior
Brown identifies the belief in radical self-sufficiency as the psychological root of addictive substitution, where the avoidance of relational need drives the formation of pathological dependence.
, A Place Called Self: Women, Sobriety, and Radical Transformation, 2004aside
Man’s aim in humanistic religion is to achieve the greatest strength, not the greatest powerlessness; virtue is self-realization, not obedience
Fromm's humanistic religion, as cited by Pargament, reframes self-sufficiency as self-realization within a divine ideal, positioning it against both abject dependence and isolated autonomy.
, The psychology of religion and coping theory, research,, 2001aside