Epictetus, The Handbook 1: What is in Our Power?

Of all existing things some are in our power, and others are not in our power. In our power are thought, impulse, will to get and will to avoid, and, in a word, everything which is our own doing.

Things not in our power include the body, property, reputation, office, and, in a word, everything which is not our own doing.

Things in our power are by nature free, unhindered, untrammeled; things not in our power are weak, servile, subject to hindrance, dependent on others.

Remember then that if you imagine that what is naturally slavish is free, and what is naturally another’s is your own, you will be hampered, you will mourn, you will be put to confusion, you will blame gods and men; but if you think that only your own belongs to you, and that what is another’s is indeed another’s, no one will ever put compulsion or hindrance on you, you will blame none, you will accuse none, you will do nothing against your will, no one will harm you, you will have no enemy, for no harm can touch you.

—Epictetus, The Handbook, Chapter 1 (tr Matheson)

Especially in our time of technology and progress, we are convinced that we have, or one day can have, power over most anything. We speak of abolishing poverty, using science to make our lives more efficient and convenient, settling other worlds, even conquering disease and death themselves.

Stoicism can be a difficult philosophy to understand, let alone embrace and practice, under such conditions. Yet note that hand in hand with all our confidence in our abilities, modern man is often dreary, confused, and depressed. He has so much in one sense, but seems so lost in another. So many of us can’t seem to get it together.

Stoicism has, I think, an answer for this problem. It is in many ways the first principle of this philosophy that we need to consider what we actually do have control over, and how this in turn relates to our happiness. Modern man often feels like he could have power over the whole world, but he seems to have no power over himself. The Stoic suggests to him that he has these two fatally reversed.

Despite what we may think, we have very little power over the world outside of us at all. Nature will sometimes go our way, and sometimes not, but either way she will always do as she pleases.

Despite what we may think, we are hardly powerless over ourselves. We are, if only we so choose, the masters of our own thoughts, our own will, our own actions.

Consider that our happiness can only rest in what is ours, not what belongs to another. And the only things that are ours are our own selves. The fulfillment of my being won’t come from what is outside me, but will flow outward from what is within me.

Perhaps the very reason modernity can be so vexing is precisely because we have confused where our true power lies. We become addicts of our circumstances when we depend upon wealth, possessions, status and the illusion of control over the world around us. We then wonder what is still missing and why we still feel empty inside, but we feel empty inside because we have forgotten that what is inside is the only real thing that counts. I need not let all the rest rule me if only I choose to rule myself. 

Written in 4/2001