Stoic Mindset

I don't know where this list originally came from, but it does a fine job of summarizing some Stoic ethical principles. There is some repetition, but then repetition is the basis for good habits. 

The Stoic Mindset 

1. Your happiness is your responsibility.

2. Everything is temporary. 

3. We are social beings with a social duty. 

4. A philosophy of life must be lived. 

5. Happiness is not found in superficial pleasures. 

6. We are social beings with a social responsibility. 

7. Structure your goals so they become attainable, because they are. 

8. Be attached to nothing. 

9. If you are too scared to lose it, you shouldn’t have it. 

10. Associate with people who can improve your life. 

11. Accept what cannot be changed. 

12. Avoid materialism. Live simply. 

13. Do not consider yourself a victim. 

14. Live below your means. 

15. Maximize positive emotions. Minimize negative emotions. 

16. Do not let emotions control your life. 

17. Be proud of your achievements, but don’t be arrogant. 

18. Be disciplined. 

19. No quick fixes. Put in the work and do it right. 

20. Don’t put yourself in a box. Be open minded and hold yourself to the same standard you hold others. 

21. Do not judge a book by its cover. 

22. Avoid drama. 

23. Learn to forgive. Do not become the pain you feel, or the people or things that hurt you. 

24. Be there for the people you love. 

25. Educate yourself. 

26. Give yourself the chance to learn from everyone, even when you disagree. 

27. Think for yourself. 

28. Demand the best for yourself. 

29. You are what you repeatedly do. Excellence is a habit. 

30. Be as you wish to seem. 

31. Every obstacle is an opportunity. 

32. The more you value things outside of your control, the less control you have. 

33. Once you start looking for outside approval, you have already compromised your integrity. 

34. You become what you give your attention to. 

35. The more you know, the more you know you don’t know. 

Disturbed

Silent

Tidbits from Montaigne 51

Few men have been admired by their own households. 

—Michel de Montaigne, Essays 3.2 

Stoic Snippets 187

He who fears death either fears the loss of sensation or a different kind of sensation. 

But if you shall have no sensation, neither will you feel any harm. 

And if you shall acquire another kind of sensation, you will be a different kind of living being, and you will not cease to live. 

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 8.58 

IMAGE: M.C. Escher, Butterflies (1950) 

Seneca, Moral Letters 42.6

I would therefore have you reflect thus, not only when it is a question of gain, but also when it is a question of loss:
 
"This object is bound to perish." 
 
Yes, it was a mere extra; you will live without it just as easily as you have lived before. 
 
If you have possessed it for a long time, you lose it after you have had your fill of it; if you have not possessed it long, then you lose it before you have become wedded to it. 
 
"You will have less money."
 
Yes, and less trouble.
 
"Less influence." 
 
Yes, and less envy. 
 
Look about you and note the things that drive us mad, which we lose with a flood of tears; you will perceive that it is not the loss that troubles us with reference to these things, but a notion of loss. 
 
No one feels that they have been lost, but his mind tells him that it has been so. He that owns himself has lost nothing. But how few men are blessed with ownership of self! Farewell. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 42 
 
Gains and losses can only make sense when I have a proper understanding of who I am, of what I truly need, and of what can gladly be left behind, without any shame or regret. 
 
Looking at it from the outside, as if I wasn’t involved, I find it ridiculous how people define themselves by their circumstances. 
 
Yet once I experience it from the inside, I feel tortured, each and every day, by the fact that she doesn’t love me, or that no one ever offers recognition and praise, or that worldly prosperity hasn’t somehow dropped into my lap. 
 
As my son has lately grown fond of saying, “What’s up with that?” 
 
I can speculate that it is a quirk, or perhaps a curse, that comes along with being granted the gift of freedom. I also wonder if it is a consequence of some sort of original sin, but I will leave any theological speculation for another time. 
 
No, as much as I can gaze out into the Cosmos, or blame God, the problem lies within me, in the habits I have formed through my twisted thinking. The pattern will only change with a sincere daily effort. 
 
Give love profusely, while never demanding it. Be complete with the action itself, without any further expectations. Nurture the soul with a hand that is both firm and tender, and then the craving for those pesky “things” will fade away. 
 
It becomes easier with practice. Only doing it can prove the point. 
 
As I must come and go, that object before me, which I happen to crave out of some urging of the passions, must also come and go. Instead of clinging to it, I ought to let it be what it is, so that I can then be what I am. “It” has nothing to do with me—let “it” have its own place. 
 
Deliberately tame the initial compulsion, and there is a realization of how the object was superfluous to my happiness. I can be exactly the same person I was before it came into my view. 
 
Either it departs after I discover why it is feeble, or it departs before I grow too accustomed to its presence. In any case, the removal does me good. 
 
No beloved? It may be the time to stand on my own two feet. 
 
No fame? A better chance to walk away from all the petty bickering. 
 
No cash? A greater opportunity to rely upon the inner values. 
 
I was pleased as punch when my son observed that the end of this letter sounded like it came from Epictetus. I resisted the temptation to remind him that Seneca wrote this while Epictetus was probably still a baby, because only bitter people destroy the beauty of the moment by offering snarky corrections. 
 
Own yourself, and the rest can pass by peacefully. All of our problems come from failing to claim an ownership of ourselves. Discern the source of the true human values. 

—Reflection written in 1/2013 

James Ensor, The Seven Deadly Sins

James Ensor, The Seven Deadly Sins (1904) 

Pride 

Lust 

Gluttony 

Greed  

Sloth 

Anger 

Envy 

Death Dominating the Deadly Sins 

Epictetus, Golden Sayings 165

Laughter should not be much, nor frequent, nor unrestrained. 

The Labors of Hercules 7

Francisco de Zurbaran, Hercules and the Cretan Bull (1634) 

B. Picart, Hercules Captures the Cretan Bull (1731) 

Lorenzo Mattielli, Hercules Captures the Cretan Bull (1729) 

Dhammapada 296-301

The disciples of Gotama are always well awake, and their thoughts day and night are always set on Buddha. 

The disciples of Gotama are always well awake, and their thoughts day and night are always set on the law. 

The disciples of Gotama are always well awake, and their thoughts day and night are always set on the church. 

The disciples of Gotama are always well awake, and their thoughts day and night are always set on their body. 

The disciples of Gotama are always well awake, and their mind day and night always delights in compassion. 

The disciples of Gotama are always well awake, and their mind day and night always delights in meditation. 

Seneca, Moral Letters 42.5

Let us therefore act, in all our plans and conduct, just as we are accustomed to act whenever we approach a huckster who has certain wares for sale: let us see how much we must pay for that which we crave. 
 
Very often the things that cost nothing cost us the most heavily; I can show you many objects the quest and acquisition of which have wrested freedom from our hands. 
 
We should belong to ourselves, if only these things did not belong to us. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 42 
 
We can make it look as refined and as civilized as we like, but a purely consumer society can ultimately be nothing more than a system ruled by the lust for profit. There is a vast difference between the artisan, who takes pride in the quality of his craft, and the salesman, who will try to gain as much as he can, while offering you as little as he has to. 
 
One seeks to give of himself, the other wishes to receive for himself. 
 
Whenever I question capitalism, people assume I must be a socialist, wishing to forcibly redistribute wealth. No, I am instead wary of any attitude where value is reduced to money, and so I have little patience for any kind of materialism, either from the right or from the left. 
 
Once people exist for the sake of property, or for the sake of the state, and not the other way around, we have a problem. 
 
Do I wish to change something about how we get things done? Let me start with myself, before I command the world what to do. It begins at home. However my neighbors may choose to live, I will define my values for myself, and I will act accordingly. 
 
Everything has its price, in one form or another. In looking at the things that tickle my fancy, let me first ask two pertinent questions: 
 
First, do I really need it? The answer is usually “no.” Even when shopping for groceries, most of what I justify in my cart is completely extraneous. In various experiments at self-discipline, I have found that I can be perfectly healthy, as well as perfectly content, with the simplest, and thereby usually the purest, of food and drink. 
 
Second, given that I am quite free to pursue a preference, as long as it does not infringe upon my conscience, am I certain I am not trading principles for gratification? Careful now—slippery excuses come all too easily. If it is in any way hindering me from becoming prudent, courageous, temperate, and just, it is best to leave it be. 
 
I keep a watchful eye on the intentions of the tradesman, though it should not sour me to the practice of any trade. I must only retain power over myself, treating him as I too would wish to be treated, and looking closely at what is really changing hands. The money is one thing, the human dignity is another. 
 
You agree that the price should be fair? By what standards? In the current climate, I will remain the oddball who insists that decency is the currency that counts, not cash. 
 
It may have cost me little or nothing out of my wallet, and it may have cost me no time or effort at all. That doesn’t mean it was free. One man trades the market while sipping his martinis; another does an honest day of work and can’t afford to pay the rent. Be mindful about who you think is better or worse. 
 
Far too often, the price is far too high. I can’t stop you if you believe that your bank account matters more than your conscience; I will respectfully choose a different path. 
 
When I was younger, used car salesmen were the butt of many jokes, yet that is quite unfair, since lawyers, doctors, bankers, and yes, even teachers are tempted to worship Mammon. 
 
Just the other week, a fellow tried to get away with charging us twice for mowing our lawn. Did he think his trickery made him free? No, it made him a slave to his greed. 
 
The last sentence in this passage has now been banging around in my head for some time: how quickly I lose myself by clinging to fortune and fame. 

—Reflection written in 1/2013 

Sayings of Publilius Syrus 102

Many receive advice, few profit by it.  

Aesop's Fables 63

The Man, the Boy, and the Donkey 

A man and his son were once going with their Donkey to market. 

As they were walking along by its side a countryman passed them and said: "You fools, what is a Donkey for but to ride upon?" 

So the Man put the Boy on the Donkey and they went on their way. 

But soon they passed a group of men, one of whom said: "See that lazy youngster, he lets his father walk while he rides." 

So the Man ordered his Boy to get off, and got on himself. 

But they hadn't gone far when they passed two women, one of whom said to the other: "Shame on that lazy lout to let his poor little son trudge along." 

Well, the Man didn't know what to do, but at last he took his Boy up before him on the Donkey. 

By this time they had come to the town, and the passersby began to jeer and point at them. The Man stopped and asked what they were scoffing at. 

The men said: "Aren't you ashamed of yourself for overloading that poor Donkey of yours—you and your hulking son?" 

The Man and Boy got off and tried to think what to do. They thought and they thought, till at last they cut down a pole, tied the Donkey's feet to it, and raised the pole and the Donkey to their shoulders. 

They went along amid the laughter of all who met them till they came to Market Bridge, when the Donkey, getting one of his feet loose, kicked out and caused the Boy to drop his end of the pole. 

In the struggle the Donkey fell over the bridge, and his forefeet being tied together he was drowned. 

"That will teach you," said an old man who had followed them: 

"Please all, and you will please none." 

Seneca, Moral Letters 42.4

Therefore, with regard to the objects which we pursue, and for which we strive with great effort, we should note this truth: either there is nothing desirable in them, or the undesirable is preponderant. 
 
Some objects are superfluous; others are not worth the price we pay for them. But we do not see this clearly, and we regard things as free gifts when they really cost us very dear.
 
Our stupidity may be clearly proved by the fact that we hold that "buying" refers only to the objects for which we pay cash, and we regard as free gifts the things for which we spend our very selves. 
 
These we should refuse to buy, if we were compelled to give in payment for them our houses or some attractive and profitable estate; but we are eager to attain them at the cost of anxiety, of danger, and of lost honor, personal freedom, and time; so true it is that each man regards nothing as cheaper than himself. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 42 
 
Like a child’s ever-growing Christmas list, I continue to add more and more outside “things” I somehow believe I need for my happiness. Yet if I do manage to acquire them, they become tiresome so very quickly, and I wonder if all the efforts, and the deeper price I end up paying for them on the inside, were really worth it. 
 
Sometimes such trophies are quite useless. At other times they leave me as a far worse person than I was before. They cost too much, and it’s all because I didn’t develop a balanced sense of value. 
 
No, I don’t mean cutting out coupons and keeping an eye out for the sales, though those are indeed admirable ways to be thrifty; I am rather talking about a moral balance sheet, where debits and credits are determined by the giving and receiving of love and respect, not of money. 
 
I tease my wife when she comes home with a new set of cookware, as she insists that she has “saved” a tiny bit of money by spending far too much. 
 
I am equally guilty, however, when I buy ten tins of Dunhill 965 pipe tobacco, on a special sale, for the price of eight. 
 
The ugly fact is that more money went out than came in, and the spoils ended up gathering dust in a closet. She has far more than enough pots and pans. I have far more than enough pipe tobacco. The madness needs to stop! 
 
Whenever I trade a principle for a convenience, it’s much like I am a man who doesn’t know how to balance his checkbook. Perhaps a better analogy would be a man who exchanges in foreign currency, but doesn’t consult the current rate.  
 
I assume where no money has changed hands, I have ended up with a freebie. Oh no! Oh God, no! I may have just sold my soul for a quick fix. 
 
No amount of cash can equal peace of mind. No number of accessories can gain virtue. 

—Reflection written in 1/2013 

The Wheel of Fortune

Jean Delville, The Wheel of Fortune (1940) 

Delphic Maxims 11

Φρόνει θνητά 

Think as a mortal 

Abandoned Places 42

Romain Veillon, Misteriosa 

Nature 44

IMAGE by Adrian Lang (2019) 

Seneca, Moral Letters 42.3

Do you remember how, when you declared that a certain person was under your influence, I pronounced him fickle and a bird of passage, and said that you held him not by the foot but merely by a wing? Was I mistaken? 
 
You grasped him only by a feather; he left it in your hands and escaped. You know what an exhibition he afterwards made of himself before you, how many of the things he attempted were to recoil upon his own head. 
 
He did not see that in endangering others he was tottering to his own downfall. He did not reflect how burdensome were the objects which he was bent upon attaining, even if they were not superfluous. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 42 
 
Ah yes, that frustrating moment of “I told you so!” When someone older and wiser is giving sound advice, we call it nagging, and so we are inclined to be stubborn. Once it is too late to listen, we feel ashamed of our foolishness, and so we lash out in resentment. 
 
Yet youth is hardly being wasted on the young, for a certain vitality is necessary to go through so much trial and error. And as much as I wish I knew then what I know now, I wouldn’t actually know anything right now if I hadn’t had to learn it the hard way back then. 
 
If I’m still a bit wet behind the years, how can I tell if the advice is actually worth following? Before I even begin to assess the content of what has been said, let me at least pause long enough to listen patiently until the end, to let it fully sink in. This has the remarkable effect, however inadvertently, of delaying any rash decisions, and thereby allowing for the inflamed passions to cool down. 
 
It has to start with the listening. Almost all of my worst decisions come from failing to take some time for thinking in peace and quiet. My impatience to act immediately betrays my lack of self-control. 
 
It won’t go well for anyone when the object of my desire is not thoroughly measured by judgment, and as much as I might bring pain and suffering to the circumstances of others, I do the greatest damage to myself, by crippling my own soul. The clever plots and the grand designs inevitably come back to bite me in the rear. 
 
All the willpower in the world is useless without an awareness of purpose, for only an informed conscience can properly define the goal. The object may well have some value to it, though I must carefully count the cost in relation to the ultimate end. 
 
For example, is the pursuit of a career worth abandoning my friends? Is my longing for worldly power going to diminish my moral power? 
 
A skill in finance can certainly bring in a cash profit, but it takes a focus on philosophy, as a daily practice, to do anything with understanding and love. 

—Reflection written in 1/2013 

Youth Tempted by the Vices

Luca Giordano, Youth Tempted by the Vices (1664) 

Innocence Between Vice and Virtue

Marie-Guillemine Benoist, Innocence between Vice and Virtue (1790) 

Victory of Virtue Over Vice

Francesco Conti, Victory of Virtue Over Vice (1709) 

Virtue Triumphing Over Vice

Filippo Pedrini, Allegory of Virtue Triumphing Over Vice (c. 1820) 

Stockdale on Stoicism 31

Enchiridion means "ready at hand." In other words, it is a handbook. Its author, Epictetus, was a very unusual man of intelligence and sensitivity who gleaned wisdom rather than bitterness from his early first-hand exposure to extreme cruelty, the abuse of power, and self-indulgent debauchery. 

Epictetus was born a slave around 50 A.D. At 15 he was sold at a slave auction in Rome to Epaphroditus, a secretary to Emperor Nero. When Epaphroditus helped Nero complete his suicide attempt, Epictetus was able to venture out on his own. 

Being a serious and doubtless disgusted young man, he gravitated to the high-minded public lectures of the Stoic teachers who were then the philosophers of Rome. 

Epictetus eventually became apprenticed to the very best Stoic in the empire, Musonius Rufus. After ten or more years of study, he achieved the status of philosopher in his own right. 

With that came true freedom, and the preciousness of that was duly celebrated by the former slave. In his works, individual freedom is praised about seven times more frequently than it is in the New Testament. The Stoics held that all human beings were equal in the eyes of God: male and female, black and white, slave and free. 

Epictetus speaks like a modern person, using "living speech," not the literary Attic Greek we are used to in men of that tongue. The Enchiridion was actually penned not by Epictetus, who was above all else a determined teacher and man of modesty who would never take the time to transcribe his own lectures, but by one of his most meticulous and determined students, Arrian, who, with Epictetus's consent, took down his words verbatim. 

Arrian bound the lectures into books; in the two years that he was enrolled in Epictetus's school, he filled eight books. 

Arrian put the Enchiridion together as highlighted extractions "for the busy man." 

That last morning, Rhinelander told me, " As a military man, I think you'll have special interest in this. Frederick the Great never went on a campaign without a copy of this handbook in his kit." 

—from James B. Stockdale, Master of My Fate: A Stoic Philosopher in a Hanoi Prison 

Sayings of Ramakrishna 198

The breeze of His grace is blowing night and day over your head. 

Unfurl the sails of your boat, the mind, if you want to make rapid progress through the ocean of life. 

Seneca, Moral Letters 42.2

"But," you say, "he thinks ill of evil men." 
 
Well, so do evil men themselves; and there is no worse penalty for vice than the fact that it is dissatisfied with itself and all its fellows.
 
"But he hates those who make an ungoverned use of great power suddenly acquired." 
 
I retort that he will do the same thing as soon as he acquires the same powers. In the case of many men, their vices, being powerless, escape notice; although, as soon as the persons in question have become satisfied with their own strength, the vices will be no less daring than those which prosperity has already disclosed. These men simply lack the means whereby they may unfold their wickedness. 
 
Similarly, one can handle even a poisonous snake while it is stiff with cold; the poison is not lacking; it is merely numbed into inaction. 
 
In the case of many men, their cruelty, ambition, and indulgence only lack the favor of Fortune to make them dare crimes that would match the worst. That their wishes are the same you will in a moment discover, in this way: give them the power equal to their wishes. 

—from Seneca, Moral Letters 42 
 
I cringe at the number of times I have attached myself to a person simply because he said he disliked the same people I did—there’s a certain deceptive comfort in feeling one is part of a special club. It did not occur to me at the time that this may just have meant that he also didn’t much like himself. 
 
I still tend to think of those consumed by wickedness as satisfied with their gains, however ill-gotten, but I forget that their vices are the symptoms of a deep discontent, and they are merely very skilled at putting on a show. A man who despises scoundrels can just as well be a scoundrel himself. 
 
I should not underestimate the capacity of people to craft an appealing image of themselves, and how readily we are willing to fall for such trickery. It is incredibly clever of the grasping man to stand against the rich and powerful, when it is merely his ultimate goal to replace them. 
 
While a man may not yet be committing evil deeds, he may simply be lacking the opportunity to do so. I know a fellow who remains the perfect gentleman until he is offered the chance to bet in a card game. I, for one, am a model of sobriety until you place a fifth of Irish whiskey on the table right in front of me. 
 
To get a better sense of someone’s character, it is necessary to look beyond what he happens to be saying or doing at this moment, and to consider the deeper merit of his motives. Look at the why behind the actions, not just at what is currently appealing in the actions.  
 
A drowsy snake on a chilly day still retains both the ability and the instinct to bite. 
 
He may call me a friend today, but will my usefulness to him pass by tomorrow? Will the smiles now be replaced by scowls later? If I judge too quickly, as it seems Lucilius is doing, I will only have myself to blame for not taking the time to carefully read the signs. The difference between an unassuming everyman and a brutal tyrant can be as simple as a lucky break. 
 
I get too caught up in all this play-acting, forgetting how the only value that counts is the sincerity of my own convictions. Once I am involved in making deals and forging alliances with the shifty folks, I have abandoned the very virtues I wish to hold dear. The end is not “winning” the race at any cost, the end is rather running the race with as much dignity and honor as I can muster. 

—Reflection written in 1/2013 

Stoic Snippets 186

To my own free will the free will of my neighbor is just as indifferent as his poor breath and flesh. 

For though we are made especially for the sake of one another, still the ruling power of each of us has its own office, for otherwise my neighbor's wickedness would be my harm, which God has not willed, in order that my unhappiness may not depend on another. 

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 8.56 

Thomas a Kempis, The Imitation of Christ 3.55

Of the corruption of Nature and the efficacy of Divine Grace 

1. O Lord my God, who has created me after Your own image and similitude, grant me this grace, which You have shown to be so great and so necessary for salvation, that I may conquer my wicked nature, which draws me to sin and to perdition. For I feel in my flesh the law of sin, contradicting the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the obedience of sensuality in many things; nor can I resist its passions, unless Your most holy grace assist me, fervently poured into my heart. 

2. There is need of Your grace, yes, and of a great measure thereof, that my nature may be conquered, which has alway been prone to evil from my youth. For being fallen through the first man Adam, and corrupted through sin, the punishment of this stain descended upon all men; so that Nature itself, which was framed good and right by You, is now used to express the vice and infirmity of corrupted Nature; because its motion left unto itself draws men away to evil and to lower things. For the little power which remains is as it were one spark lying hid in the ashes. This is Natural reason itself, encompassed with thick clouds, having yet a discernment of good and evil, a distinction of the true and the false, though it be powerless to fulfill all that it approves, and possesses not yet the full light of truth, nor healthfulness of its affections. 

3. Hence it is, O my God, that I delight in Your law after the inward man, knowing that Your commandment is holy and just and good; reproving also all evil, and the sin that is to be avoided: yet with the flesh I serve the law of sin, while I obey sensuality rather than reason. Hence it is that to will to do good is present with me, but how to perform it I find not. Hence I ofttimes purpose many good things; but because grace is lacking to help my infirmities, I fall back before a little resistance and fail. Hence it comes to pass that I recognize the way of perfectness, and see very clearly what things I ought to do; but pressed down by the weight of my own corruption, I rise not to the things which are more perfect. 

4. Oh how entirely necessary is Your grace to me, O Lord, for a good beginning, for progress, and for bringing to perfection. For without it I can do nothing, but I can do all things through Your grace which strengthens me. O truly heavenly grace, without which our own merits are nought, and no gifts of Nature at all are to be esteemed. Arts, riches, beauty, strength, wit, eloquence, they all avail nothing before You, O Lord, without Your grace. For the gifts of Nature belong to good and evil alike; but the proper gift of the elect is grace—that is, love—and they who bear the mark thereof are held worthy of everlasting life. So mighty is this grace, that without it neither the gift of prophecy nor the working of miracles, nor any speculation, howsoever lofty, is of any value at all. But neither faith, nor hope, nor any other virtue is accepted with You without love and grace. 

5. O most blessed grace that makest the poor in spirit rich in virtues, and renders him who is rich in many things humble in spirit, come You, descend upon me, fill me early with Your consolation, lest my soul fail through weariness and drought of mind. I beseech You, O Lord, that I may find grace in Your sight, for Your grace is sufficient for me, when I obtain not those things which Nature longs for. If I be tempted and vexed with many tribulations, I will fear no evil, while Your grace remains with me. This alone is my strength, this brings me counsel and help. It is more powerful than all enemies, and wiser than all the wise men in the world. 

6. It is the mistress of truth, the teacher of discipline, the light of the heart, the solace of anxiety, the banisher of sorrow, the deliverer from fear, the nurse of devotion, the drawer forth of tears. What am I without it, save a dry tree, a useless branch, worthy to be cast away! “Let Your grace, therefore, O Lord, always prevent and follow me, and make me continually given to all good works, through Jesus Christ, Your Son. Amen.” 

IMAGE: Jean II Restout, Pentecost (1732)