After hearing author Ryan Holiday on a podcast, I was intrigued with his knowledge of Stoicism and just how the philosophy aligned with my core values. After purchasing The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living and Lives of the Stoics: The Art of Living from Zeno to Marcus Aurelius I decided to document my journey. Here I will share my anecdote while learning and reflecting on Stoicism and how I plan to apply it to my life.
“Erase the false impressions from your mind by constantly saying to yourself, I have it in my soul to keep out any evil, desire or any kind of disturbance — instead, seeing the true nature of things, I will give them only their due. Always remember this power that nature gave you.”
- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 8.29
“What's left to be prized? This, I think – to limit our action or inaction to only what's in keeping with the needs of our own preparation… it's what the exertions of education and teaching are all about – here is the thing to be prized! If you hold this firmly, you'll stop trying to get yourself all the other things… If you don't , you won't be free, self-sufficient, or liberated from passion, but necessarily full of envy, jealousy, and suspicion for any who have the power to take them, and you'll plot against those who do have what you prize… But by having some self- respect for your own mind and prizing it, you will please yourself and be in better harmony with your fellow human beings, and more in tune with the gods – praising everything they have set in order and allotted you.”
- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 6.16.2b-4a
“From Rusticus … I learned to read carefully and not be satisfied with a rough understanding of the whole, and not to agree too quickly with those who have a lot to say about something.”
- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 1.7.3
“Let's pass over to the really rich — how often the occasions they look just like the poor! When they travel abroad they must restrict their baggage, and when haste is necessary, they dismiss their entourage. And those who are in the army, how few of their possessions they get to keep…”
- Seneca, On Consolation To Helvia, 12.1.b-2
“I will keep constant watch over myself and – most usefully – will put each day up for review. For this is what makes us evil – that none of us looks back upon our own lives. We reflect upon only that which we are about to do. And yet our plans for the future descend from the past.”
- Seneca, Moral Letters, 83.2
“Ask yourself the following first thing in the morning: What am I lacking in attaining freedom from passion? What for tranquility? What am I? A mere body, estate-holder, or reputation? None of these things. What, then? A rational being. What then is demanded of me? Meditate on your actions. How did I steer away from serenity? What did I do that was unfriendly, unsocial, or uncaring? What did I fail to do in all these things?”
- Epictetus, Discourses, 4.6.34-35