If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

success is the target unrelenting success! 

Analysis

Eagles, as birds of prey, will sometimes kill crows as part of their natural diet. Crows, however, are known to harass and even attack eagles, particularly when defending their territory or nests. In these encounters, the eagle often responds by flying higher, taking advantage of the crow’s inability to breathe at higher altitudes, causing the crow to fall to its death. 

The crow falls to its own death, hurt by nothing more than its own actions turning inward.

Why Would A Crow Ride an Eagle?

It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s a….crow on the back of a Bald Eagle? The strange aerial encounter, caught on camera by bird photographer Phoo Chan about a year ago, is making the rounds online today, to the delight of many.

So what exactly is going on here? Was the crow just tired of flying, or was it intentionally trying to annoy its adversary?

It’s hard to tell, says Audubon field editor Kenn Kaufman. While it is not uncommon for smaller birds to harass larger birds that threaten their nesting territories, physically riding on their backs is an unusual tactic—and definitely an unusual sight.

Crows, along with other kinds of smaller birds such as Red-winged Blackbirds, Common Grackles and kingbirds, will not hesitate to defend their nests against eagles, hawks, vultures and Great Blue Herons if duty calls, especially during the nesting season, says Kaufman.

Typically when something like this happens “the eagle or other large bird being harassed will react in an aggressive way,” Kaufman says. Or, the larger bird will ignore its tormentor, “just as we might ignore a small dog yipping at our heels,” adds Kaufman—which very well may be what was happening in this photomontage.

Whether an innocent play-date or a moment of vindication, it is hard to deny Chan’s luck in capturing the remarkable occurrence on camera. The California-based photographer has plenty of experience capturing flying birds, so he must have been well-prepared.

The only bird that dares to peck an eagle is the crow. It sits on its back and bites the eagle’s neck. However, the eagle does not respond nor fight with the crow, it spends no time on the crow
instead the eagle opens its wing and soar higher to the heavens. The higher the flight the tougher it is for the crow to breathe then the crow fails down from the lack of energy. It simply means that once a person moves towards his/her goals, He/she is faced with obstacles and challenges but when they keep pushing yourself forward every other unnecessary thing will fall off by itself. So, keep soaring higher and overcome every obstacle with ease and not be distracted from your purpose. It simply means that once a person moves towards his/her goals, He/she is faced with obstacles and challenges but when they keep pushing yourself forward every other unnecessary thing will fall off by itself. So, keep soaring higher and overcome every obstacle with ease and not be distracted from your purpose.

“The only bird that dares to peck the eagle is the crow. It sits on its back and bites its neck. However, the eagle doesn’t respond, nor does it fight with the crow; it doesn’t waste any time or effort on it, it just opens its wings and begins to climb up the highest place in the sky. The higher the flight, the harder it is for the crow to breathe, and then the crow falls due to lack of oxygen.

Stop wasting time with crows, with dangerous people who only approach your life to try to destabilize you, to project their own storm on you. Just take them to your heights, and they will disappear on their own”.

He cannot breath anymore so he passes out

Now the crow will be the victim of circumstance

The crow has been defeated

source

and always remmeber

The only bird that will peck at an Eagle is the crow. He sits on his back and bites his neck. The eagle does not respond or fight with the crow, it doesn’t waste time or energy on the crow. It simply opens its wings and begins to rise higher in the sky. The higher the flight the harder it is for the crow to breathe and then the crow falls due to lack of oxygen. Stop wasting your time with the crows. Just take them to your heights and they’ll fade.

I know of a man named Paul that is the crow.

Introduction to the ever so stoic and confident they are often interpreted as intimidating by others

What is a sigma male? (Sigma male definition)

A sigma male is a man within the socio sexual hierarchy who chooses to live his life outside of the normal social dominance hierarchy structures of society. Sigma males share many traits in common with the alpha archetype, though their tendency to walk outside of the lines of traditional social dominance hierarchies sets them apart and makes them different.  One thing is sure: A sigma male is not going to sit in an office cubicle and take orders from a boss! Career wise, sigma males like to be their own authority. They are entrepreneurs, digital nomads, freelancers, innovators, creative, or among the top positions in a company. They realize that other people are needed to achieve some goals. Lookup any reference online to Sigma Male Characteristics and you’ll consistently read about how intimidating the Sigma Male can be. That may very well be true but, it’s not because of anything that man is consciously doing. It’s simply because that’s the way we are. So, when people ask the question, “Why are Sigma Males intimidating,” they’re usually asking, “Why do I feel so intimidated?” These people are simply not accustomed to a man who knows who and what he is and where he’s going in life.

‘Sigma Male’ archetype in modern socio sexual hierarchy for all intents and purposes,it describes a man who goes his own way—living as a lone wolf.  

To most people, sigma males are something of an enigma. They are the lone wolves of this world who don’t quite fit in to any of the boxes we traditionally break society down into. Instead, these free spirited and independent men walk their own path in life, and reject social obligations or expectations. In contrast to alphas and betas, sigmas are known for their choice to live outside of the social dominance hierarchy, something that can be hard for others to wrap their heads around. As a consequence of their rare and elusive nature, sigma males have a tendency to confuse, and at times intimidate others. The reasons behind this phenomenon, and whether or not it is at all justified is what we are going to explore here.

Read more below…

Review of Sigma Males Main Characteristics

Before we can delve into any intimidation discussion, I think that we first need to describe the more common characteristics of a typical Sigma Male…

1. Sigma Males are Introverts. This must not be construed as some sort of a negative aspect. Sigmas are generally introverts because they realize that much of what is being discussed around them tends to be intellectual nonsense. Sigmas know that they have better things to do with their time than participate in social ‘OneUpManShip’.
2. Sigma Males are Self-Reliant. Sigmas refuse to be beholden to anyone. They rely on their own ingenuity to solve problems as they arise and don’t wait for an external someone to come along and save them. Because of this self-reliance and their insistence on finding the answer for themselves, Sigma Males are often thought not to be team players. This couldn’t be further from the truth.
   Sigma Males simply want to solve problems… not talk about them endlessly.
3. Sigma Males are Lone Wolves. This characteristic is probably the number one reason that Sigmas are considered so intimidating. Sigmas have no problem with alone time. They prefer the quiet and peace of being able to contemplate their lives without distraction. Since most people think that quiet time equals boredom, the reality that there are people out around them who detest the common room-filling, pointless noise of everyday life confuses and threatens them.

There are, of course, many more characteristics of Sigma Males that explain what Sigma Males are all about, but, that is beyond the scope of this article. For more information about these characteristics, check-out “What is a Sigma Male.”

Intimidator or Planner?

The Sigma Male is a notorious planner. While others are trying to be the loudest in the room, the Sigma is quietly planning his next five moves. Hr will sit quietly in the conference room as others speak louder and louder and try to posture everyone into thinking that they know best. Sigmas are silently contemplating the issue on the table and working-out how to fix it.

Since the Sigma Male doesn’t try and take part in the discussion, everyone begins to think that “This guy thinks he’s better than us. That’s why he isn’t saying anything.”

Not true. The Sigma is simply calculating the steps needed to address the problem and sees endless posturing as a waste of hi time.

A Sigma Male simply cannot suffer fools.

They are extremely confident.

While alpha males are known for their extroverted confidence they make sure that everyone around them knows sigma males are often just as confident, but introvertedly. At first sight, they might not appear as the most confident people in the room.

This is because a sigma male does not need to display his dominance to feel better about himself. His self esteem does not come from social media, other people’s opinions, or approval. They are confident of who they are, and they have a clear picture of what they like and what they don’t like.

Confidence Mistaken for Intimidation

Sigma males are often just as confident as Alpha males, but in an introverted manner. This contrasts with Alpha males, who are known for their extroverted confidence and make sure everyone around them knows. They might not look like the boldest individuals in the room at first glance. Reason being, a Sigma male does not require a display of superiority to boost his self-esteem. Social media and the approval of strangers are not sources of his confidence. If you want to convince a Sigma man of his worth, you won’t succeed.

They know who they are and have a distinct sense of what they like and don’t like. This aspect of your personality is often misunderstood as brashness. That makes people wary of getting into arguments with Sigma males, who may listen to what they have to say, but just as easily dismiss it. Still, when confronted with evidence to the contrary, they are willing to reconsider their positions. A Sigma male is most likely to be persuaded by rational arguments and evidence, rather than appeals to his emotions.

Many women find men in the Sigma fraternity attractive because of their confidence and other positive characteristics. Girls find them attractive because of their confidence, strength, and mystery. Women often initiate interactions with Sigma males because, unlike Alpha males, they don’t actively pursue women. Women will view this man as a challenge, one they must rise to in order to unlock. And it can be especially difficult because Sigma men are notoriously quiet and reserved.

However, Sigma men will respect a woman who attempts this task. When a girl knows what she wants, it impresses him. He has no interest in being with a woman who is passive and easy to control. She must instead be strong-willed, resourceful, and unconstrained. She shouldn’t worry about appearing to be a certain way by wearing designer clothes and designer makeup. She ought to be herself, with nothing to copy from anyone else, and she ought to challenge and intrigue him.

Sigma Males are Self-Aware

Introspection is one of the primary traits of a sigma male.

As opposed to an alpha male who projects himself outward for everyone to see, the sigma male focuses on himself and how his actions impact his entire being.

Sigma males know themselves extremely well.

They know their strengths and are actively working towards improving the weaknesses they think matter.

Instead of spending his time surrounding himself with people, you’ll often find the sigma male in his bubble analyzing what he could have done better.

Even without the best social graces, they still manage to avoid drama because they know how to handle social situations and understand how to come across likable.

As someone who lives their entire lives in their heads and doesn’t really seek out validation, they’ll surely appreciate it when someone finally notices the very special things about them.

As introspective as they may be, sigma males are still human like the rest of us and may get into trouble from time to time.

However, they’ll be able to patch up whatever lapses in judgment they had in no time and turn failures into opportunities for self-development.

Males of the Sigma order have an exceptional grasp on their own identities.

When left to his own devices, Sigmas often reflect on life. He is constantly analyzing his behavior because he understands the consequences of his choices. He is well aware of his own abilities and is making strides to enhance his areas of development. When he errs, he is quick to learn from his error and move on.

Most people flatly don’t understand this way of thinking. The vast majority of today’s human are followers and seem incapable of charting their own course. Because of this, the confident Sigma male seems aloof and arrogant and — most apropos to this article — intimidating.

Without the stress of maintaining social status, Sigmas are free to focus on their inner world of feelings and impulses. He spends a lot of time reflecting on himself and his surroundings; and, as a result, he rarely acts without first giving serious consideration to his options and consequences.

They have clear goals and are constantly striving to better themselves. As a result, Sigma males make excellent partners because they constantly strive to improve their romantic skills.

They are hyper aware of their surroundings

Sigma males know themselves extremely well. Their times of solitude often end up becoming times of introspection. He reflects on his actions regularly and knows how his actions impact his entire being. He has a good sense of his strengths and is actively working towards improving his weaknesses.

If he makes a mistake, he is quick to turn his misjudgment into a lesson. Because they are not burdened with the pressure that comes with defending their position in society, their own emotions and desires take center stage. They know what they want out of life and always work on self improvement.

They Have An Obscure Moral Compass

Sigma men have a propensity for seeing right and wrong in complicated situations. In this regard, rather than passing instant judgement on a group of people, they might have sympathy for them. They become more analytical thinkers who consider all sides of a situation before making a judgement.

They Are Risk Takers

Sigmas don’t take the beaten path when it comes to their careers or personal lives. They prefer to break free and pursue their own interests because they detest cultural norms and cages. They also acknowledge the risks involved in their choice. Sigma males also know a better way of managing stress.

Now that we’ve looked at some sigma male traits let’s get right to their characteristics.

 They Embrace Their Own Personality And Care Less About Others

The sigma male is not a people-pleaser! Instead, sigma males remain true to their elements, while alpha males and other males occasionally change their personalities to maintain their relevance in social standings. It is a remarkable quality because it means they’ll essentially be the same person around others as they are by themselves.

They Listen Well

Ever met an intriguing man who talks less but remembers every little detail from the last conversation? There is a strong possibility that he could be a sigma male. Because they recognize the value of maintaining silence and showing respect when others speak, sigma males typically have good listening skills. As they prioritize the quality of the content over the volume, they listen attentively and speak only when necessary.

Self Management 

Like alpha males, sigma males have a difficult time with power and authority. In contrast to beta males who do as they are told, sigma males frequently break the rules, making them poor followers and workers. Sigma males experience a sense of being stuck in stop-and-go traffic at work. They do not want anything or anyone to impede their progress. They want to handle issues their own way.

The sigma male wants the freedom and flexibility to rethink, reinvent, and reshape their problems uniquely. They are devoted self-starters who thrive when given total control. Many men in the sigma group are entrepreneurs, risk-takers, and creative thinkers.

Advocates of Privacy 

The passions of sigma men are contained within their hearts. Others frequently describe them as secretive, selfish, and private. However, sigma males indeed tend to hide their interests and passions. They don’t feel the need to share because they have something to hide, not because they have something to conceal. Therefore, a sigma male does not promote his success.

Sigma males are the most rewarding people to connect with and befriend, even though it takes a while. That quiet exterior conceals a self-assured passion unmatched by any other.

Grounded Leaders

Sigma males lead by example, putting their hearts into their work and inspiring others to follow in their footsteps. Alpha males frequently use force and aggression to lead, but sigma males do so by setting a good example for others. They don’t typically want to dominate or intimidate others. Without being superior to anyone, sigma males command just as much respect and power as an alpha.

Titles and positions don’t matter to sigma males. They adopt a modest and realistic strategy. Because of their discipline and humble attitude, sigma males make such respected leaders.

This book, ‘The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: Follow Them and People Will Follow You’ by John Maxwell teaches about how to become a good leader.

The Sigma Lifestyle 

A sigma male lives his life unlike anyone else. He has high standards for his way of life, workout routines, and habits. Nobody has the power to alter his way of life. Nothing is worse for a sigma male than a controlling individual. He will find it intolerable when someone tries to change his way of life. He prefers to complete tasks in his own order without worrying about other commitments or others’ desires.

Now that we have successfully learned the characteristics of sigma males and understood their perspective let’s look at the advantages of being a male sigma.

Sigma Males Are Opinionated and Convincing

One of the traits that make the sigma males really intimidating is the fact that they are opinionated and convincing. Unfortunately, people often mistake this for being arrogant. The sigma males have control over their minds, and they are not easily influenced by other people.

Sigma males enjoy intellectually stimulating conversations and are very firm about their beliefs and values. Despite being firm about their beliefs and values, sigma males always listen to other people’s points of view. Even when someone says something completely irrelevant, the sigma males never belittle them. And sigma males have a way of swaying people to see things from his perspective through his well-thoughts and coherent arguments. But if they can’t convince people to see things from their point of view, the lone wolves are disappointed at all. After all, they respect everybody’s opinion and thinking pattern.

Sigma Males are Decisive

The fact that sigma males are decisive makes them seem intimidating to other people.Don’t get this wrong; sigma males are not reckless when making decisions. They carefully evaluate their options, but they don’t allow themselves to be bogged down by the decision-making process.  The lone wolves are not like Beta and Omega males, who sometimes have paralysis by analysis in the process of making decisions.  The truth is, the sigma males always trust their minds and instinct to make the correct decisions.  I don’t think anything frustrates the sigma male more than seeing other people wasting time deliberating on issues that can easily be resolved.  To the lone wolves, a real man should be bold and take action when necessary, not waiting for someone else to help them make a choice.

They Are More Rational Than Being Emotional

Most sigma males’ actions are led by reasons rather than emotion. They rely on their rational sense and instincts when solving problems.  Sigma males don’t allow personal sentiments to cloud their judgment. For every decision the sigma males make, they always gauge the effect of their actions.  Most times, sigma males can’t stand the Beta and Omega males. These guys are so ignorant in a world so full of information.  And once a sigma male realizes that you are insensitive and inconsiderate on issues that require careful analysis, he will start avoiding you.

They Don’t Allow Random People Into Their Lives

Generally, sigma males are careful of who they allow into their lives. They know that people can be inconsistent; they try to dot all the I’s and cross all the T’s before they allow anybody into their lives.  The sigma males’ philosophy about friendship is that it’s better to stay alone and true than be surrounded by fake people.  Of course, the sigma males don’t need other people’s validation to become confident.  The lone wolves know who they are, what they are, and what they can do. So, they don’t give a damn about what people think of them.  Even though the sigma male is yet to figure out who he is, he doesn’t need anybody’s validation to tell him what he’s capable of doing.  Regardless of the rough path the sigma males pass through in life, they will eventually figure out who they are.  So, the lone wolves have a small circle of friends and are always happy with them.  When it comes to friendship, sigma males prefer to have a few loyal and reliable friends than having several people they can trust.

They Always Stick to Their Moral  

One of the sigma males’ intimidating traits is that they always stick to their morals.  Every sigma male knows what he stands for, and they don’t compromise their values and beliefs for any reason.  Once something doesn’t feel right, you can’t convince the sigma male to do it. And the lone wolves’ actions determine the actions they do and do not find acceptable from other people.  It doesn’t matter whether you are the sigma male’s boss or the most feared tyrant; once you step out of the line, he boldly tells you.

Sigma Males Are Not Attention Seekers

Sigma males don’t seek attention. They need their own space. However, their exceptional personality always attracts people to them.  Sigma males are not like Beta and Omega males who can go to any length just to get other people’s attention.  It’s quite funny how people are naturally drawn to the sigma males even when he tries not to be noticed.  Perhaps, it’s because the lone wolves genuinely seek what’s best for other people.  Funny enough, the socializing sigma males are engaged in is not directly driven by them. But by the people who are influenced by the lone wolf’s unique traits.

Sigma Males Don’t Live Their Lives to Please Other People

Sigma males don’t live their lives to impress or please people. They are not afraid to stay their true self.  The lone wolves don’t care whether they will ruffle a few feathers; they will always be themselves.  Well, what do you expect from a personality like the sigma males? They are confident and believe in themselves.  Irrespective of what happens, the sigma males never feel the need to go out of their way to please or impress people.  Of course, sigma males treat people around them with respect. But they never pander to other people’s egos just to get validation.  Even though the sigma males are passionate about being successful, they don’t achieve success at the expense of their self-esteem.  The lone wolves always show their true colors and are unapologetic about their actions.

Sigma Males are Goal Oriented

Sigma males are goal-oriented. They always focus on a particular goal and develop strategies to achieve these goals.  At all times, the sigma males maintain a clear vision. And for any reason, they don’t waver or believe that their dreams are not realistic. It doesn’t matter the challenges they encounter. The lone wolves know the steps they need to take to achieve their goals. And they are laser-focused on achieving their smaller and smarter goals to achieve their long-term goals.

Sigma Males Don’t Put up with Excuses

Sigma males seriously hate when someone tries to replace effort with excuses.  It disgusts the sigma males when people whine about how they can’t properly manage their time and find a way to blame their inefficiency on external factors.  At all times, the lone wolves focus on what they can do and devise a way to overcome obstacles.  Regardless of how big an obstacle seems, once the sigma male sets his mind, he will always overcome them.  Which of these traits do you have? Kindly share your thoughts in the comment below;

Sigma males don’t care what others think

Sigma males don’t live their lives according to what others think of them.Unlike alphas and betas, they are entirely uninterested in fitting in to a particular role in society, and reject occupying a spot within the traditional social dominance hierarchy. Instead of letting their worth and position in society be determined by their relationship to others, sigma males set their own standards and walk their own path. Especially for those who rely particularly heavily on their relationships with others in order to make sense of their place in the world, the sigma’s total independence can be somewhat shocking and intimidating.

Sigmas write their own rules

One consequence of the sigma’s independence is that he writes his own rules for life. He values his own judgement above that of society, and therefore creates his own set of rules to live by. This can make it quite difficult to predict exactly what a sigma male will do, or how he will react in a given situation. For this reason, sigma males are sometimes profiled as having a moral compass that can not be understood as black and white, but lies in a more grey zone. People who are unfamiliar with a sigma male might at times find themselves intimidated by his unique sense of moral compass.

It’s impossible to tell what they’re thinking

Sigma males are naturally introverted, and don’t give away their inner thoughts or feelings easily. They tend to keep to themselves and only share their innermost thoughts and feelings with those they truly trust. Their somewhat asocial nature means that they are not often very well versed in expressing their inner dialogue and don’t use the same social cues as those around them. People who spend time in the company of a sigma male might struggle at first to understand his unique way of expressing himself, and can feel intimidated by the fact that they can not tell what’s going through his mind and what exactly his intentions may be.

They don’t spook easily

The primary goal of a sigma male in life is to be as independent as possible. In order to maintain his independence, a sigma male needs to learn to confront life’s challenges head on. Pretty quickly, this leads to the sigma male developing a deep sense of resilience that can be hard to shake. Even when he feels worried or uncertain about a situation, sigma males understand that showing fear and anxiety is a waste of energy that could be better spent simply tackling the issue at hand. Especially to the outside, sigma males are not easily phased by the challenges that life throws at them, and their ability to resist being spooked in the face of risk, danger, or complication can leave the more anxious minded people around them feeling intimidated.

They are quietly confident

For many people, confidence is equated with being loud and assertive. This is not the case for the sigma male. Sigma males spend a lot of time reflecting, and end up developing a deep sense of self awareness. This self awareness in turn translates in to a quiet confidence that wins respect and commands authority without the sigma male needing to assert himself. Simply by being himself, the sigma male exudes a natural confidence that can be disarming for those used to more abrasive displays of confidence. The uniquely calm and quiet confidence exuded by the sigma male lies at the heart of why more insecure men may find him intimidating.

They’re highly skilled

Sigma males are serious about their passions, and love nothing more than getting stuck in to a project. They like to explore their interests to their fullest, and quite often end up becoming experts on various topics. Their dedication to the interests that they are most passionate about often end up producing sigma males with highly developed skill sets. In many cases, these skills may lie in areas that are completely unrelated to one another – given the sigma male’s naturally curious nature and willingness to explore. This can end up giving the impression that the sigma male is a jack of all trades who is good at everything, something that others can understandably be intimidated by.

They find the spotlight without trying

The sigma male’s quiet confidence means that he is highly unlikely to seek attention or want to be in the spotlight. He is, of course, a lone wolf by nature, and generally prefers to stick to himself and go under the radar. However, his natural intelligence, innovative approach, and confidence mean that all too often the sigma male finds himself thrust into the spotlight. Famous sigma males like Steve Jobs and Elon Musk never set out to become global icons – they simply followed their own path in life and as a consequence ended up in the spotlight. The natural ability of the sigma male to draw praise and admiration even when he does not seek it out can make him the focus of jealousy and feelings of intimidation from others.

They stick to their guns

Sigma males spend so much time observing their surroundings and reflecting. They see things as they truly are, and don’t get caught up and lost in superficial details. Being so in tune with themselves and their surroundings, sigma males possess a keen sense of instinct and intuition. Walking their own path through life requires trusting these instincts and listening to their gut. When a sigma male feels an intuition about something, it can be almost impossible to persuade him otherwise. Some people find the sharp intuition of the sigma male intimidating, as it can sometimes feel as if he always knows something that the people around him don’t.

They can come across as a rebel

Everyone knows that the heart of the sigma personality is a life of total independence and an aversion to authority. It should come as no surprise that, even with his introverted nature, the sigma male can come across as some what of a rebel. He refuses to follow rules that he doesn’t agree with and works by his own set of moral and social standards. What others don’t understand is that the sigma male is not intentionally making an attempt to rebel, he is simply unable to deviate from his totally independent nature. Nevertheless, his apparent rebellion is one of the ways the sigma male intimidates people around him.

They treat everyone equally

Given their removed position in society, sigma males do not see value in people according to their position on the social dominance hierarchy. Unlike most others, sigma males do not assign value to their peers based on social factors such as status, power, or popularity. As a consequence, sigma males are known for their tendency to treat everyone they meet equally – regardless of their “social stats.” To those on the outside who base their behaviour heavily on their position in the social dominance hierarchy, the egalitarian attitude of the sigma male can be hard to comprehend, and even a little intimidating.

Women are naturally drawn to them

Given all their impressive characteristics such as intelligence, skill, humility, and a penchant for deep reflection, it is no surprise that sigma males present a natural allure to many women. Their down to earth and introverted nature gives them an aloof and intriguing aura that women often find difficult to resist. Other men, like the alphas and betas, often have to work so hard to win the attention of women that the seemingly effortless allure of the sigma male can often be the source of considerable intimidation among his peers.

They are prone to financial success

The sigma male is an intelligent and innovative thinker. Beyond this, he has a serious work ethic and sense of dedication. His ideas are rarely about keeping to the status quo, and more often he sigma male situates himself at the heart of innovation. For this reason, sigma males tend to make great thought leaders, as they inspire others to generate new approaches and solutions to the world around them. Sigma males harness their unusual combination of natural abilities both in their personal and professional lives, and this often results in financial success – even when that wasn’t the intended goal. Understandably, the seemingly natural financial success of the sigma male can leave others feeling disadvantaged, intimidated, and sometimes even envious.

They always achieve their goals

The sigma male possesses an ability to focus that tends to surpass his other male counterparts. He has an attitude of precision and dedication and refuses to let external obstacles get in his way. The average sigma harnesses this sharp focus and passion for his goals to generate achievement. As he is the only person able to set a goal for himself, he tends to stop at nothing until he has achieved it. Sigma males owe a lot of their success to this goal-oriented ability, which to the outside can come across as being entirely natural, or some sort of gifted ability to achieve the goals he sets his mind to. For men of lesser focus and dedication, the achievements of the sigma male can act as a reminder of their own shortcomings.

They are totally independent

Independence is something that most people strive for in life. The ability to do what they want, when they want, and being unrestricted by the judgement of others. While most people strive for this, the reality is that few actually achieve it. The sigma male on the other hand not only strives for independence, but actually achieves it. He lives his life relying as little as possible on the external, and champions freedom and autonomy. Especially for those who seek the same independence but are unable to cultivate it, the total freedom of the sigma male inspires equal parts intimidation and awe.

This has been our exploration of the unique position in society that is occupied by the sigma male, and how it has an intimidating effect on many of those around him. Luckily, however, the sigma male’s natural humility allows him to maintain pleasant social relations with even those that are intimidated by him.

He knows how to adapt to different situations

Alpha males can grab a social group or a situation by the neck and make themselves the leader, but there are times when imposing your own leadership isn’t always possible (or recommended).

When alpha males aren’t given the respect or authority they think they deserve, they have a tendency to become a lesser version of themselves.

And that’s where a sigma male has the advantage.

While a sigma male can be in charge if they need to be, they don’t require the validation of being “the leader” in various social situations and power dynamics.

They are happy to fit whatever role is needed for them at any given moment, meaning they are more fluid and flexible than alpha males, and thus more commonly successful in any situation.

With no self-imposed expectations or pressures, a sigma male can be either a follower, a leader, or any position in between, as long as they know that they are being used efficiently and productively.

The problem with this, however, is that this can sometimes rub other people the wrong way.

The unabashed confidence and freedom to play any part can come off as arrogance, intimidating those around the sigma male.

He is a silent leader

What comes to mind when you picture the traditional leader?

Someone on the front lines, with an entourage of officials or subordinates around him at all times; someone who is always on the highest floor, making executive decisions.

An alpha male who speaks loud, always looks big and intimidating and doesn’t look like someone you would ever mess with.

But sigma males are just as capable as alpha males as being leaders, except they have their own approach to it.

Sigma men can be counted on to do what needs to be done.

They have the perfect mix of self-reliance, introspectiveness, and intelligence to figure out any problem and turn something inefficient into something efficient.

You would always want a sigma male on your team. You get the confidence and leadership of an alpha male with none of the downsides of someone with a large and fragile ego that needs constant validation.

A sigma male will never quit regardless of the obstacle or inconvenience; instead, he will keep working at something until he finds a way around it.

They are the types who aren’t afraid to go do what needs to be done, even if it’s “unbecoming” of a leader, because their utmost priority is the goal, not their image.

He is the master of his own fate

Sigma males are independent self-starters. You’ll very rarely find them in anything other than executive-level and managerial positions.

As deeply introspective individuals, they have a sixth sense for inefficiency and have a knack for breaking down processes into actually actionable steps.

It goes without saying that the sigma male is deeply ambitious. He may not always be the loudest voice in the room but his convictions and morals remain strong even when no one’s listening.

 It’s hard to understand him

The sigma male personality may be one of the hardest personality types to understand.

Because he is neither beta nor alpha but unique in his own way, it’s difficult to characterize his choices and his behavior because they don’t really fit in our binary understanding of what it means to be dominant or submissive.

If you’re dating a sigma male, one of the most difficult things about dating him is that he’s not very vocal.

His knack for problem-solving tends to come first, which may not always be what you need emotionally.

Combine this with their disinterest in playing by traditional societal expectations, sigma males can come across as robotic, unfeeling partners.

This could not be farther from the truth. Sigma males are among the best partners out there precisely because they’re highly self-aware.

They may not always communicate what they’re thinking or planning because they live in their own heads, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t take you into consideration.

Sigma males are primarily solution-driven. They want to keep moving forward and help those he cares about become the best version of themselves too.

This fascination for efficiency can come across a little unempathetic at times, but it’s his way of showing you he cares.No one else lives by the motto action speaks louder than words better than a sigma male.

He could be an alpha if he wanted

By their very nature, alpha males want you to know that they’re alpha males. They live by structures and fall into the archetype of what it means to be a strong man with leadership qualities.

The sigma male couldn’t care less. He possesses the same relentlessness, ruthlessness, and cunning of an alpha male but isn’t really interested in projecting that onto his peers.

Sigma males believe in showcasing their talents and abilities through actions; awards and acknowledgements are secondary to them.

He doesn’t need titles or to be the center of attention to feel important — he just knows that he is.

This self-confidence and security allows sigma males to work quietly in the background without the need to constantly declare themselves as the leader.

They’re often happy wearing many different hats in a team and no job ever feels “too small” for them.

When it comes to projects, their ego comes last. The most important thing is that the job gets done.

If you ever come across an unassuming, intelligent man don’t make the mistake of thinking he’s a beta. He might just be a dominant introvert in disguise, happily waiting for the right time to shine.

He can’t be told what to do when it comes to anything

With a certain security and fixation on who you are comes some stubbornness too.

Because sigma males are confident with who they are as a person, they have a very clear picture of the things they like and don’t like.

As a result, it might be hard to get a sigma male to see the different side of things.

This might frustrate partners of sigma males who only wish to enrich his life.

Instead of pushing him to do things your way, appeal to his pragmatic side and talk about the benefits of doing things a certain way.

Sigma males can be dead set on who they are as people but are at the same time open to adopting when proven wrong.

Take him to a restaurant he’d never go to.

Present an argument about an opinion he never would have considered. Introduce a new shirt that he wouldn’t have picked for himself.

Sigma males may be stuck in their own ways but will be more than happy to enrich their lives and their personality, as long as you help them ease into it.

Learn more about the Sigma Males …..

Alpha vs Sigma: The Dominant Sigma Male

What Sigma Men Hate! – The Ultimate Guide to Sigma Males

How To Become A High Value Man

Why is a sigma male so irresistible to women?

The Sigma Male Explained: Understanding the Lone Wolf

Sigma Males Destroy Controlling and Manipulative People

Why Are Sigma Males So Confident its Intimidating?

Learn More About on Stoicism – The Stoic Man An Unstoppable Force to Reckon With…..

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What is Stoicism? A Definition & Stoic Exercises To Get You Started

9 Principles of Stoicism which will Improve your Life

A Complete Guide to Stoicism: How You Can Use this Ancient Philosophy to Live a Better Life

Stoicism, Virtue, and Mental Health

The Stoic Man – Indifference is a power – Stoicism 101

What is Stoicism and How Can it Turn your Life to Solid Gold?

Stoic Quotes on Control – The Absolute Man

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Good Habits That Will Help You Become Rich

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What every woman loves in a man?

Non compos mentis “having control/mastery of one’s mind.”

Cowards are bold in or with a crowd!

Those that embrace being a beginner will thrive!

Why are the best among us often subject to the most ruthless attacks? Many people see a good person as a mirror that reflects their own failings back at them! They could learn from this feeling, or they could try to shatter the mirror. Many Choose the Later!

One of the reasons that Stoic philosophy has had a comeback in recent years is because of the revolutionary effect it can have on your life to understand what you have control over and what you don’t have control over. According to the countless Stoic quotes on control available, the recipe for a happy life involves correctly identifying what you have control over and focusing your energy there while learning to accept what you don’t have the power to change.

The Greek philosopher Epictetus taught extensively about understanding what you have control over and accepting those things that are outside of your control.

Typically, people exist somewhere on a spectrum when it comes to their relationship to themselves and the rest of the world. Some people might try to have way too much control over things that are simply out of their hands. On the flip side, others might assume that they have no agency in the parts of life that they truly could take control of.

To help us tap into what the Stoics are talking about when they discuss the topic of control, we’ve compiled a giant list of quotes from our favorite Stoic philosophers and other thinkers, writers, athletes, and more.

Stoic Quotes on What Is In Your Control

What’s in your control? As we’ll learn from Epictetus, only a small handful of things. In his view, we have control over “whatever is of our own doing.” Whatever is not of our own doing, however, is outside of our power.

“The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control. Where then do I look for good and evil? Not to uncontrollable externals, but within myself to the choices that are my own…” – Epictetus

Here we have a succinct description of an essential part of Stoic philosophy. Distinguishing between what is in your control and what isn’t in your control is the first step on the road to a virtuous and happy life, according to this school of thought.

“We should always be asking ourselves: “Is this something that is, or is not, in my control?” ― Epictetus

Mad about a traffic jam? Furious that you forgot to pay your credit card bill on time? Take a moment to think about whether the situation is within your control. If it is, fix it. If it isn’t, find a way to accept it and perhaps how to avoid the negative outcome in the future.

“Some things are within our power, while others are not. Within our power are opinion, motivation, desire, aversion, and, in a word, whatever is of our own doing; not within our power are our body, our property, reputation, office, and, in a word, whatever is not of our own doing.” ― Epictetus

Here Epictetus lets us know what exactly we’re talking about when we talk about what is within our control. Basically, it’s your mindset, your thoughts, and your actions. In his view, even your body and your property is not within your control.

“In our control is the most beautiful and important thing, the thing because of which even the god  himself is happy— namely, the proper use of our impressions. We must concern ourselves absolutely  with the things that are under our control and entrust the things not in our control to the universe.” ― Musonius Rufus

Musonius Rufus chimes in to remind us that our concerns should be largely about the things that we can change. When something is out of your control, you must learn to have a faith in the workings of the universe, God, nature, or whatever term best fits your worldview.

“The content of your character is your choice. Day by day, what you choose, what you think and what you do is who you become.” ―  Heraclitus

Why is it important to understand what you have control over? Because when you do, you can control your mind and your actions. This is the recipe to becoming the person you want to be.

“Control what you can control. I can control my emotions, my attitude, my effort every day.” – Mitchell Trubisky

The quarterback of the Pittsburgh Steelers has used his Stoic attitude to his advantage. On the field, a lot of things aren’t in your control, but you can control what you bring to the table.

“While we may not be able to control all that happens to us, we can control what happens inside us.”― Benjamin Franklin

Ben Franklin is always a good fellow to turn to when you’re looking for advice. You might not be able to control the weather or the stock market, but you can control how you react to them.

“You only have control over three things in your life – the thoughts you think, the images you visualize, and the actions your take.” ― Jack Canfield

If you take the time to dig into the world of self-improvement literature, you’ll find that there are some pretty Stoic ideas in there.

“No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path.” ― Buddha

Do you find yourself blaming others for your problems or hoping someone will show up to save the day? Believe it or not, miraculous things can happen when you realize that you have control over your attitude, mindset, and actions, and not a whole lot else. Determining where your responsibility lies and where it doesn’t can change (and save) your life.

“Success at anything will always come down to this: focus and effort. And we control both.” – Dwayne Johnson

The Rock is cooking up some seriously Stoic notions here. You can control where you put your attention and how hard you work at the things you focus on. He posits that, luckily, this is the path to success.

“You want to change your life? Control the only thing you can control: the meaning you give something.” – Tony Robbins

Tony Robbins stops by with a new way of saying what Epictetus said thousands of years ago. Not only do you control your attitude, but you can choose the meaning you give to events that occur.

“Control the things you can control. As for the rest – God bless it all.” – Chuck Palahniuk

Is the author of Fight Club a nihilist? If you ask us, he’s sounding pretty Stoic here.

“You can control two things: your work ethic and your attitude about anything.”― Ali Krieger

Why is it that so many athletes seem to have Stoic leanings? Whatever the answer is, it certainly seems that the notion of controlling what you can control has led many to great success.

“Really, at the end of the day, the only thing you can control is yourself; the only person you can truly educate is yourself. You have to redefine what beauty is to you so you can’t be affected by what people are saying.” ― Rupi Kaur

It’s easy to walk around thinking about others, judging them, worrying about what they think about you, and so on. What if you turned your focus towards improving yourself and letting go of something that’s out of your control– your reputation?

“Life comes with many challenges. The ones that should not scare us are the ones we can take on and take control of.” – Angelina Jolie

Rather than running from responsibility, we should leap at the opportunity to take control of what we can. If we continuously improve ourselves day by day, we’ll find that we can have an increasing amount of trust in our ability to handle what the world throws at us.

Stoic Quotes About Controlling Your Mindset

A big part of Stoicism is taking control of your mindset. Let’s see what Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and more have to say about taking the reins of your outlook.

“If a person gave away your body to some passer-by, you’d be furious. Yet you hand over your mind to anyone who comes along, so they may abuse you, leaving it disturbed and troubled — have you no shame in that?” ― Epictetus

Ain’t it the truth? We let others get in our heads, define who we are, and ultimately leave us frazzled and confused. Take control of your mind– it’s one of the only things you do have control over according to Epictetus.

“You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.” ― Marcus Aurelius

This beautiful quote is worthy of hanging on your bedroom wall. If you can access the truth of this statement, you can feel a major shift in perspective nearly instantaneously.

“No person has the power to have everything they want, but it is in their power not to want what they don’t have, and to cheerfully put to good use what they do have.” ― Seneca

When you realize what is in your control rather than worrying about things outside of your control, you’re on the path to happiness, according to Seneca.

“Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens.” ― Epictetus

It can be so hard to let go of things that are out of our control. There’s a hair to split here: you don’t want to feel defeated about “the rest,” but it is good to learn to find a space of acceptance, order, and faith in the part of the universe that isn’t you.

“There are two things a person should never be angry at, what they can help, and what they cannot.” ― Plato

You shouldn’t suppress your anger (or any emotions, for that matter,) but you can learn to realize that it isn’t particularly useful. If you can fix a situation, don’t be mad– fix it. If you can’t fix it, you will want to find a way to accept it.

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” ― Viktor Frankl

Have you ever been in a situation that you didn’t have any power to change? If you’re human, then probably. When you run out of other people to blame, something beautiful happens. You realize you can change yourself.

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” ― Viktor Frankl

Viktor Frankl knows a few things about what it means to have everything taken away from you. When you are truly in a situation where you have no control, you have access to the reality that no one can ever take your ability to control your own mindset.

“You learned to run from what you feel, and that’s why you have nightmares. To deny is to invite madness. To accept is to control.” – Megan Chance

One thing that is a little dangerous about modern Stoicism is the idea that you simply shouldn’t experience emotions, that you should be, well, stoic. Megan Chance describes here a way that you can be Stoic and still allow yourself to feel your emotions– through finding acceptance.

“It is not he who reviles or strikes you who insults you, but your opinion that these things are insulting.” ― Epictetus

What if you didn’t let other people’s words, opinions, or even actions affect you? What if you could change your mindset and not allow them to impact you negatively?

“To enjoy good health, to bring true happiness to one’s family, to bring peace to all, one must first discipline and control one’s own mind. If a man can control his mind he can find the way to Enlightenment, and all wisdom and virtue will naturally come to him.” ― Buddha

Just as the Stoics saw the path to eudaimonia was through understanding that you have control over your mindset, so does Buddha, in his own way.

“Take control of your consistent emotions and begin to consciously and deliberately reshape your daily experience of life.” ― Tony Robbins

It can be so tempting to blame the problems in our lives on other factors, whether it be our family, our finances, our politicians, etc. What if you took control of your mindset and changed what it felt like and what it consisted of to be alive?

Stoic Quotes on Accepting What Isn’t in Your Control

We’ve talked about what’s in our control, but what simply isn’t? Let’s see what the Stoics (and others) have to say on the topic.

“If you want your children and wife and friends to live forever, you’re a fool, because you’re wanting things that aren’t within your power to be within your power, and the things that aren’t your own to be your own.” ― Epictetus

Maybe number one on the things that aren’t in your control: death. It might sound harsh, but Epictetus isn’t wrong here. If you refuse to accept that the people that you love will die, you have your sense of what is and isn’t in your control all messed up.

“The Fates guide the person who accepts them and hinder the person who resists them.” ― Cleanthes

There is something so poetic about this line from Cleanthes. Have you ever felt like you were in tune with life and everything was chugging along swimmingly? And other times you felt like you were going against your gut and it seemed like the sky was totally falling?

“You cannot always control what goes on outside. But you can always control what goes on inside.” ― Wayne Dyer

Things are happening outside of your mind, your body, your house, your neighborhood, and your country all the time. Heck, things are happening outside of your solar system all the time. Focusing your attention on where it has the most impact can be a game-changer.

“At the end of the day, you can’t control the results; you can only control your effort level and your focus.” – Ben Zobrist

Another Stoically minded athlete helps us remember that even the results of our actions are out of our control. But we have complete control over how much focus and effort we put towards the things we’re working towards.

“If you focus on what you can’t control, you’re a little crazy inside, angry and depressed. If you focus most of the time on what you don’t have instead of what you do have, you’re going to be extremely unhappy.” – Tony Robbins

It’s easy to drive yourself mad when you are concerning yourself with things you can’t control. Experiment with shifting your focus, and you’ll likely feel some incredible results.

“Don’t worry about what you can’t control. Our focus and energy needs to be on the things we can control. Attitude, effort, focus- these are the things we can control…” – Tim Tebow

Tim Tebow also seems to ascribe to a very Epictetian perspective, which appears to have one him numerous accolades including first-round NFL draft pick and two-time national champion.

“Your reputation is in the hands of others. That’s what the reputation is. You can’t control that. The only thing you can control is your character.” – Wayne Dyer

This is one of the hardest things to swallow when it comes to the Stoic understanding of control. You are not in control of your reputation. No matter how hard you try, how good you are, or how kind you treat others, people are simply going to think what they think. So instead of doing what you think others think is good, maybe tap into yourself and determine what you think is good.

“You can’t control how other people see you or think of you. But you have to be comfortable with that.” – Helen Mirren

Overcoming a fixation on what other people think of you is one of the most powerful things you can do in your life.

“I’m not in control of my muse. My muse does all the work.” – Ray Bradbury

Where does inspiration come from? Does it come from a one-hour block of time you make on your calendar? Do you ask it to show up and it does?

No, not really. So if you’re keeping a list of things out of your control, maybe add your muse, too.

“You can’t control the world, but when you control your thoughts, you bring order.” – Bernie Siegel

Ah, chaos and order. The word these days does certainly seem pretty chaotic. However, you can bring order to your life by controlling your thoughts just as you can bring order to your house by cleaning your room.

“It’s only when caterpillarness is done that one becomes a butterfly. That again is part of this paradox. You cannot rip away caterpillarness. The whole trip occurs in an unfolding process of which we have no control.” – Ram Dass

Ram Dass takes the question of control to a trippy place, but he’s not wrong. We are all on a journey whether we like it or not. While we can control our thoughts and actions, there are a lot of things that contribute to who we become that are completely out of our power.

Stoic Quotes About Control and Happiness

Why should the Stoic’s view on control matter to you? Couldn’t you just happily go about your life without ever thinking twice about what Epictetus or Marcus Aurelius thinks?

Well, not exactly, at least not according to the great Stoic philosophers. In their view, an absolutely essential ingredient in obtaining happiness is understanding what is and isn’t in your control.

“There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power or our will.” ― Epictetus

Are you happy with your life? It’s a loaded question, but it’s an important one. If you sit quietly with yourself and think about the ways that you are unhappy, you just might find that Epictetus is on to something here. If you can determine what is out of your control and stop worrying about those things, you might just find you have a lot more joy in your day-to-day life.

“Just keep in mind: the more we value things outside our control, the less control we have.” ― Epictetus

Everything you do in life has an opportunity cost. If you go to the grocery store, that means you didn’t file your taxes using that time. If you spend your bonus on a luxurious vacation, that means you can’t use that money to fix your leaky roof.

Epictetus lets us in on a little secret here: if most of what you value are things that you don’t have control over, you are removing control from the things you can control. You only have so much focus and attention. Consider pointing them in a direction where you can really affect real change in your life.

“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.” ― Marcus Aurelius

Is happiness something that happens to you, or something you make? Marcus Aurelius is here to tell us, nobly as always, that you control how happy you are by controlling the quality of your thoughts.

Stoic Quotes About Control and Freedom

When we think of control, it tends to conjure images that don’t necessarily coincide with our notions of freedom. However, the Stoics argue that the more control you have over the things you can control, the freer you really are.

“No man is free who is not master of himself.” ― Epictetus

Epictetus knows a think about what it means to be free, having spent much of his early life as a slave. Being free isn’t about not having any responsibilities, as a large segment of our culture might argue. Instead, it’s about taking responsibility where you can and becoming the person you want to be through your thoughts and actions.

“Concern should drive us into action and not into a depression. No man is free who cannot control himself.” ― Pythagoras

Worried about something? Instead of stewing about it, consider taking action.

“Freedom is the only worthy goal in life. It is won by disregarding things that lie beyond our control.”  ― Epictetus 

When we worry about things outside of our control, we are letting those things be our master. If you want to be free, you have to be able to make the distinction between the things that you have power over and the things that you don’t.

“Freedom is control in your own life.” ― Willie Nelson

What if you felt like you had control over your mind, your actions, and your day? To Willie Nelson, that’s what it means to be free. Whether he picked up some Stoic philosophy along the way or found that truth on his own, it’s pretty hard to argue with.

“To enjoy freedom we have to control ourselves.”― Virginia Woolf

You’ve probably known someone (or know someone who knew someone) that had every material thing in their lives handed to them on a silver platter. They don’t have to worry about money, they don’t seem to have to work, and their parents never once told them “no.”

One would think that would be the definition of freedom. In reality, though, how happy and free did those people really seem? Typically, that’s a recipe for all kinds of personality problems or other disastrous outcomes.

The paradox of freedom is that you need to have a good head on your shoulders in order to enjoy it. Otherwise, it will take control of your life, and you won’t actually be free at all.

My fault, my failure, is not in the passions I have, but in my lack of control of them. Jack Kerouac

Are You Ready to Accept What You Can’t Control?

One of the important aspects of Stoic philosophy is the idea that philosophy should actually be applied to one’s life. Rather than just being a fun logic puzzle, Stoicism is intended to be something that is actually useful in your day-to-day experience.

It can be easy to see philosophical quotes and think “oh, how nice.” Maybe you even print them out and pin them on your bulletin board, but they don’t actually impact how you think and act.

When it comes to these Stoic quotes on control, though, take a leap and consider what it would mean to really apply this to your life. The next time you’re in a traffic jam and you’re going to be late, you might wonder to yourself “am I in control of this?”

Maybe you left later than you should have knowing what you know about your city’s rush hour. If that’s the case, you’ve learned a valuable lesson that you can use in the future. It’s simple: next time you’ll leave earlier.

Or, maybe you left plenty of time to accommodate traffic and the delay was pretty much entirely unforeseeable.

In either case, getting angry and honking your horn isn’t going to change the fact that you’re idling on the interstate. If you can learn how to accept that you aren’t in control of certain things, you can spend your time with a higher quality of thoughts and avoid the exhausting rage of pointless anger.

Maybe you actually realize while you’re waiting in traffic that it doesn’t matter that much if you’re five minutes late to your meeting. Or, maybe you’re able to appreciate some scenery out the window since you aren’t hurling forward at 70 mph. These types of instances are an opportunity to check in with your thoughts and control your mindset. Over time, you might find that doing so helps you become the person you want to be. source

More on Stoicism…..

Want An Unconquerable Mind? Try Stoic Philosophy

What is Stoicism? A Definition & Stoic Exercises To Get You Started

9 Principles of Stoicism which will Improve your Life

A Complete Guide to Stoicism: How You Can Use this Ancient Philosophy to Live a Better Life

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As legions of warriors and prisoners can attest, Stoicism is not grim resolve but a way to wrest happiness from adversity

We do this to our philosophies. We redraft their contours based on projected shadows, or give them a cartoonish shape like a caricaturist emphasising all the wrong features. This is how Buddhism becomes, in the popular imagination, a doctrine of passivity and even laziness, while Existentialism becomes synonymous with apathy and futile despair. Something similar has happened to Stoicism, which is considered – when considered at all – a philosophy of grim endurance, of carrying on rather than getting over, of tolerating rather than transcending life’s agonies and adversities.

No wonder it’s not more popular. No wonder the Stoic sage, in Western culture, has never obtained the popularity of the Zen master. Even though Stoicism is far more accessible, not only does it lack the exotic mystique of Eastern practice; it’s also regarded as a philosophy of merely breaking even while remaining determinedly impassive. What this attitude ignores is the promise proffered by Stoicism of lasting transcendence and imperturbable tranquility.

It ignores gratitude, too. This is part of the tranquility, because it’s what makes the tranquility possible. Stoicism is, as much as anything, a philosophy of gratitude – and a gratitude, moreover, rugged enough to endure anything. Philosophers who pine for supreme psychological liberation have often failed to realise that they belong to a confederacy that includes the Stoics. ‘According to nature you want to live?’ Friedrich Nietzsche taunts the Stoics in Beyond Good and Evil (1886):

O you noble Stoics, what deceptive words these are! Imagine a being like nature, wasteful beyond measure, indifferent beyond measure, without purposes and consideration, without mercy and justice, fertile and desolate and uncertain at the same time; imagine indifference itself as a power – how could you live according to this indifference? Living – is that not precisely wanting to be other than this nature? Is not living – estimating, preferring, being unjust, being limited, wanting to be different? And supposing your imperative ‘live according to nature’ meant at bottom as much as ‘live according to life’ – how could you not do that? Why make a principle of what you yourself are and must be?

This is pretty good, as denunciations of Stoicism go, seductive in its articulateness and energy, and therefore effective, however uninformed.

Which is why it’s so disheartening to see Nietzsche fly off the rails of sanity in the next two paragraphs, accusing the Stoics of trying to ‘impose’ their ‘morality… on nature’, of being ‘no longer able to see [nature] differently’ because of an ‘arrogant’ determination to ‘tyrannise’ nature as the Stoic has tyrannised himself. Then (in some of the least subtle psychological projection you’re ever likely to see, given what we know of Nietzsche’s mad drive for psychological supremacy), he accuses all of philosophy as being a ‘tyrannical drive’, ‘the most spiritual will to power’, to the ‘creation of the world’.

The truth is, indifference really is a power, selectively applied, and living in such a way is not only eminently possible, with a conscious adoption of certain attitudes, but facilitates a freer, more expansive, more adventurous mode of living. Joy and grief are still there, along with all the other emotions, but they are tempered – and, in their temperance, they are less tyrannical.

If we can’t always go to our philosophers for an understanding of Stoicism, then where can we go? One place to start is the Urban Dictionary. Check out what this crowdsourced online reference to slang gives as the definition of a ‘stoic’:

stoic
Someone who does not give a shit about the stupid things in this world that most people care so much about. Stoics do have emotions, but only for the things in this world that really matter. They are the most real people alive.
Group of kids are sitting on a porch. Stoic walks by.
Kid – ‘Hey man, yur a fuckin faggot an you suck cock!’
Stoic – ‘Good for you.’
Keeps going.

You’ve gotta love the way the author manages to make mention of a porch in there, because Stoicism has its root in the word stoa, which is the Greek name for what today we would call a porch. Actually, we’re more likely to call it a portico, but the ancient Stoics used it as a kind of porch, where they would hang out and talk about enlightenment and stuff. The Greek scholar Zeno is the founder, and the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius the most famous practitioner, while the Roman statesman Seneca is probably the most eloquent and entertaining. But the real hero of Stoicism, most Stoics agree, is the Greek philosopher Epictetus.

He’d been a slave, which gives his words a credibility that the other Stoics, for all the hardships they endured, can’t quite match. He spoke to his pupils, who later wrote down his words. These are the only words we know today as Epictetus’, consisting of two short works, the Enchiridion and the Discourses, along with some fragments. Among those whom Epictetus taught directly is Marcus Aurelius (another Stoic philosopher who did not necessarily expect to be read; his Meditations were written expressly for private benefit, as a kind of self-instruction).

Among those Epictetus has taught indirectly is a whole cast of the distinguished, in all fields of endeavour. One of these is the late US Navy Admiral James Stockdale. A prisoner of war in Vietnam for seven years during that conflict, he endured broken bones, starvation, solitary confinement, and all other manner of torture. His psychological companion through it all were the teachings of Epictetus, with which he had familiarised himself after graduating from college and joining the Navy, studying philosophy at Stanford University on the side. He kept those teachings close by in Vietnam, never letting them leave his mind even when things were at their most dire. Especially then. He knew what they were about, those lessons, and he came to know their application much better than anyone should have to.

Stockdale wrote a lot about Epictetus, in speeches and memoirs and essays, but if you want to travel light (and, really, what Stoic doesn’t?), the best thing you could take with you is a speech he gave at King’s College London in 1993, published as Courage Under Fire: Testing Epictetus’s Doctrines in a Laboratory of Human Behavior (1993). That subtitle is important. Epictetus once compared the philosopher’s lecture room to a hospital, from which the student should walk out in a little bit of pain. ‘If Epictetus’s lecture room was a hospital,’ Stockdale writes, ‘my prison was a laboratory – a laboratory of human behaviour. I chose to test his postulates against the demanding real-life challenges of my laboratory. And as you can tell, I think he passed with flying colours.’

‘You are unfortunate in my judgment, for you have never been unfortunate’

Stockdale rejected the false optimism proffered by Christianity, because he knew, from direct observation, that false hope is how you went insane in that prison. The Stoics themselves believed in gods, but ultimately those resistant to religious belief can take their Stoicism the way they take their Buddhism, even if they can’t buy into such concepts as karma or reincarnation. What the whole thing comes down to, distilled to its briefest essence, is making the choice that choice is really all we have, and that all else is not worth considering. ‘Who […] is the invincible human being?’ Epictetus once asked, before answering the question himself: ‘One who can be disconcerted by nothing that lies outside the sphere of choice.’

Any misfortune ‘that lies outside the sphere of choice’ should be considered an opportunity to strengthen our resolve, not an excuse to weaken it. This is one of the truly great mind-hacks ever devised, this willingness to convert adversity to opportunity, and it’s part of what Seneca was extolling when he wrote what he would say to one whose spirit has never been tempered or tested by hardship: ‘You are unfortunate in my judgment, for you have never been unfortunate. You have passed through life with no antagonist to face you; no one will know what you were capable of, not even you yourself.’ We do ourselves an immense favour when we consider adversity an opportunity to make this discovery – and, in the discovery, to enhance what we find there.

Another shrewdly resourceful Stoic mind-hack is what William B Irvine – in his book A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy­ (2009)– has given the name ‘negative visualisation’. By keeping the very worst that can happen in our heads constantly, the Stoics tell us, we immunise ourselves from the dangers of too much so-called ‘positive thinking’, a product of the mind that believes a realistic accounting of the world can lead only to despair. Only by envisioning the bad can we truly appreciate the good; gratitude does not arrive when we take things for granted. It’s precisely this gratitude that leaves us content to cede control of what the world has already removed from our control anyway.

How did we let something so eminently understandable become so grotesquely misunderstood? How did we forget that that dark passage is really the portal to transcendence?

Many will recognise in these principles the general shape and texture of cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). Indeed, Stoicism has been identified as a kind of proto-CBT. Albert Ellis, the US psychologist who founded an early form of CBT known as Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT) in 1955, had read the Stoics in his youth and used to prescribe to his patients Epictetus’s maxim that ‘People are disturbed not by things but by their view of things.’ ‘That’s actually the “cognitive model of emotion” in a nutshell,’ Donald Robertson tells me, and he should certainly know, as a therapist who in 2010 wrote a book on CBT with the subtitle ‘Stoic Philosophy as Rational and Cognitive Psychotherapy’.

This simplicity and accessibility ensure that Stoicism will never be properly embraced by those who prefer the abstracted and esoteric in their philosophies. In the novel A Man in Full (1998), Tom Wolfe gives Stoicism, with perfect plausibility, to a semi-literate prison inmate. This monologue of Conrad Hensley’s may be stilted, but there’s nothing at all suspect about the sentiment behind it. When asked if he is a Stoic, Conrad replies: ‘I’m just reading about it, but I wish there was somebody around today, somebody you could go to, the way students went to Epictetus. Today people think of Stoics – like, you know, like they’re people who grit their teeth and tolerate pain and suffering. What they are is, they’re serene and confident in the face of anything you can throw at them.’

Marcus Aurelius started each day telling himself: ‘I shall meet with meddling, ungrateful, violent, treacherous, envious, and unsociable people’

Which leads us naturally to ask just what it was that was thrown at them. We’ve already noted that Epictetus had the whole slavery thing going on, so he checks out. So does Seneca, in spite of what many have asserted – most recently the UK classicist Mary Beard in an essay for the New York Review of Books that asks: ‘How Stoical Was Seneca?’ before providing a none-too-approving answer. What Beard’s well-informed and otherwise cogent essay fails to allow for is just how tough it must have been for Seneca – tubercular, exiled, and under the control of a sadistically murderous dictator – no matter what access he sometimes had to life’s luxuries. It was Seneca himself who said that ‘no one has condemned wisdom to poverty’, and only an Ancient Greek Cynic would try to deny this. Besides, Seneca would have been the first to tell you, as he told a correspondent in one of his letters: ‘I am not so shameless as to undertake to cure my fellow-men when I am ill myself. I am, however, discussing with you troubles which concern us both, and sharing the remedy with you, just as if we were lying ill in the same hospital.’

Marcus Aurelius lay ill in that hospital, too. As beneficiary of the privileges of emperor, he also endured the struggles and stresses of that very same position, plus a few more besides. I know better than to try to improve on the following accounting, provided in Irvine’s A Guide to the Good Life:

He was sick, possibly with an ulcer. His family life was a source of distress: his wife appears to have been unfaithful to him, and of the at least 14 children she bore him, only six survived. Added to this were the stresses that came with ruling an empire. During his reign, there were numerous frontier uprisings, and Marcus often went personally to oversee campaigns against upstart tribes. His own officials – most notably, Avidius Cassius, the governor of Syria – rebelled against him. His subordinates were insolent to him, which insolence he bore with ‘an unruffled temper’. Citizens told jokes at his expense and were not punished for doing so. During his reign, the empire also experienced plague, famine, and natural disasters such as the earthquake at Smyrna.

Ever the strategist, Marcus employed a trusty technique in confronting the days that comprised such a life, making a point to tell himself at the start of each one of them: ‘I shall meet with meddling, ungrateful, violent, treacherous, envious, and unsociable people.’ He could have been different about it – he could have pretended things were just hunky-dory, especially on those days when they really were, or seemed to be. But how, then, would he have been prepared to angle both into the wind and away from it – adapting, always, to fate’s violently vexing vicissitudes? Where would that have left him when the weather changed? source

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The point of philosophy is to become a better person, at least according to the Stoics. Perhaps this is why the Stoicism and the Stoics writings continue to play a vital role in religion, philosophy, psychology, and mental health. Their four virtues, among other aspects of Stoicism, were expanded from Socrates beginning around 300BCE and today form the foundation for our most popular psychotherapies, including Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy, Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy, Cognitive Therapy, and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.

What is Stoicism?

Stoicism is an extension of Western Philosophy started by Socrates and continued with Plato and Aristotle. The founder of Stoicism, Zeno of Citium, did not study with Socrates or his students and was not trained as a philosopher, but rather lucked into philosophy after a terrible tragedy involving a sunken ship and the loss of all of his possessions off the shores of ancient Greece. Being broke and in a strange land, Zeno wandered into a bookstore and was introduced to Socrates and philosophy.

He was hooked and went on to read everything he could find on the topic of Socratic Philosophy. He began to share what he learned in stoas, which were long columned hallways open to the public. The term Stoicism, today referring to the restriction of emotions, derives from the term stoa – it originally referred to teachings that occurred in the stoa (hallway lectures).

Stoicism is not really about restricting emotions, but rather about the importance of rational thinking. After reading much about Socrates, Zeno concluded that “The purpose of life is happiness, which is achieved by virtue, living according to the dictates of reason, ethical and philosophical training, self-reflection, careful judgements and inner calm.” He didn’t see happiness as only for the wealthy, or educated, or privileged, but rather for all humans.

Zeno was not only the father of Stoicism, he was also a proponent of social justice. As he shared his wisdom in the halls of Ancient Athens, he charged no fees and had no restrictions on who could attend and participate. Perhaps this is why the three most prolific Stoic writers included such diversity as a slave named Epictetus; a playwright and counselor to the infamous Nero named Seneca the Younger; and Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius, often referred to as ‘the last of the five great emperors.’ It is important to note that much of the Stoic writings were destroyed when Sparta took over as the government of Athens during the Peloponnesian War yet the diversity of philosophers is still very broad.

The Four Virtues and Modern Psychology

I wrote an article on Positive Psychology titled “Character Strengths and the Virtuous Life” where I defined virtue as “living the life that best suits who you are – your character.” Since Positive Psychology identifies six virtues, four of which are the same as the Stoics. Martin Seligman, a co-founder of Positive Psychology, like the Stoic Philosophers, see virtue as both necessary and sufficient for happiness. Others, like Aristotle, disagree. But that’s for another post.

For Stoics, including Zeno of Citium, living a virtuous life is the key to happiness. Virtue is living a life that maximizes wisdom, courage, moderation (or temperance), and courage as it fits with who you are and what you value (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy). A virtuous life is about being rational and enjoying positive emotions, eliminating negative emotions, and being true to who you are as a person.

The Stoics spoke of four virtues – wisdom, courage, temperance, and justice. These virtues are seen across many western philosophies, including Christianity, and stem from the writings of Plato when he wrote that a ‘good city’ must be ‘wise, brave, temperate, and just.‘ (Kelly, 2022). These four virtues have stood the test of time. The vices, include foolishness (the enemy of wisdom), cowardice (the enemy of courage), intemperance (the enemy of temperance), and injustice (the enemy of justice), cowardice, intemperance. Virtue and vice are opposites on a spectrum between good and evil, positive and negative, or healthy and unhealthy.

Wisdom

Since the term ‘philosophy’ literally translates to ‘love of wisdom,’ let’s start with that one. Wisdom, to the Stoics, was not about the acquisition of knowledge, but rather the ability to differentiate what is important and under your control and what is indifferent – the Stoic term for anything that does not or should not impact your ability to experience a happy life (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy). A wise person, then, is one who understand what is important for them at that moment from a rational perspective, considering emotions but not allowing them to drive any decisions or actions.

The Serenity Prayer is common across 12-step programs like Alcoholics Anonymous and emphasizes the importance of virtue, especially wisdom and courage. It goes like this: God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Wisdom is about knowing how we impact our world and how the world impacts us (Kelly, 2022).

Courage

Epictetus, one of the most prolific of the Stoics, was once asked how to thrive and he responded with two simple words – persist and resist (Daily Stoic). He likened human existence to a military campaign, arguing that each of us is assigned a key post and to thrive we must hold our ground and prevent the enemy from encroaching. Courage, according to the Stoics, is about the strength to stand up to adversity by maintaining your values and living according to your virtues. A key to surviving and thriving is also resisting temptations that lead you away from your ideal self. To have courage means to persist and to resist.

Like the chess board metaphor in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, the goal in life is not to continually reposition yourself as your surroundings change or to constantly battle with yourself, but rather to discover your ideal self and maintain that as unmovable. The chess board represents your values while the chess pieces represent your thoughts, beliefs, ideas, emotions, and other contently changing and evolving aspects of yourself. If you focus on how to position your pieces, on which thoughts are good and which are bad, and what you can sacrifice to gain an better advantage or to counter the negative, you lose track of who you are. You are the chess board – identify your virtues , your values, the best in you and then hold steady – persist and resist.

Temperance

In his journal, Meditations, Marcus Aurelius wrote “if you seek tranquility, do less….do less, better. Because most of what we say and do is not essential” (2002, 4.24).  The idea behind Temperance – sometimes referred to as Moderation – is to find balance. According to Seneca the Younger, counselor to Nero, wealth should be no less than what is essential and no more than what is enough. Stoics believed in the idea of ‘all things in moderation,’ and argued that anything in excess counters virtue and deprives one of their best life.

Researchers and clinicians in Cognitive-Behavior Therapy warns us about the dangers of intemperance. In Aaron Beck’s Cognitive Therapy (CT), cognitive distortions like catastrophizing (assuming the worst) and  all-or-none or polarized thinking (seeing only extremes) are often to blame for worsening depression and anxiety. It is similar for Albert Ellis’ Rational-Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) where the tendency to overuse extremes of thought like ‘shoulds’ and ‘musts’ tend to minimize the positive and amplify the negative (mentalhelp.net) resulting in symptoms of both depression and anxiety.

Justice

Marcus Aurelius argued that the Virtue of Justice was the most important virtue that ties all of the virtues together. He asked the point of being courageous if not for other people and the good of wisdom if it is not used to improve the world. Just as Zeno of Cyprus shared his knowledge and wisdom with anyone who wanted to listen at no charge and in public stoa, the Stoics believed that everyone was entitled to live their best life and this included open access to modern ideas. Justice includes the idea of sympatheia – that we are all interdependent; that the entire universe in interconnected – which is emphasized throughout the Stoic writings (Daily Stoic).

Stoicism and Mental Health

It is difficult to argue with Plato on the importance of being wise, brave, temperate, and just. These four virtues apply to us as individuals, as families, and as communities. Stoics believed in the interconnectedness of everyone and everything. Marcus Aurelius eloquently stated, “what hurts the hive, hurts the bee.” The counter is also true, what hurts the bee, hurts the hive. According to the Stoics, thriving means living your life according to virtue. Virtue represents who you are, what you value, and how you act.

Carl Rogers, the founder of Person-Centered Therapy, taught us that therapeutic change occurs when we establish genuine relationships that include positive regard and empathy. Like other humanists/existentialists, he also believed that mental health is about minimizing the overlap between who you are in reality and who you want to be. Living a virtuous life is about moving toward your ideal or authentic self.

References

Aurelius, M. (2002). The Meditations. New York, NY: Random House.

Daily Stoic (n.d.). Four Stoic Virtues.

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (n.d.). Stoic ethics.

Kelly, S. (2022). The Four Stoic Virtues.

MentalHelp.net (n.d.) Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy.  source

More on Stoicism…..

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Stoic Exercises, Wisdom, and More

For those of us who live our lives in the real world, there is one branch of philosophy created just for us: Stoicism. It’s a philosophy designed to make us more resilient, happier, more virtuous and more wise–and as a result, better people, better parents and better professionals.

Stoicism has been a common thread though some of history’s great leaders. It has been practiced by Kings, presidents, artists, writers and entrepreneurs. Marcus Aurelius. Frederick the Great, Montaigne, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill, Theodore Roosevelt, General James Mattis, —just to name a few—were all influenced by Stoic philosophy.

So what is Stoicism? Who were the Stoics? How can you be a Stoic? We answer all your questions and more below. Click the links below to navigate to a specific section or scroll and read the entirety of the page:

I. What Is Stoicism?

II. How Did Stoicism Begin? 

III. Who Were The Stoic Philosophers?

• Marcus Aurelius
• Seneca
• Epictetus

IV. What Are The 4 Virtues of Stoicism?

• Courage
• Temperance
• Justice
• Wisdom

V. What Are The Best Books On Stoicism?

• Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
• Letters From A Stoic by Seneca
• Discourses by Epictetus
• The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman
• The Obstacle Is The Way by Ryan Holiday

VI. How To Be A Stoic: 9 Stoic Exercises To Get You Started

• The Dichotomy of Control
• Journal
• Practice Misfortune
• Train Perceptions
• Remember—It’s All Ephemeral
• Take The View From Above
• Memento Mori: Meditate On Your Mortality
• Premeditatio Malorum
• Amor Fati

VII. What Are The Best Stoic Quotes?

I. What Is Stoicism?

“Of all people only those are at leisure who make time for philosophy, only they truly live. Not satisfied to merely keep good watch over their own days, they annex every age to their own. All the harvest of the past is added to their store. ” — Seneca

The private diaries of one of Rome’s greatest emperors, the personal letters of one of Rome’s best playwrights and wisest power brokers, the lectures of a former slave and exile, turned influential teacher. Against all odds, some two millennia later, these incredible documents survive. They contain some of the greatest wisdom in the history of the world and together, they constitute the bedrock of what is known as Stoicism—an ancient philosophy that was once one of the most popular civic disciplines in the West, practiced by the rich and the impoverished, the powerful and the struggling alike in the pursuit of the Good Life.

Except to the most avid seekers of wisdom, Stoicism is either unknown or misunderstood. To the average person, this vibrant, action-oriented, and paradigm-shifting way of living has become shorthand for “emotionlessness.” Given the fact that the mere mention of philosophy makes most nervous or bored, “Stoic philosophy” on the surface sounds like the last thing anyone would want to learn about, let alone urgently need in the course of daily life.

It would be hard to find a word that dealt a greater injustice at the hands of the English language than “Stoic.” In its rightful place, Stoicism is a tool in the pursuit of self-mastery, perseverance, and wisdom: something one uses to live a great life, rather than some esoteric field of academic inquiry. Certainly, many of history’s great minds not only understood Stoicism for what it truly is, they sought it out: George Washington, Walt Whitman, Frederick the Great, Eugène Delacroix, Adam Smith, Immanuel Kant, Thomas Jefferson, Matthew Arnold, Ambrose Bierce, Theodore Roosevelt, William Alexander Percy, Ralph Waldo Emerson. Each read, studied, quoted, or admired the Stoics. The ancient Stoics themselves were no slouches. The names you encounter on this site in our daily email meditations—Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Seneca—belonged to, respectively, a Roman emperor, a former slave who triumphed to become an influential lecturer and friend of the emperor Hadrian, and a famous playwright and political adviser.

What have all these and countless other great men and women found within Stoicism that others missed? A great deal. Primarily, that it provides much needed strength, wisdom, and stamina for all of life’s challenges.

I. What Is Stoicism?

“Of all people only those are at leisure who make time for philosophy, only they truly live. Not satisfied to merely keep good watch over their own days, they annex every age to their own. All the harvest of the past is added to their store. ” — Seneca

The private diaries of one of Rome’s greatest emperors, the personal letters of one of Rome’s best playwrights and wisest power brokers, the lectures of a former slave and exile, turned influential teacher. Against all odds, some two millennia later, these incredible documents survive. They contain some of the greatest wisdom in the history of the world and together, they constitute the bedrock of what is known as Stoicism—an ancient philosophy that was once one of the most popular civic disciplines in the West, practiced by the rich and the impoverished, the powerful and the struggling alike in the pursuit of the Good Life.

Except to the most avid seekers of wisdom, Stoicism is either unknown or misunderstood. To the average person, this vibrant, action-oriented, and paradigm-shifting way of living has become shorthand for “emotionlessness.” Given the fact that the mere mention of philosophy makes most nervous or bored, “Stoic philosophy” on the surface sounds like the last thing anyone would want to learn about, let alone urgently need in the course of daily life.

It would be hard to find a word that dealt a greater injustice at the hands of the English language than “Stoic.” In its rightful place, Stoicism is a tool in the pursuit of self-mastery, perseverance, and wisdom: something one uses to live a great life, rather than some esoteric field of academic inquiry. Certainly, many of history’s great minds not only understood Stoicism for what it truly is, they sought it out: George Washington, Walt Whitman, Frederick the Great, Eugène Delacroix, Adam Smith, Immanuel Kant, Thomas Jefferson, Matthew Arnold, Ambrose Bierce, Theodore Roosevelt, William Alexander Percy, Ralph Waldo Emerson. Each read, studied, quoted, or admired the Stoics. The ancient Stoics themselves were no slouches. The names you encounter on this site in our daily email meditations—Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Seneca—belonged to, respectively, a Roman emperor, a former slave who triumphed to become an influential lecturer and friend of the emperor Hadrian, and a famous playwright and political adviser.

What have all these and countless other great men and women found within Stoicism that others missed? A great deal. Primarily, that it provides much needed strength, wisdom, and stamina for all of life’s challenges.

If you want to take a deeper dive into Stoicism and learn how to apply the philosophy to your life, check out our most popular course, Stoicism 101: Ancient Philosophy For Your Actual Life. It’s a 14-day course that will equip you with the tools to live as vibrant and expansive a life as the Stoics. Along with 14 daily emails, there will be 3 live video sessions with bestselling author Ryan Holiday, one of the world’s foremost thinkers and writers on ancient philosophy and its place in everyday life. Learn more here and make sure to register before the live cohort begins on March 22nd!

II. How Did Stoicism Begin?

Around 304 BC, a merchant named Zeno was shipwrecked on a trading voyage. He lost nearly everything. Making his way to Athens, he was introduced to philosophy by the Cynic philosopher Crates and the Megarian philosopher Stilpo, which changed his life. As Zeno later joked, “I made a prosperous voyage when I suffered shipwreck.” He would later move to what became known as the Stoa Poikile, literally meaning “painted porch.” Erected in the 5th century BC—the ruins of it are visible still, some 2,500 years later—the painted porch is where Zeno and his disciples gathered for discussion. While his followers were originally called Zenonians, it is the ultimate credit to Zeno’s humility that the philosophical school he founded, unlike nearly every school and religion before or since, didn’t ultimately carry his name.

III. Who Were The Stoic Philosophers?

Agasicles, king of the Spartans, once quipped that he wanted to be “the student of men whose son I should like to be as well.” It is a critical consideration we need to make in our search for role models. Stoicism is no exception. Before we begin our studies we need to ask ourselves: Who are the people that followed these precepts? Who can I point out as an example? Am I proud to look up to this person? Do I want to be more like them?

The Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius, the playwright and political advisor Seneca, and the slave turned prominent teacher Epictetus—these are the three Stoics you need to get to know first. Once you do, we’re confident you will want to follow in their footsteps.

Who Is Marcus Aurelius?

“Alone of the emperors,” the historian Herodian would write of the man who became known to us as Marcus Aurelius, “he gave proof of his learning not by mere words or knowledge of philosophical doctrines but by his blameless character and temperate way of life.” Cassius Dio: “In addition to possessing all the other virtues, he ruled better than any others who had ever been in any position of power.”

Born April 26th, 121, nobody would have predicted that Marcus Catilius Severus Annius Verus would one day be Emperor of the Roman Empire. The emperor Hadrian, who would have known young Marcus through his early academic accomplishments, sensing his potential, kept an eye on the boy. His nickname for Marcus, whom he liked to go hunting with, was Verissimus—a play on his name Verus—the truest one. What exactly Hadrian saw in Marcus is unclear. But by Marcus’s 17th birthday, Hadrian had begun planning something extraordinary.

He was going to make Marcus Aurelius the emperor of Rome.

On February 25th, 138, Hadrian adopted a 51 year old man named Antoninus Pius on the condition that he in turn adopted Marcus Aurelius. Given life-expectancy statistics of the time, Hadrian figured this regent and mentor might be at the helm in five years. All was well, except Antoninus lived and ruled for twenty three years. 

In 161, as Antoninus died and ended one of the longest reigns, Marcus finally became the Emperor of the Roman Empire and ruled for nearly two decades until his death in 180. His reign wasn’t easy: wars with the Parthian Empire, the barbarian tribes menacing the Empire on the northern border, the rise of Christianity, as well as the plague that left millions dead.

The famous historian Edward Gibbon wrote that under Marcus, the last of the ‘Five Good Emperors,’ “the Roman Empire was governed by absolute power, under the guidance of wisdom and virtue”. The guidance of wisdom and virtue. That’s what separates Marcus from the majority of past and present world leaders. Just look at the journal that he left behind, which is now known as his Meditations: the private thoughts of the most powerful man in the world, admonishing himself on how to be more virtuous, more just, more immune to temptation, wiser.

And for Marcus, Stoicism provided a framework for dealing with the stresses of daily life as a leader of one of the most powerful empires in human history.

Who Is Seneca?

Born around 4BC in Corduba, Spain, the son of a wealthy and learned writer known to history as Seneca the Elder, Seneca the Younger was destined for great things from birth. Seneca’s father selected Attalus the Stoic to tutor his boy, primarily for his reputation as a man of great eloquence. His son took to education with gusto—by Seneca’s own telling, he cheerfully “laid siege” to the classroom and was the first to arrive and last to leave it. The most powerful lesson that Seneca learned from Attalus was on the desire to improve practically, in the real world. The purpose of studying philosophy, Seneca learned from his beloved instructor, was to “take away with him some one good thing every day: he should return home a sounder man, or on the way to becoming sounder.”

While his commitment to self-improvement was beloved by his teachers, they also knew that his father—no fan of philosophy—was paying them to train his son for an active and ambitious political career. In Rome, a promising young lawyer could appear in court as early as age 17, and there is little doubt that Seneca was one…but, only in his early twenties, Seneca’s health nearly cut it all short. A lung condition forced him to take an extended trip to Egypt to recover where he would spend nearly a decade writing, reading, and building up his strength.

He returned to Rome at 35 in 31 AD—a time of paranoia and violence and corruption and political turmoil. Seneca kept his head down for the most part throughout the equally terrifying reigns of Tiberius and Caligula. His life took a sharp turn in 41 A.D. when Claudius became the emperor and exiled Seneca to the island of Corsica. It would be another eight years away from Rome—and although he started productively (writing Consolation to Polybius, Consolation to Helvia and On Anger in a short span), the many writing consolations soon needed some consoling himself. So began his practice of letter writing, which would continue all his life.

Eight years later, in another sharp turn, Agrippina, mother of future emperor Nero and wife of Claudius recalled Seneca from exile to become her son’s tutor and adviser. At 53 years old, Seneca is suddenly elevated to the center of life in the Roman imperial court—a whirlwind of events that history still hasn’t wrapped its head around. In the end, Seneca made only minimal impact on Nero, a man whom time would shortly reveal to be deranged. Was it always a hopeless mission? Probably. But all a Stoic can do is show up and do our work. Seneca believed he had an obligation. As he would later write, the difference between the Stoics and the Epicureans is that the Stoics felt that politics was a duty.

Who Is Epictetus?

While Seneca would speak, with surprising relatability, about slave owners who became owned by the responsibility and management of their slaves or other Stoics would congratulate themselves for their humane treatment of their human chattel, Epictetus actually was one.

His given name is not known. Epictētos is Greek meaning “acquired.” Epictetus was born into slavery. Epictetus’ mention of his owner, Epaphroditus, is surprisingly neutral because we know Epaphroditus was cruel even by Roman standards. Later Christian writers tell us that Epictetus’s master was violent and depraved, at one point twisting Epictetus’s leg with all his might. As a punishment? As a sick pleasure? In a wrestling match? Trying to get a disobedient young kid to follow instructions? We don’t know. All we hear is that Epictetus calmly warned him about taking it too far. When the leg snapped, Epictetus made no sound, he uttered no tears. He smiled and looked at his master and said, “Didn’t I warn you?”

For the rest of his life, Epictetus would walk with a limp. But Epictetus remained unbroken by the incident. “Lameness is an impediment to the leg,” he would later say, “but not to the will.” Epictetus would choose to see his disability as only a physical impairment, and in fact it was that idea of choice that defined the core of his philosophical beliefs. Life was like a play, he liked to say, and if it was the playwrights “pleasure you should act a poor man, a cripple, a governor, or a private person, see that you act it naturally. For this is your business, to act well the character assigned you; to choose it is another’s.”

And so he did.

Law established by Augustus in 4AD determined that slaves could not be freed before their 30th birthday. Epictetus didn’t obtain his freedom until shortly after emperor Nero’s death. He chose to dedicate himself fully to philosophy and taught in Rome for nearly 25 years…Until the emperor Domitian famously banished all philosophers in Rome. Epictetus fled to Nicopolis in Greece where he founded a philosophy school and taught until his death.

IV. What Are The 4 Virtues of Stoicism?

Courage.

Temperance.

Justice.

Wisdom.

They are the most essential values in Stoic philosophy. “If, at some point in your life,” Marcus Aurelius wrote, “you should come across anything better than justice, truth, self-control, courage—it must be an extraordinary thing indeed.” That was almost twenty centuries ago. We have discovered a lot of things since then—automobiles, the Internet, cures for diseases that were previously a death sentence—but have we found anything better?

…than being brave

…than moderation and sobriety

…than doing what’s right

…than truth and understanding?

No, we have not. It’s unlikely we ever will. Everything we face in life is an opportunity to respond with these four traits:

Courage

If you’ve read Cormac McCarthy’s dark and beautiful novel All the Pretty Horses, you’ll remember the key question that Emilio Perez asks John Grady, one that cuts to the core of life and what we all must do to live a life worth living.

“The world wants to know if you have cojones. If you are brave?”

The Stoics might have phrased this a bit differently. Seneca would say that he actually pitied people who have never experienced misfortune. “You have passed through life without an opponent,” he said, “No one can ever know what you are capable of, not even you.”

The world wants to know what category to put you in, which is why it will occasionally send difficult situations your way. Think of these not as inconveniences or even tragedies but as opportunities, as questions to answers. Do I have cojones? Am I brave? Am I going to face this problem or run away from it? Will I stand up or be rolled over?

Let your actions etch a response into the record—and let them remind you of why courage is the most important thing.

Temperance 

Of course, life is not so simple as to say that courage is all the counts. While everyone would admit that courage is essential, we are also all well aware of people whose bravery turns to recklessness and becomes a fault when they begin to endanger themselves and others.

This is where Aristotle comes in. Aristotle actually used courage as the main example in his famous metaphor of a “Golden Mean.” On one end of the spectrum, he said, there was cowardice—that’s a deficiency of courage. On the other, there was recklessness—too much courage. What was called for, what we required then, was a golden mean. The right amount.

That’s what Temperance or moderation is about: Doing nothing in excess. Doing the right thing in the right amount in the right way. Because “We are what we repeatedly do,” Aristotle also said, “therefore excellence is not an act, but a habit.”

In other words: Virtue and excellence is a way of living. It’s foundational. It’s like an operating system and the code this system operates on is habit.

As Epictetus would later say, “capability is confirmed and grows in its corresponding actions, walking by walking, and running by running… therefore, if you want to do something, make a habit of it.” So if we want to be happy, if we want to be successful, if we want to be great, we have to develop the capability, we have to develop the day-to-day habits that allow this to ensue.

This is great news. Because it means that impressive results or enormous changes are possible without herculean effort or magic formulas. Small adjustments, good systems, the right processes—that’s what it takes.

P.S. Daily Stoic sifted through the greatest Stoic wisdom and aimed it at one of the most challenging parts of life: habit formation and growth. Check out Daily Stoic Habits for Success, Habits for Success Challenge! Challenge yourself to change what you “repeatedly do.” We are promising that if you can do that, you can achieve excellence—personally and professionally. 

Justice

Being brave. Finding the right balance. These are core Stoic virtues, but in their seriousness, they pale in comparison to what the Stoics worshipped most highly: Doing the right thing.

There is no Stoic virtue more important than justice, because it influences all the others. Marcus Aurelius himself said that justice is “the source of all the other virtues.” Stoics throughout history have pushed and advocated for justice, oftentimes at great personal risk and with great courage, in order to do great things and defend the people and ideas that they loved.

• Cato gave his life trying to restore the Roman Republic.
• And Thrasea and Agrippinus gave theirs resisting the tyranny of Nero.
• George Washington and Thomas Jefferson formed a new nation—one which would seek, however imperfectly, to fight for democracy and justice—largely inspired by the philosophy of Cato and those other Stoics.
• Thomas Wentworth Higginson, a translator of Epictetus, led a black regiment of troops in the US Civil War.
• Beatrice Webb, who helped to found the London School of Economics and who first conceptualized the idea of collective bargaining, regularly re-read Marcus Aurelius.

Countless other activists and politicians have turned to Stoicism to gird them against the difficulty of fighting for ideals that mattered, to guide them towards what was right in a world of so much wrong. A Stoic must deeply believe that an individual can make a difference. Successful activism and political maneuvering require understanding and strategy, as well as realism… and hope. It requires wisdom, acceptance and also a refusal to accept the statue quo.

It was James Baldwin who most brilliantly captured this tension in Notes of a Native Son:

It began to seem that one would have to hold in mind forever two ideas which seemed to be in opposition. The first idea was acceptance, the acceptance, totally without rancor, of life as it is, and men as they are: in light of this idea it goes without saying that injustice is commonplace. But this did not mean that one could be complacent, for the second idea was of equal power: that one must never, in one’s own life, accept these injustices as commonplace but one must fight them with all one’s strength.

A Stoic sees the world clearly…but also sees clearly what the world can be. And then they are brave, and strategic enough to help bring it into reality.

Wisdom

Courage. Temperance. Justice. These are the critical virtues of life. But what situations call for courage? What is the right amount? What is the right thing? This is where the final and essential virtue comes in: Wisdom. The knowing. The learning. The experience required to navigate the world.

Wisdom has always been prized by the Stoics. Zeno said that we were given two ears and one mouth for a reason: to listen more than we talk. And since we have two eyes, we are obligated to read and observe more than we talk as well.

It is key today, as it was in the ancient world, to  be able to distinguish between the vast aggregations of information that lay out there at your disposal—and the actual wisdom that you need to live a good life. It’s key that we study, that we keep our minds open always. You cannot learn that which you think you already know, Epictetus said. It’s true.

Which is why we need to not only be humble students but also seek out great teachers. It’s why we should always be reading. It’s why we cannot stop training. It’s why we have to be diligent in filtering out the signal from the noise.

The goal is not just to acquire information, but the right kind of information. It’s the lessons found in Meditations, in everything from the actual Epictetus to James Stockdale entering the world of Epictetus. It’s the key facts, standing out from the background noise, that you need to absorb.

Thousands of years of blazing insight are available to the world. It is likely that you have the power to learn anything you want at your fingertips. So today, honor the Stoic virtue of wisdom by slowing down, being deliberate, and finding the wisdom you need.

Two eyes, two ears, one mouth. Remain a student. Act accordingly—and wisely.

P.S. If you’re looking to be a better reader—to build a real reading practice—the Stoics can help. We built out some of their best insights into our Daily Stoic: Read-to-Lead Reading Challenge. It’s going to walk you through more than a dozen actionable challenges that will help you elevate your game as a reader, learn how to think more critically and discover important books that will change your life. We’ve got videos and worksheets and all sorts of recommendations and strategies for you. If you’ve liked any of our other courses, you’ll love this one—it’s awesome, it’s actionable and it will help you get a better ROI out of one of the most important ways we spend our time and enrich our minds. Give it a shot. 

V. What Are The Best Books On Stoicism?

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

Meditations is perhaps the only document of its kind ever made. It is the private thoughts of the world’s most powerful man giving advice to himself on how to make good on the responsibilities and obligations of his positions. Marcus stopped almost every night to practice a series of spiritual exercises—reminders designed to make him humble, patient, empathetic, generous, and strong in the face of whatever he was dealing with. You cannot read this book and not come away with a phrase or a line that will be helpful to you next time you are in trouble. Read it, it is practical philosophy embodied.

Letters From A Stoic by Seneca

While Marcus wrote mainly for himself, Seneca had no trouble advising and aiding others. In fact, that was his job—he was Nero’s tutor, tasked with reducing the terrible impulses of a terrible man. His advice on grief, on wealth, on power, on religion, and on life are always there when you need them. Seneca’s letters are the best place to start, but the essays in On the Shortness of Life are excellent as well.

Discourses by Epictetus

That Epictetus’ teachings survive to us is remarkable. It is only thanks to a student named Arrian, who’s credited with transcribing the lessons he learned in Epictetus’ classroom at the beginning of the second century AD. Arrian wrote in a letter prior to the Discourses’ publishing, “whatever I used to hear him say I wrote down, word for word, as best I could, as a record for later use of his thought and frank expression.” Arrian would use those lessons to achieve renown throughout Rome as a political advisor, military commander, and prolific author. Interestingly, in the first book of Meditations, titled “Debts and Lessons,” Marcus thanks one of his philosophy teachers, Rusticus, “for introducing me to Epictetus’s lectures – and loaning me his own copy.”

The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman

The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living features not only 366 all-new translations of brilliant stoic passages but 366 exciting stories, examples and explanations of the stoic principles from Marcus Aurelius, Seneca and Epictetus but also some of the lesser known but equally wise stoics from Zeno to Cleanthes to Chrysippus. The book takes the reader on a daily journey through practical, pragmatic philosophy. Each day offers a new stoic insight and exercise. By following these teachings, you’ll find the serenity, self-knowledge and resilience you need to live well.

 The Obstacle Is the Way by Ryan Holiday

Inspired by Stoicism and the maxim from Marcus Aurelius—“The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way”—The Obstacle Is The Way is a primer of the key principles for thriving under pressure. Through historical examples of great men and women, it teaches us how to overcome adversity and difficulties, turn obstacles upside down, and shows us how to love our fate, no matter what it might bring. The book has become a cult classic with coaches and athletes alike and has been featured in prominent outlets like Sports Illustrated and ESPN.

VI. How To Be A Stoic: 9 Stoic Exercises To Get You Started

1. The Dichotomy Of Control

“The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control. Where then do I look for good and evil? Not to uncontrollable externals, but within myself to the choices that are my own . . .” Epictetus

The single most important practice in Stoic philosophy is differentiating between what we can change and what we can’t. What we have influence over and what we do not. A flight is delayed because of weather— no amount of yelling at an airline representative will end a storm. No amount of wishing will make you taller or shorter or born in a different country. No matter how hard you try, you can’t make someone like you. And on top of that, time spent hurling yourself at these immovable objects is time not spent on the things we can change.

Return to this question daily—in each and every trying situation. Journal and reflect on it constantly. If you can focus on making clear what parts of your day are within your control and what parts are not, you will not only be happier, you will have a distinct advantage over other people who fail to realize they are fighting an unwinnable battle.

2. Journal

“Few care now about the marches and countermarches of the Roman commanders. What the centuries have clung to is a notebook of thoughts by a man whose real life was largely unknown who put down in the midnight dimness not the events of the day or the plans of the morrow, but something of far more permanent interest, the ideals and aspirations that a rare spirit lived by.” — Brand Blanshard

Epictetus the slave. Marcus Aurelius the emperor. Seneca the power broker and playwright. These three radically different men led radically different lives. But they seemed to have one habit in common: Journaling.

It would be Epictetus who would admonish his students that philosophy was something they should “write down day by day,” that this writing was how they “should exercise themselves.” Seneca’s favorite time to journal was in the evenings. When darkness had fallen and his wife had gone asleep, he explained to a friend, “I examine my entire day and go back over what I’ve done and said, hiding nothing from myself, passing nothing by.” Then he would go to bed, finding that “the sleep which follows this self-examination” was particularly sweet. And Marcus, he was the most prodigious of journalers, and we are lucky enough that his writings survive to us, appropriately titled, Τὰ εἰς ἑαυτόν, Ta eis heauton, or “to himself.”

In Stoicism the art of journaling is more than some simple diary. This daily practice is the philosophy. Preparing for the day ahead. Reflecting on the day that has passed. Reminding oneself of the wisdom we have learned from our teachers, from our reading, from our own experiences. It’s not enough to simply hear these lessons once, instead, one practices them over and over again, turns them over in their mind, and most importantly, writes them down and feels them flowing through their fingers in doing so.

Stoicism is designed to be a practice and a routine. It’s not a philosophy you read once and magically understand at the soul-level. No, it’s a lifelong pursuit that requires diligence and repetition and concentration. (Pierre Hadot called it spiritual exercising). That’s one of the benefits of the page-a-day (with monthly themes) format we organized the Stoics into (and the weekly themes in The Daily Stoic Journal). It’s putting one thing up for you to review—to have at hand—and to fully digest. Not in passing. Not just once. But every single day over the course of a year, and preferably year in and year out. And if Epictetus is right, it’s something you’re supposed to keep within reach at all times—which is why a collection of the greatest hits, presented daily, was so appealing to us.

In this way, journaling is Stoicism. It’s almost impossible to have one without the other.

P.S. Check out The Daily Stoic Journal. It’s an easy place to start and is built around the Stoic journaling methods of Marcus Aurelius and Seneca.

3. Practice Misfortune

“It is in times of security that the spirit should be preparing itself for difficult times; while fortune is bestowing favors on it is then is the time for it to be strengthened against her rebuffs.” — Seneca

Seneca, who enjoyed great wealth as the adviser of Nero, suggested that we ought to set aside a certain number of days each month to practice poverty. Take a little food, wear your worst clothes, get away from the comfort of your home and bed. Put yourself face to face with want, he said, you’ll ask yourself “Is this what I used to dread?”

It’s important to remember that this is an exercise and not a rhetorical device. He doesn’t mean “think about” misfortune, he means live it. Comfort is the worst kind of slavery because you’re always afraid that something or someone will take it away. But if you can not just anticipate but practice misfortune, then chance loses its ability to disrupt your life.

Emotions like anxiety and fear have their roots in uncertainty and rarely in experience. Anyone who has made a big bet on themselves knows how much energy both states can consume. The solution is to do something about that ignorance. Make yourself familiar with the things, the worst-case scenarios, that you’re afraid of.

Practice what you fear, whether a simulation in your mind or in real life. The downside is almost always reversible or transient.

4. Train Perceptions

“Choose not to be harmed and you won’t feel harmed. Don’t feel harmed and you haven’t been.” — Marcus Aurelius

The Stoics had an exercise called Turning the Obstacle Upside Down. What they meant to do was make it impossible to not practice the art of philosophy. Because if you can properly turn a problem upside down, every “bad” becomes a new source of good.

Suppose for a second that you are trying to help someone and they respond by being surly or unwilling to cooperate. Instead of making your life more difficult, the exercise says, they’re actually directing you towards new virtues; for example, patience or understanding. Or, the death of someone close to you; a chance to show fortitude.

Marcus Aurelius described it like this:

“The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.”

It should sound familiar because it is the same thinking behind Obama’s “teachable moments.” Right before the election, Joe Klein asked Obama how he’d made his decision to respond to the Reverend Wright scandal. He said something like ‘when the story broke I realized the best thing to do wasn’t damage control, it was to speak to Americans like adults.’ And what he ended up doing was turning a negative situation into the perfect platform for his landmark speech about race.

The common refrain about entrepreneurs is that they take advantage of, even create, opportunities. To the Stoic, everything is opportunity. The Reverend Wright scandal, a frustrating case where your help goes unappreciated, the death of a loved one, none of those are “opportunities” in the normal sense of the word. In fact, they are the opposite. They are obstacles. What a Stoic does is turn every obstacle into an opportunity.

There is no good or bad to the practicing Stoic. There is only perception. You control perception. You can choose to extrapolate past your first impression (‘X happened.’ –> ‘X happened and now my life is over.’). If you tie your first response to dispassion, you’ll find that everything is simply an opportunity.

Note: This exercise served as the inspiration behind The Obstacle Is The Way.

5. Remember—It’s All Ephemeral

“Alexander the Great and his mule driver both died and the same thing happened to both.” — Marcus Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius wrote to himself a simple and effective reminder to help him regain perspective and stay balanced:

“Run down the list of those who felt intense anger at something: the most famous, the most unfortunate, the most hated, the most whatever: Where is all that now? Smoke, dust, legend…or not even a legend. Think of all the examples. And how trivial the things we want so passionately are.”

It is important to note that ‘passion’ here isn’t the modern usage we’re familiar with as in enthusiasm or caring about something. As Don Robertson explains in his book, when the Stoics discuss overcoming ‘passions’, which they called patheiai, they refer to the irrational, unhealthy and excessive desires and emotions. Anger would be a good example. What is important to remember, and this is the crucial bit, they seek to replace them with eupatheiai, such as joy instead of excessive pleasure.

Returning to the point of the exercise, it’s simple: remember how small you are. For that matter, remember how small most everything is.

Remember that achievements can be ephemeral, and that your possession of them is for just an instant.

If everything is ephemeral, what does matter? Right now matters. Being a good person and doing the right thing right now, that’s what matters and that’s what was important to the Stoics.

Take Alexander the Great who conquered the known world and had cities named in his honor. This is common knowledge. The Stoics would also point out that, once while drunk, Alexander got into a fight with his dearest friend, Cleitus, and accidentally killed him. Afterward, he was so despondent that he couldn’t eat or drink for three days. Sophists were called from all over Greece to see what they could do about his grief, to no avail.

Is this the mark of a successful life? From a personal standpoint, it matters little if your name is emblazoned on a map if you lose perspective and hurt those around you.

Learn from Alexander’s mistake. Be humble and honest and aware. That is something you can have every single day of your life. You’ll never have to fear someone taking it from you or, worse still, it taking over you.

6.Take The View From Above

“How beautifully Plato put it. Whenever you want to talk about people, it’s best to take a bird’s- eye view and see everything all at once— of gatherings, armies, farms, weddings and divorces, births and deaths, noisy courtrooms or silent spaces, every foreign people, holidays, memorials, markets— all blended together and arranged in a pairing of opposites.” — Marcus Aurelius

Marcus would often practice an exercise that is referred to as “taking the view from above” or “Plato’s view.” It invites us to take a step back, zoom out and see life from a higher vantage point than our own. This exercise—envisioning all the millions and millions of people, all the “armies, farms, weddings and divorces, births and deaths”—prompts us to take perspective and just like the previous exercise, remind us how small we are. It reorients us, and as Stoic scholar Pierre Hadot put it, “The view from above changes our value judgments on things: luxury, power, war…and the worries of everyday life become ridiculous.”

Seeing how small we are in the grand scheme of things is only one portion of this exercise. The second, more subtle point, is to tap into what the Stoics call sympatheia, or a mutual interdependence with the whole of humanity. As the astronaut Edgar Mitchell, one of the first people to actually experience a real ‘view from above’ put it, “In outer space you develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it.” Take a step back from your own concerns and remind yourself of your duty to others. Take Plato’s view.

7. Memento Mori: Meditate On Your Mortality

“Let us prepare our minds as if we’d come to the very end of life. Let us postpone nothing. Let us balance life’s books each day. … The one who puts the finishing touches on their life each day is never short of time.” Seneca

The quote from Seneca above takes part of Memento Mori—the ancient practice of reflection on mortality that goes back to Socrates, who said that the proper practice of philosophy is “about nothing else but dying and being dead.” In his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius wrote that “You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.” That was a personal reminder to continue living a life of virtue now, and not wait.

Meditating on your mortality is only depressing if you miss the point. The Stoics find this thought invigorating and humbling. It is not surprising that one of Seneca’s biographies is titled Dying Every Day. After all, it is Seneca who urged us to tell ourselves “You may not wake up tomorrow,” when going to bed and “You may not sleep again,” when waking up as reminders of our mortality. Or as another Stoic, Epictetus, urged his students: “Keep death and exile before your eyes each day, along with everything that seems terrible— by doing so, you’ll never have a base thought nor will you have excessive desire.” Use those reminders and meditate on them daily—let them be the building blocks of living your life to the fullest and not wasting a second.

8. Premeditatio Malorum

“What is quite unlooked for is more crushing in its effect, and unexpectedness adds to the weight of a disaster. This is a reason for ensuring that nothing ever takes us by surprise. We should project our thoughts ahead of us at every turn and have in mind every possible eventuality instead of only the usual course of events… Rehearse them in your mind: exile, torture, war, shipwreck. All the terms of our human lot should be before our eyes.”  — Seneca

The premeditatio malorum (“the pre-meditation of evils”) is a Stoic exercise of imagining things that could go wrong or be taken away from us. It helps us prepare for life’s inevitable setbacks. We don’t always get what is rightfully ours, even if we’ve earned it. Not everything is as clean and straightforward as we think they may be. Psychologically, we must prepare ourselves for this to happen. It is one of the most powerful exercise in the Stoics’ toolkit to build resilience and strength.

Seneca, for instance, would begin by reviewing or rehearsing his plans, say, to take a trip. And then, in his head (or in journaling as we said above), he would go over the things that could go wrong or prevent it from happening—a storm could arise, the captain could fall ill, the ship could be attacked by pirates.

“Nothing happens to the wise man against his expectation,” he wrote to a friend. “. . . nor do all things turn out for him as he wished but as he reckoned—and above all he reckoned that something could block his plans.”

By doing this exercise, Seneca was always prepared for disruption and always working that disruption into his plans. He was fitted for defeat or victory.

9. Amor Fati

“To love only what happens, what was destined. No greater harmony.” — Marcus Aurelius

The great German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche would describe his formula for human greatness as amor fati—a love of fate. “That one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backwards, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it….but love it.”

The Stoics were not only familiar with this attitude but they embraced it. Two thousand years ago, writing in his own personal journal which would become known as Meditations, Emperor Marcus Aurelius would say: “A blazing fire makes flame and brightness out of everything that is thrown into it.” Another Stoic, Epictetus, who as a crippled slave has faced adversity after adversity, echoed the same: “Do not seek for things to happen the way you want them to; rather, wish that what happens happen the way it happens: then you will be happy.”

It is why amor fati is the Stoic exercise and mindset that you take on for making the best out of anything that happens: Treating each and every moment—no matter how challenging—as something to be embraced, not avoided. To not only be okay with it, but love it and be better for it. So that like oxygen to a fire, obstacles and adversity become fuel for your potential.

VII. What Are The Best Stoic Quotes?

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“We are often more frightened than hurt; and we suffer more from imagination than from reality.” — Seneca

“It’s silly to try to escape other people’s faults. They are inescapable. Just try to escape your own.” —Marcus Aurelius

“Our life is what our thoughts make it.” — Marcus Aurelius

“Don’t explain your philosophy. Embody it.”  Epictetus

“If anyone tells you that a certain person speaks ill— of you, do not make excuses about what is said of you but answer, ‘He was ignorant of my other faults, else he would not have mentioned these alone.’” — Epictetus

“If it is not right, do not do it, if it is not true, do not say it.” — Marcus Aurelius

“You become what you give your attention to…If you yourself don’t choose what thoughts and images you expose yourself to, someone else will.” — Epictetus

“Be tolerant with others and strict with yourself.” — Marcus Aurelius

“You always own the option of having no opinion. There is never any need to get worked up or to trouble your soul about things you can’t control. These things are not asking to be judged by you. Leave them alone.” — Marcus Aurelius

“All you need are these: certainty of judgment in the present moment; action for the common good in the present moment; and an attitude of gratitude in the present moment for anything that comes your way.” — Marcus Aurelius

“No person has the power to have everything they want, but it is in their power not to want what they don’t have, and to cheerfully put to good use what they do have.” — Seneca

“If anyone can refute me—show me I’m making a mistake or looking at things from the wrong perspective—I’ll gladly change. It’s the truth I’m after, and the truth never harmed anyone.” — Marcus Aurelius

“Today I escaped anxiety. Or no, I discarded it, because it was within me, in my own perceptions not outside.” — Marcus Aurelius

“You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realise this, and you will find strength.” — Marcus Aurelius

“It isn’t events themselves that disturb people, but only their judgements about them.” — Epictetus

“To be like the rock that the waves keep crashing over. It stands unmoved and the raging of the sea falls still around it.” — Marcus Aurelius

“First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.” — Epictetus

“Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be One.” — Marcus Aurelius

“The primary indication of a well-ordered mind is a man’s ability to remain in one place and linger in his own company.” — Seneca

“Receive without pride, let go without attachment.” — Marcus Aurelius

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What is Stoicism and How Can it Turn your Life to Solid Gold?

Stoic Quotes on Control – The Absolute Man

We can think of hardship many ways: As failure. As unfairness. As the end of the conversation. Clearly, this was not meant to be, we can say. They don’t want me to succeed, so what’s the point of trying?

Or, we can choose—we can train ourselves—to see it a better way: As grist for the mill. As a chance to learn about endurance, patience, resilience, struggle. As an opportunity to prove our mettle. As a way of learning about people or situations or actions or things.

Marcus Aurelius believed in the latter approach. As he wrote:

“Our inward power, when it obeys nature, reacts to events by accommodating itself to what it faces—to what is possible. It needs no specific material. It pursues its own aims as circumstances allow; it turns obstacles into fuel. As a fire overwhelms what would have quenched a lamp. What’s thrown on top of the conflagration is absorbed, consumed by it—and makes it burn still higher.”

It’s not about accepting hardship then, or resigning ourselves to it. Rather, it’s a matter of agreeing to work with it. To decide to make the most of it. To see hardship as an opportunity, not an obstacle. In this way, we can turn what happens to us into fuel.

We can be made better and brighter by everything that happens. source

Non compos mentis “having control/mastery of one’s mind.”

Members of a brainy movement across the pond are reviving ancient stoic thought and coupling it with modern psychology to strengthen mental resilience. Their ideas hold fascinating promise for business and government leaders tackling global problems in a turbulent, post-recession slump.

This week, leaders of the movement sponsored what they dubbed “Stoic Week,” showcasing how emperors and warriors of bygone eras offer compelling, timeless principles that today’s leaders can use to remain calm in the throes of adversity—or in the midst of wild success.

Conde Nast CEO Jonathan Newhouse swears stoic philosophy is key to his inner stability amidst industries heavily focused on external appearance. Former Vancouver mayor Sam Sullivan says stoicism empowered him out of depression after a skiing accident left him quadriplegic. Former president Bill Clinton (who indulged in some rather un-stoic passions) reportedly sought stoic wisdom throughout his presidency.

Prominent business thinker Nassim Nicholas Taleb praises stoic philosophy in his Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder, a book that Stoic Week organizer Donald Robertson says nudged many curious readers toward stoicism. Robertson, a Scottish-born therapist and classics enthusiast, led workshops on psychological resilience for managers at oil giant Shell called “How to think like a Roman Emperor,” based on the life of stoic philosopher-king Marcus Aurelius. Aurelius’ life embodied these five core stoic ideals:

1. Immediately Recognize What Is Out Of Your Control.

A stoic leader realizes that only his thoughts and intentions are truly within his sphere of control; everything else is ultimately uncontrollable.

“Anyone in a leadership role must come to terms quickly with the paradox of their position: that leaders must wield power but that often so much that happens lies outside of their control,” Robertson told Forbes. “How do we accept the limits of our power without slumping into passivity?”

Robertson said people sometimes confuse stoicism with submissiveness, but calls this “a very superficial misunderstanding.” Students of ancient stoicism tended to be sons from wealthy, cosmopolitan families. Many went on to rule empires or advise great leaders in commerce and war.

“Can you point to a single historical stoic who sat on his hands?” quips Robertson, whose forthcoming book, Stoicism and the Art of Happiness: A Teach Yourself Guide, is due early next year. “It’s just not in the nature of their philosophy to be doormats or stay-at-home types.”

Robertson gave an analogy by Cato of Utica that a stoic is like an archer who diligently and confidently notches his arrow and draws his bow but must accept that once his arrow has flown it could be blown off course or its target could move.

Stoic managers take great pains to aim well but must accept what happens with total equanimity.

https://youtu.be/MkKxAi_c0LQ

2. Fear, Anger And Other Emotions Are Personal Choices, Regardless Of Outer Circumstances.  

Rear Adm. James Stockdale, stoic Navy pilot

In a Harvard Business Review article called “Building Resilience,” psychologist Martin Seligman from the University of Pennsylvania discusses his concept of “learned helplessness,” when people subjected to stressful environments eventually collapse into complete passivity. Learned helplessness is the antithesis of stoic belief in inner power.

Trapped in a Vietnamese torture camp, American James Stockdale’s antagonizers wrenched his shoulders from their sockets, shattered his leg twice and broke his back. Shot down from his Navy plane, Stockdale’s captors held him seven years: more than four years in solitary confinement and two years shackled in irons.

Though his body lay captive in Hanoi prison cells, Stockdale later recounted that his mind was free and his spirit unbroken. Through clandestine channels, Stockdale, a high-ranking officer, maintained chain of command among his fellow captured pilots—75 initially, growing to more than 460—issuing orders and boosting morale. Released at war’s end, Stockdale later won the Medal of Honor, the military’s highest award, and served as president of the Naval War College.

Before his capture, Stockdale mentally bulwarked himself for hardship after graduate studies at Stanford University, where a philosophy professor introduced him to the stoics, particularly Epictetus.

“Epictetus was telling his students that there can be no such thing as being the ‘victim’ of another,” Stockdale later wrote. “You can only be a ‘victim’ of yourself. It’s all in how you discipline your mind.”

A stoic manager understands that no matter what chaotic circumstances surround her, she has total power over her own emotions and the richness of her inner life.

3. Live A Life Centered On Principles, Not Wealth, Awards, Family or Power.

For a stoic leader, the ends do not justify the means. Stoic leaders hunger for and build their lives around four cardinal virtues: wisdom, courage, temperance and justice. If a leader builds his life around anything else—a central theme in business guru Stephen R. Covey’s 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People –he could be disappointed because everything except these virtues is ephemeral.

It’s difficult to practice these values in rough-and-tumble marketplaces like Wall Street and Silicon Valley. But a stoic businessman recognizes that if his ambition is tethered to anything but the cardinal virtues, he’s in the words of stoic Cleanthes, “like a dog tied to a cart, and compelled to go wherever it goes.”

This doesn’t mean that stoics don’t enjoy pleasurable things like acclaim, love and monetary success; it means that they “prefer” them, but they don’t “require” them to be happy. A true philosopher, in the words of Crates of Thebes, is one who’s “looking on generals and donkey-drivers in the same light.”

The journey of life is more important than any material goal because the journey is life. If you feel trapped in a work environment that demands unethical behavior, a stoic guru would advise, it’s better to quit than stay in a place that erodes your commitment to principle.

A stoic leader does everything in her power to succeed but will not compromise her principles in pursuit of fleeting success.

4. People Who Misbehave Do Not Deserve An Emotional Reaction From You.  

In today’s lexicon, say the word “stoic” and you’ll conjure up images of a cold, harsh Scrooge-like figure. But ironically, stoicism can lead to even greater empathy for others who aren’t stoic because they’re not fortunate enough to live a principle-centered life. Someone who treats a stoic unkindly or deviously is merely demonstrating that he or she is behaving like one of Cleanthes’ tethered creatures. And since a stoic has complete control over his response to a negative stimulus, he chooses to emotionally disengage when someone picks a fight.

“The challenge for stoics has always been to live in a society full of people who ultimately suffer because they value material things or social status, without seeming unsympathetic to their plight,” says Robertson, who’s written on the connection between modern cognitive behavioral therapy and stoicism. “Most modern therapists see a great deal of self-inflicted human suffering but have to maintain an attitude of empathic understanding, even when their clients appear to be their own worst enemies.”

Stoicism is a deterministic philosophy, which means its practitioners believe that every external action is the uncontrollable result of circumstances leading up to that action. So if a person behaves rudely it’s because of something dysfunctional inside them that triggers that behavior; this is out of the stoic’s control. However, things get dicey in questions of crime and punishment.

“A criminal justice system should treat criminals as if they’re foolishly mistaken about the most important things in life,” Robertson says.  “It should seek mainly to rehabilitate and educate them, or perhaps to deter them, but not to punish for the sake of retribution, which the Stoics would see as a foolish and vicious response to those who commit wrongs.  It makes us as bad as them.”

A stoic leader remains unflappable in the face of others’ irrational misdeeds. He does not overreact, and if it’s his job, any punitive action he takes against a perpetrator seeks to remedy dysfunction behind the misdeed rather than meting out blind punishment.

5. Meditate Daily To Revive Your Commitment To A Principle-Centered Life   

Each day’s a fresh start, and a stoic clears his mind through reading or pondering stoic thought, a process that some call “cognitive hygiene,” or catharsis. Each morning this rejuvenates and reminds him of stoic principles. Each night it helps him identify mistakes and feel healthy pride in worthy accomplishments.

What’s fascinating about this new push to revive stoicism from the dusts of antiquity is that it wrenches stoicism from theoretical realms into the real world. It’s by design, since Epictetus and other stoic sages taught that philosophy is a way of life, not just an academic exercise.

Emperor Aurelius visualized a stoic “as boxer, not fencer. The fencer’s weapon is picked up and put down again. The boxer’s is part of him. All he has to do is clench his fist.”

Stoicism doesn’t require pomp and circumstance, so it can be practiced quickly and simply. Through daily practice it develops men and women whose mental defenses are self-sufficient and instinctual. source

More on Stoicism…..

Want An Unconquerable Mind? Try Stoic Philosophy

What is Stoicism? A Definition & Stoic Exercises To Get You Started

9 Principles of Stoicism which will Improve your Life

A Complete Guide to Stoicism: How You Can Use this Ancient Philosophy to Live a Better Life

Stoicism, Virtue, and Mental Health

The Stoic Man – Indifference is a power – Stoicism 101

What is Stoicism and How Can it Turn your Life to Solid Gold?

Stoic Quotes on Control – The Absolute Man

A few weeks ago, I got a really interesting email from a guy in Norway that said something like, “Hey Mr. MM.. What you are preaching is Pure Stoicism, with a great twist and perception on today’s world … I love it!!” *

“Stoicism?” I asked, “You mean like the Stoics in Shakespearean plays that show no emotion of any sort? That doesn’t sound quite right to me.

But it turns out I had fallen into a common misconception. The Clever Norwegian pointed me to a book on the topic, which I immediately checked out of the library and read completely. It was called “A Guide to the Good Life, The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy“.

From reading the book, I learned that Stoicism was actually a shockingly advanced old philosophy that found many followers in ancient Rome. Although it has fallen widely out of favor in modern life, people in today’s society would probably identify the central ideas as “Hardcore Mustachianism”.

Stoicism, in short, is a series of mental techniques and ways of life that allow you to decrease and then virtually eliminate all negative emotions such as anger, fear, anxiety, and dissatisfaction, while simultaneously building up a tide of pure Joy inside you that eventually starts to make you jump around and boogie at unexpected moments, and occasionally shout out “AHH YEAH!!” as discreetly as possible to yourself when the Joy overflows.

Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? But over the past few years, this is exactly the transformation that has been happening to me. As I learned from the book, every good Stoic is a work in progress, and I still have much to learn and I’m not free from all negative emotions. But compared to a normal person, things are getting pretty unusually joyful up in here.

So let’s see what it’s all about.

The core of the philosophy seems to be this: To have a good and meaningful life, you need to overcome your insatiability. Most people, at best, spend their lives in a long pursuit of happiness. So today’s successful person writes out a list of desires, then starts chasing them down and satisfying the desires. The problem is that each desire, when satisfied, tends to be replaced by a new desire. So the person continues to chase. Yet after a lifetime of pursuit, the person ends up no more satisfied than he was at the beginning. Thus, he may end up wasting his life.

The solution, the Stoics realized, is to learn to want the things you already have, rather than wanting other things. The most interesting technique that will help you achieve this is Negative Visualization.

For example, suppose that you currently have a good working set of eyes. Imagine carefully what it would be like to live your life as a blind person. You would have to work very hard to rearrange your life to remain functional — learn braille, take special precautions when walking around town and when cooking eggs at home, etc. — but in the end, you could surely survive and even become happy again if you were blind. But now open your eyes. SURPRISE!! YOU HAVE THIS BONUS OF SIGHT!!!. Wow, you were already doing just fine in your blind life, but now you have working eyes too? What an incredible life – you are truly blessed with more than you even need.

It turns out that if you practice negative visualization on a regular basis, you learn to both appreciate your current life much more, and to be mentally prepared in the event of any changes in your life as well – loss of health, fortune, a loved one, etc. You have replaced negative emotions with satisfaction and even joy.

The next great trick is the one that allows you to eliminate anxiety about the present and the future. That can be done by separating your worries into things you can control, and things you can’t. Some people worry endlessly about politics and world events – so much that it affects their ability to lead a happy life, even when in reality, world politics barely even affect their lives here in the cushioned and prosperous rich world! The Stoic solution to this is to realize that politics and the actions of other countries are completely outside of your circle of influence – so you can breathe easily and completely drop all worry about them. There is a smaller subset of these events that you CAN influence – who you vote for, and possibly where you donate your money or time. To eliminate the rest of your worry, make the votes and take the local actions, and then you can be 100% worry free.

Similarly, instead of worrying about your health as many people do, you simply work to the best of your ability to optimize the body you’ve been given, and the matter is completely closed – you can confidently move on!

As an unexpected bonus, we now know that it is the act of worrying itself that causes many of a modern person’s mental and physical problems, so by eliminating worry AND taking action, you are providing yourself with a double boost.

Moving from the mental to the physical, Stoics actually enjoy experimenting with Voluntary Discomfort. As a contemporary Stoic, you might make a point of seeing how long you can leave the air conditioning off on a summer day, or try hiking in bare feet instead of shoes occasionally to feel the land and force your feet to adapt to tougher conditions than a moisture-wicking merino wool hiking sock.  It sounds absurd by modern standards, until you realize that by doing this, you are actually broadening your comfort zone, even while you eliminate your fear of discomfort. Thanks to the practice above, you are now able to enjoy yourself in a much broader range of temperatures, and appreciate the comfort of shoes when you do have them. Meanwhile, a person with the extreme opposite philosophy might become irritated if he ever has to travel in less than a first-class airplane seat or stay in less than a five star hotel or drink sub-$500-per-bottle wine. By experimenting with voluntary discomfort, we  learn to appreciate far more of our life, and can be content with a much simpler and more wholesome one.

“The more pleasures a man captures, the more masters he will have to serve”

Nature Itself told the Stoics what conditions they should learn to appreciate as humans – since they realized we are all in fact an integral part of Nature. In Mustachian terminology, all of these thoughts relating to adapting your comfort level to embrace Nature are collectively referred to as Badassity.

But there’s much more to the philosophy than sitting around trying to be happy with what you’ve got. Stoics believe that the main purpose of our productive energy is to fulfill all of our life’s obligations to our best ability, and to help our fellow humans. So a stoic is actually a hard-working person who enjoys the feeling of hard work – even extremely hard work, as it just falls into the “Voluntary Discomfort/Badassity” category described above.

Rewarding social interactions are a specialty of the Stoic. They believe that humans are social animals at the core, and thus we must exercise this part of our personality to maintain a balanced happiness. But at the same time, it is not rational to have any interest in fame or social status, since these are fleeting indulgences rather than sources of true happiness.

When we encounter insults from other people, we must deal with them with reason rather than anger. Either the insult is true, in which case we should be grateful for the insulter for pointing out this area in which we could improve, or it is false, in which case we should pity the insulter for his lack of accurate perception. Either way, an insult is nothing to get upset about. In the case of a True Fuckwit who not only insults us, but manages to commit major injustices to us, the best revenge is simply to live an even better life while refusing to be like that person. I have actually been through a major encounter with one of these TFs, and I while my initial anger took over a year to subside, I am happy to report that I am now exacting my “revenge” more thoroughly each day.

The core of all of these tricks and techniques is to let reason triumph over your reflexive emotions. By understanding human emotions and motivations as thoroughly as possible, Stoics are able to bend our evolutionary programming and use it for the purpose of attaining a ridiculous amount of happiness, rather than its original purpose, which is to survive and reproduce successfully.

For example, our insatiable desire for MORE of everything is not a moral failing on the part of humans. It’s a natural evolutionary program, just as simple as the programming that makes even YOU raise an eyebrow when you see an unusually curvaceous and sexy butt. Ancestors of ours who were insatiable, and always wanted more mates, more children, more food, more social standing, and more security against predators and enemies were quite simply the ones who got to produce the largest number of surviving children. But while insatiability did historically lead to more children, it does not lead to more happiness in a modern life. For happiness, you have to trick yourself into being happy with the things you’ve got.

Last in my own miniature summary of Stoicism, I’d like to point out the difference between Pleasure and Happiness. An alternative philosophy called Hedonism suggests that to have the best life, you simply maximize pleasure. But Stoics reject that, since pleasure is just one dimension of true happiness. Eating cupcakes is pleasurable, as is sex, sleeping in, drinking wine, and watching TV. Higher level pleasures might be had by driving a fancy car for the first few times, receiving compliments from important people or having millions of people ask for your autograph. But each pleasure very rapidly wears out if overused, and the Hedonist is left scrambling desperately higher up the pyramid of earthly pleasures until he runs out of money or health. Meanwhile, by focusing on Happiness – the underlying signal delivered by Pleasure, the Stoic can make it a much more consistent and tranquil companion in his life. In our society as well as those thousands of years ago, the Stoics is truly the one who has Got It Goin’ On.

And these days, he ends up becoming much richer as an almost-trivial side benefit. source

* — Thanks Rolf!

More on Stoicism…..

Want An Unconquerable Mind? Try Stoic Philosophy

What is Stoicism? A Definition & Stoic Exercises To Get You Started

9 Principles of Stoicism which will Improve your Life

A Complete Guide to Stoicism: How You Can Use this Ancient Philosophy to Live a Better Life

Stoicism, Virtue, and Mental Health

The Stoic Man – Indifference is a power – Stoicism 101

What is Stoicism and How Can it Turn your Life to Solid Gold?

Stoic Quotes on Control – The Absolute Man

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