# A Life Worth Living  ## Metadata - Author:: [[William Ferraiolo]] - Full Title:: A Life Worth Living - Category: #books ## Highlights > Each of us is a small, ephemeral, and insignificant element of the vast universe, and yet – we are here! Life presents itself for the living. ([Location 155](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=155)) > Our existence as a species, and our presence here as individuals, is either literally a miracle, or it is the statistical approximation of the miraculous. ([Location 159](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=159)) > The condition and characteristic of a philosopher is that he looks to himself for all help or harm. – Epictetus [Enchiridion, 48] ([Location 169](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=169)) > Make your rules of life brief, yet so as to embrace the fundamentals; recurrence to them will then suffice to remove all vexation, and send you back without fretting to the duties to which you must return. – Marcus Aurelius [Meditations, Book Four, 3] ([Location 170](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=170)) > We must still make our way within a world that lies almost entirely beyond our control. We must still face death, deprivation, and bodily frailty, as well as events and persons that do not conform to common hopes and expectations. ([Location 187](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=187)) > Our troubles often stem from the fact that we desire what we do not have, or are averse to what befalls us. ([Location 191](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=191)) > Epictetus reminds his students to: Remember that desire demands the attainment of that of which you are desirous; and aversion demands the avoidance of that to which you are averse; that he who fails of the object of his desires is disappointed; and he who incurs the object of his aversion is wretched. [Enchiridion, 2] ([Location 193](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=193)) > fearsome. Epictetus contends: Men are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of things... When, therefore, we are hindered, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never blame anyone but ourselves; that is, our own judgments. [Enchiridion, 5] ([Location 198](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=198)) > (unless, of course, all problems are, as Stalin quipped, solved by death – and who wants to wait for that “solution”?). ([Location 211](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=211)) > Epictetan counsel is founded upon this crucial distinction: There are things which are within our power, and there are things which are beyond our power. Within our power are opinion, aim, desire, aversion, and, in one word, whatever affairs are our own. Beyond our power are body, property, reputation, office, and, in one word, whatever are not properly our own affairs. [Enchiridion, I] ([Location 228](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=228)) - Tags: [[favorite]] > Failure to correctly distinguish internals from externals, and regulate desire accordingly, virtually ensures frustration, anxiety, and distress. ([Location 233](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=233)) - Tags: [[favorite]] > The wise seek to know their own minds so that they may better govern themselves, and do not pin their contentment to winning the hearts and minds of others. The Stoic sage does not make demands on the external world, but instead develops self-discipline so as to deal reasonably with the world as it presents itself. ([Location 246](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=246)) > It is unwise, unhealthy, and wasteful to expend energy trying to control or to change circumstances that lie beyond one’s control and one’s ability to enact change. ([Location 248](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=248)) > In his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius nicely articulates the point: Our mental powers should enable us to perceive the swiftness with which all things vanish away: their bodies in the world of space, and their remembrance in the world of time. [Book Two, 12] ([Location 259](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=259)) > Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen and your life will be serene. [Enchiridion, 8] ([Location 285](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=285)) > Nietzsche regarded as the primary expression of the noble character. In Ecce Homo, under the heading “Why I Am So Clever,” he states: My formula for what is great in mankind is amor fati: not to wish for anything other than that which is; whether behind, ahead, or for all eternity. Not just to put up with the inevitable – much less to hide it from oneself, for all idealism is lying to oneself in the face of the necessary – but to love it. [II, 10] Nietzsche himself was not exactly a Stoic, and the Stoics did not explicitly use the expression “amor fati,” but their respective ([Location 287](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=287)) > When I see anyone anxious, I say, what does this man want? Unless he wanted something or other not in his power, how could he still be anxious? – Epictetus [Discourses, Book II, Ch. 13] ([Location 315](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=315)) > Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen and your life will be serene. [Enchiridion, 8] ([Location 350](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=350)) > Albert Ellis, the father of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), explicitly credits the Roman Stoics with providing the foundation for his very successful and popular brand of cognitive intervention. In his best-selling manual of guided self-governance, A Guide to Rational Living, the chapter entitled “Conquering Anxiety and Panic” offers this advice regarding attachment to conditions beyond one’s control: Try not to exaggerate the importance or significance of things. Your favorite cup, as Epictetus noted many centuries ago, merely represents a cup that you like. Your wife and children, however delightful, remain mortals… But if you exaggeratedly convince yourself that this is the only cup in the world or that your life would be completely empty without your wife and children, you will overestimate their value and make yourself needlessly vulnerable to their possible loss. [1997, p. 174] ([Location 368](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=368)) > Remind yourself constantly of all the physicians, now dead, who used to knit their brows over their ailing patients; of all the astrologers who so solemnly predicted their clients’ doom; the philosophers who expatiated so endlessly on death or immortality; the great commanders who slew their thousands; the despots who wielded powers of life and death with such terrible arrogance, as if themselves were gods who could never die; the whole cities which have perished completely, Helice, Pompeii, Herculaneum, and others without number. After that, recall one by one each of your own acquaintances; how one buried another, only to be laid low himself and buried in turn by a third, and all in so brief a space of time. Observe, in short, how transient and trivial is all mortal life; yesterday a drop of semen, tomorrow a handful of spice or ashes. Spend, therefore, these fleeting moments on earth as Nature would have you spend them, and then go to your rest with good grace, as an olive falls in its season, with a blessing for the earth that bore it and a thanksgiving to the tree that gave it life. [Meditations, Book Four, 48] ([Location 392](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=392)) > Epictetus reminds us that nothing of any great moment is lost when nature reclaims what it has given us on loan: “But it is now time to die.” Why do you say die? Do not talk of the thing in tragic strain; but state the thing as it is, that it is time for your material part to revert whence it came. And where is the terror of this? What part of the world is going to be lost? What is going to happen that is new or prodigious? [Discourses, Book IV, Ch. Seven] ([Location 410](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=410)) > Why, do you not know, then, that the origin of all human evils, and of baseness and cowardice, is not death, but rather the fear of death? Fortify yourself, therefore, against this. Hither let all your discourses, readings, exercises, tend. And then you will know that only in this way are men made free. [Book III, Ch. 26] ([Location 417](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=417)) > The simple person is a person without pretensions, unconcerned with himself, his image or his reputation; he doesn’t calculate, has no secrets, and acts without guile, ulterior motives, agendas, or plans. [1996, p. 155] – André Comte-Sponville ([Location 461](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=461)) > For the Stoic, then, doing philosophy meant practicing how to “live”: that is how to live freely... in that we give up desiring that which does not depend on us and is beyond our control... [1995, p. 86] – Pierre Hadot ([Location 463](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=463)) > Seek not good from without; seek it within yourselves, or you will never find it. [1944, Ch. 25] – Epictetus ([Location 465](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=465)) > Voluntary Simplicity, Duane Elgin (1993) elucidates the core concept of simplicity as it pertains to the art of living: To live more simply is to live more purposefully and with a minimum of needless distraction. The particular expression of simplicity is a personal matter. We each know where our lives are unnecessarily complicated. We are all painfully aware of the clutter and pretense that weigh upon us and make our passage through the world more cumbersome and awkward... Simplicity of living means meeting life face-to-face. It means confronting life clearly, without unnecessary distractions. It means being direct and honest in relationships of all kinds. [1993, pp. 24–25] ([Location 477](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=477)) > But our souls are... joined to God, as being indeed members and distinct portions of his essence. – Epictetus [Discourses, Book I, 14] ([Location 628](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=628)) > “Hymn of Cleanthes”: Conduct me, Zeus, and thou, O Destiny, Wherever your decrees have fixed my lot. I follow cheerfully; and, did I not, Wicked and wretched, I must follow still. [Enchiridion, 52 – emphasis added] ([Location 668](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=668)) > The Stoic’s art is really the art of instruction, training, and discipline. The sage effectively disciplines his mind and conditions his will so as to respond to the vicissitudes of daily life with reason and equanimity. ([Location 722](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=722)) > The world, according to the Stoics, unfolds as a smooth, harmonious confluence of perfectly ordered streams of events. All events are directed by the will of Zeus, and are fated to occur because their antecedents and concomitants appear precisely as they do. ([Location 751](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=751)) > Now, the things within our power are by nature free, unrestricted, unhindered; but those beyond our power are weak, dependent, restricted, alien. Remember, then, that if you attribute freedom to things by nature dependent, and take what belongs to others for your own, you will be hindered, you will lament, you will be disturbed, you will find fault both with gods and men. But if you take for your own only that which is your own, and view what belongs to others just as it really is, then no one will ever compel you, no one will restrict you, you will find fault with no one, you will accuse no one, you will do nothing against your will; no one will hurt you, you will not have an enemy, nor will you suffer any harm. [Enchiridion, 1] ([Location 834](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=834)) - Tags: [[favorite]] > Epictetus often describes the benefits of Stoic practice in terms that make no reference to anything beyond the terrestrial realm and augmentation of the practitioner’s well-being: So, in our own case, we take it to be the work of one who studies philosophy to bring his will into harmony with events; so that none of the things which happen may happen against our inclination, nor those which do not happen be desired by us. Hence they who have settled this point have it in their power never to be disappointed in what they seek, nor to incur what they shun; but to lead their own lives without sorrow, fear, or perturbation, and in society to preserve all the natural or acquired relations of son, father, brother, citizen, husband, wife, neighbor, fellow traveler, ruler, or subject. Something like this is what we take to be the work of a philosopher. [Discourses, p. 122] Thus, the promise of Stoic practice is presented in pragmatic terms. The goal is self-improvement, freedom from “perturbation,” and virtue in all “natural or acquired relations.” The Stoic seeks to become a better person – irrespective of external judgment. ([Location 857](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=857)) > The existence or nonexistence of Zeus, or any God, is not subject to the agent’s will. Thus, an action or mental posture’s compliance with the dictates of Zeus, or any external entity, is a fortiori not subject to the agent’s will, and cannot “contribute to the preservation of a rational being qua rational being.” It follows that “pleasing Zeus” cannot be “strictly speaking good,” but must be relegated to the realm of the “preferred indifferent” (and that, only if Zeus exists). The only good is excellence (ἀρετή). The only proper Stoic goal is the improvement of one’s character – irrespective of God’s presence or absence from one’s world. ([Location 896](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=896)) > Begin each day by telling yourself: Today I shall be meeting with interference, ingratitude, insolence, disloyalty, ill-will, and selfishness – all of them due to the offenders’ ignorance of what is good or evil. But for my part I have long perceived the nature of good and its nobility, the nature of evil and its meanness, and also the nature of the culprit himself, who is my brother (not in the physical sense, but as a fellow-creature similarly endowed with reason and a share of the divine); therefore none of those things can injure me, for nobody can implicate me in what is degrading. Neither can I be angry with my brother or fall foul of him; for he and I were born to work together, like a man’s two hands, feet, or eyelids, or like the upper and lower rows of his teeth. To obstruct each other is against Nature’s law – and what is irritation or aversion but a form of obstruction? [Book II, Section I] ([Location 965](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=965)) > You cannot begin to understand suffering from this side of eternity. – Kimber Kauffman ([Location 1651](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=1651)) > Axiom of Futility. Agents are required not to make direct attempts to do (or be) something that is logically, theoretically, or practically impossible. – Becker [p. 42] ([Location 1792](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=1792)) > To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others. – Albert Camus ([Location 1794](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=1794)) - Tags: [[favorite]] > Above all, remember that the door stands open. Be not more fearful than children; but as they, when they weary of the game, cry, “I will play no more,” even so, when thou art in the like case, cry, “I will play no more” and depart. But if thou stayest, make no lamentation. – Epictetus, The Golden Sayings of Epictetus ([Location 2322](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=2322)) # A Life Worth Living  ## Metadata - Author:: [[William Ferraiolo]] - Full Title:: A Life Worth Living - Category: #books ## Highlights > Each of us is a small, ephemeral, and insignificant element of the vast universe, and yet – we are here! Life presents itself for the living. ([Location 155](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=155)) > Our existence as a species, and our presence here as individuals, is either literally a miracle, or it is the statistical approximation of the miraculous. ([Location 159](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=159)) > The condition and characteristic of a philosopher is that he looks to himself for all help or harm. – Epictetus [Enchiridion, 48] ([Location 169](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=169)) > Make your rules of life brief, yet so as to embrace the fundamentals; recurrence to them will then suffice to remove all vexation, and send you back without fretting to the duties to which you must return. – Marcus Aurelius [Meditations, Book Four, 3] ([Location 170](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=170)) > We must still make our way within a world that lies almost entirely beyond our control. We must still face death, deprivation, and bodily frailty, as well as events and persons that do not conform to common hopes and expectations. ([Location 187](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=187)) > Our troubles often stem from the fact that we desire what we do not have, or are averse to what befalls us. ([Location 191](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=191)) > Epictetus reminds his students to: Remember that desire demands the attainment of that of which you are desirous; and aversion demands the avoidance of that to which you are averse; that he who fails of the object of his desires is disappointed; and he who incurs the object of his aversion is wretched. [Enchiridion, 2] ([Location 193](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=193)) > fearsome. Epictetus contends: Men are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of things... When, therefore, we are hindered, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never blame anyone but ourselves; that is, our own judgments. [Enchiridion, 5] ([Location 198](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=198)) > (unless, of course, all problems are, as Stalin quipped, solved by death – and who wants to wait for that “solution”?). ([Location 211](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=211)) > Epictetan counsel is founded upon this crucial distinction: There are things which are within our power, and there are things which are beyond our power. Within our power are opinion, aim, desire, aversion, and, in one word, whatever affairs are our own. Beyond our power are body, property, reputation, office, and, in one word, whatever are not properly our own affairs. [Enchiridion, I] ([Location 228](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=228)) - Tags: [[favorite]] > Failure to correctly distinguish internals from externals, and regulate desire accordingly, virtually ensures frustration, anxiety, and distress. ([Location 233](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=233)) - Tags: [[favorite]] > The wise seek to know their own minds so that they may better govern themselves, and do not pin their contentment to winning the hearts and minds of others. The Stoic sage does not make demands on the external world, but instead develops self-discipline so as to deal reasonably with the world as it presents itself. ([Location 246](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=246)) > It is unwise, unhealthy, and wasteful to expend energy trying to control or to change circumstances that lie beyond one’s control and one’s ability to enact change. ([Location 248](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=248)) > In his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius nicely articulates the point: Our mental powers should enable us to perceive the swiftness with which all things vanish away: their bodies in the world of space, and their remembrance in the world of time. [Book Two, 12] ([Location 259](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=259)) > Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen and your life will be serene. [Enchiridion, 8] ([Location 285](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=285)) > Nietzsche regarded as the primary expression of the noble character. In Ecce Homo, under the heading “Why I Am So Clever,” he states: My formula for what is great in mankind is amor fati: not to wish for anything other than that which is; whether behind, ahead, or for all eternity. Not just to put up with the inevitable – much less to hide it from oneself, for all idealism is lying to oneself in the face of the necessary – but to love it. [II, 10] Nietzsche himself was not exactly a Stoic, and the Stoics did not explicitly use the expression “amor fati,” but their respective ([Location 287](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=287)) > When I see anyone anxious, I say, what does this man want? Unless he wanted something or other not in his power, how could he still be anxious? – Epictetus [Discourses, Book II, Ch. 13] ([Location 315](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=315)) > Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen and your life will be serene. [Enchiridion, 8] ([Location 350](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=350)) > Albert Ellis, the father of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), explicitly credits the Roman Stoics with providing the foundation for his very successful and popular brand of cognitive intervention. In his best-selling manual of guided self-governance, A Guide to Rational Living, the chapter entitled “Conquering Anxiety and Panic” offers this advice regarding attachment to conditions beyond one’s control: Try not to exaggerate the importance or significance of things. Your favorite cup, as Epictetus noted many centuries ago, merely represents a cup that you like. Your wife and children, however delightful, remain mortals… But if you exaggeratedly convince yourself that this is the only cup in the world or that your life would be completely empty without your wife and children, you will overestimate their value and make yourself needlessly vulnerable to their possible loss. [1997, p. 174] ([Location 368](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=368)) > Remind yourself constantly of all the physicians, now dead, who used to knit their brows over their ailing patients; of all the astrologers who so solemnly predicted their clients’ doom; the philosophers who expatiated so endlessly on death or immortality; the great commanders who slew their thousands; the despots who wielded powers of life and death with such terrible arrogance, as if themselves were gods who could never die; the whole cities which have perished completely, Helice, Pompeii, Herculaneum, and others without number. After that, recall one by one each of your own acquaintances; how one buried another, only to be laid low himself and buried in turn by a third, and all in so brief a space of time. Observe, in short, how transient and trivial is all mortal life; yesterday a drop of semen, tomorrow a handful of spice or ashes. Spend, therefore, these fleeting moments on earth as Nature would have you spend them, and then go to your rest with good grace, as an olive falls in its season, with a blessing for the earth that bore it and a thanksgiving to the tree that gave it life. [Meditations, Book Four, 48] ([Location 392](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=392)) > Epictetus reminds us that nothing of any great moment is lost when nature reclaims what it has given us on loan: “But it is now time to die.” Why do you say die? Do not talk of the thing in tragic strain; but state the thing as it is, that it is time for your material part to revert whence it came. And where is the terror of this? What part of the world is going to be lost? What is going to happen that is new or prodigious? [Discourses, Book IV, Ch. Seven] ([Location 410](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=410)) > Why, do you not know, then, that the origin of all human evils, and of baseness and cowardice, is not death, but rather the fear of death? Fortify yourself, therefore, against this. Hither let all your discourses, readings, exercises, tend. And then you will know that only in this way are men made free. [Book III, Ch. 26] ([Location 417](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=417)) > The simple person is a person without pretensions, unconcerned with himself, his image or his reputation; he doesn’t calculate, has no secrets, and acts without guile, ulterior motives, agendas, or plans. [1996, p. 155] – André Comte-Sponville ([Location 461](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=461)) > For the Stoic, then, doing philosophy meant practicing how to “live”: that is how to live freely... in that we give up desiring that which does not depend on us and is beyond our control... [1995, p. 86] – Pierre Hadot ([Location 463](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=463)) > Seek not good from without; seek it within yourselves, or you will never find it. [1944, Ch. 25] – Epictetus ([Location 465](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=465)) > Voluntary Simplicity, Duane Elgin (1993) elucidates the core concept of simplicity as it pertains to the art of living: To live more simply is to live more purposefully and with a minimum of needless distraction. The particular expression of simplicity is a personal matter. We each know where our lives are unnecessarily complicated. We are all painfully aware of the clutter and pretense that weigh upon us and make our passage through the world more cumbersome and awkward... Simplicity of living means meeting life face-to-face. It means confronting life clearly, without unnecessary distractions. It means being direct and honest in relationships of all kinds. [1993, pp. 24–25] ([Location 477](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=477)) > But our souls are... joined to God, as being indeed members and distinct portions of his essence. – Epictetus [Discourses, Book I, 14] ([Location 628](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=628)) > “Hymn of Cleanthes”: Conduct me, Zeus, and thou, O Destiny, Wherever your decrees have fixed my lot. I follow cheerfully; and, did I not, Wicked and wretched, I must follow still. [Enchiridion, 52 – emphasis added] ([Location 668](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=668)) > The Stoic’s art is really the art of instruction, training, and discipline. The sage effectively disciplines his mind and conditions his will so as to respond to the vicissitudes of daily life with reason and equanimity. ([Location 722](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=722)) > The world, according to the Stoics, unfolds as a smooth, harmonious confluence of perfectly ordered streams of events. All events are directed by the will of Zeus, and are fated to occur because their antecedents and concomitants appear precisely as they do. ([Location 751](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=751)) > Now, the things within our power are by nature free, unrestricted, unhindered; but those beyond our power are weak, dependent, restricted, alien. Remember, then, that if you attribute freedom to things by nature dependent, and take what belongs to others for your own, you will be hindered, you will lament, you will be disturbed, you will find fault both with gods and men. But if you take for your own only that which is your own, and view what belongs to others just as it really is, then no one will ever compel you, no one will restrict you, you will find fault with no one, you will accuse no one, you will do nothing against your will; no one will hurt you, you will not have an enemy, nor will you suffer any harm. [Enchiridion, 1] ([Location 834](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=834)) - Tags: [[favorite]] > Epictetus often describes the benefits of Stoic practice in terms that make no reference to anything beyond the terrestrial realm and augmentation of the practitioner’s well-being: So, in our own case, we take it to be the work of one who studies philosophy to bring his will into harmony with events; so that none of the things which happen may happen against our inclination, nor those which do not happen be desired by us. Hence they who have settled this point have it in their power never to be disappointed in what they seek, nor to incur what they shun; but to lead their own lives without sorrow, fear, or perturbation, and in society to preserve all the natural or acquired relations of son, father, brother, citizen, husband, wife, neighbor, fellow traveler, ruler, or subject. Something like this is what we take to be the work of a philosopher. [Discourses, p. 122] Thus, the promise of Stoic practice is presented in pragmatic terms. The goal is self-improvement, freedom from “perturbation,” and virtue in all “natural or acquired relations.” The Stoic seeks to become a better person – irrespective of external judgment. ([Location 857](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=857)) > The existence or nonexistence of Zeus, or any God, is not subject to the agent’s will. Thus, an action or mental posture’s compliance with the dictates of Zeus, or any external entity, is a fortiori not subject to the agent’s will, and cannot “contribute to the preservation of a rational being qua rational being.” It follows that “pleasing Zeus” cannot be “strictly speaking good,” but must be relegated to the realm of the “preferred indifferent” (and that, only if Zeus exists). The only good is excellence (ἀρετή). The only proper Stoic goal is the improvement of one’s character – irrespective of God’s presence or absence from one’s world. ([Location 896](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=896)) > Begin each day by telling yourself: Today I shall be meeting with interference, ingratitude, insolence, disloyalty, ill-will, and selfishness – all of them due to the offenders’ ignorance of what is good or evil. But for my part I have long perceived the nature of good and its nobility, the nature of evil and its meanness, and also the nature of the culprit himself, who is my brother (not in the physical sense, but as a fellow-creature similarly endowed with reason and a share of the divine); therefore none of those things can injure me, for nobody can implicate me in what is degrading. Neither can I be angry with my brother or fall foul of him; for he and I were born to work together, like a man’s two hands, feet, or eyelids, or like the upper and lower rows of his teeth. To obstruct each other is against Nature’s law – and what is irritation or aversion but a form of obstruction? [Book II, Section I] ([Location 965](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=965)) > You cannot begin to understand suffering from this side of eternity. – Kimber Kauffman ([Location 1651](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=1651)) > Axiom of Futility. Agents are required not to make direct attempts to do (or be) something that is logically, theoretically, or practically impossible. – Becker [p. 42] ([Location 1792](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=1792)) > To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others. – Albert Camus ([Location 1794](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=1794)) - Tags: [[favorite]] > Above all, remember that the door stands open. Be not more fearful than children; but as they, when they weary of the game, cry, “I will play no more,” even so, when thou art in the like case, cry, “I will play no more” and depart. But if thou stayest, make no lamentation. – Epictetus, The Golden Sayings of Epictetus ([Location 2322](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B082ZT4DH6&location=2322))