Stockdale on Stoicism 5

I want to step off the chronology escalator for just a minute and explain what memories of the Enchiridion and Discourses I did have "ready at hand" when I ejected from that plane. 

What I had in hand was the understanding that the Stoic, particularly the disciple of Epictetus who developed this accounting, always keeps separate files in his mind for: 

(a) those things which are "up to him" and (b) those things which are "not up to him;" 

or another way of saying it: (a) those things which are "within his power" and (b) those things which are "beyond his power; " 

or still another way of saying it: (a) those things which are within the grasp of "his will, his free will," and (b ) those things which are beyond it. 

Among the relatively few things that are "up to me, within my power," within my will, are my opinions, my aims, my aversions, my own grief, my own joy, my moral purpose or will, my attitude toward what is going on, my own good, and my own evil. 

Please note: All these things, as are all things of real importance to the Stoic, are matters that apply principally to your "inner self;" where you live.

—from James B. Stockdale, The Stoic Warrior's Triad