Let go of the reputation and results of the world that you cannot control, and focus only on the attitude of your heart that you can control.
Five complete deep essays
The charm of Stoic philosophy is that they were not abstract thinkers confined to an ivory tower. The two Stoic figures lived completely extreme lives. Epictetus was a Roman slave who suffered from lameness and was severely abused, and Seneca was the most powerful person in Rome, the most powerful country of his time, and the teacher of Emperor Nero.
One person was threatened with life and death at the bottom of society, and the other had to endure the fear of execution and the royal court's secret struggle at the peak of enormous wealth and power. In the midst of these rough storms of fate, the absolute formula for life they discovered was ‘Stoic philosophy.’
they shouted. 'Emperor or slave, external circumstances can never determine your happiness! True freedom depends on whether I hold the reins of my soul.'
Epictetus begins the first sentence of his life handbook, Encheiridion, with the following immortal declaration:
'There are things in the world that depend on us (Ta eph' hēmin), and there are things that do not depend on us (Ta ouk eph' hēmin).'
� It's up to us: my thoughts, my values, my impulses, my choices, how I will react now. (100% under my control)
� Things that are not up to us: aging of our body, illness, other people's opinions and gossip, stock market, weather, things that have already happened in the past, test results. (0% out of my control)
Epictetus points out that the only reason we are anxious and in pain is because we are obsessed with ‘things that we cannot change with our own hands’ and neglect ‘my mind, which we can change.’ The moment we whine and get angry about an outcome we cannot control, we become slaves to that object.
The Stoics invite us to distinguish an event from our judgment about it. What we explore here is an ancient philosophical perspective, not a modern psychotherapy procedure. When someone walks past laughing, we can consider separately what we observed and the meaning we attached to it.
The first level is objective fact (impression, phantasia): ‘A man passed by smiling.’
Step 2 is my subjective evaluation (judgment, dogma): ‘That bastard laughed at me for being easy on me! I was ignored!'
Stoics say that the sensory shock of step 1 is a physical reaction and cannot be avoided, but the 'assent to judgment' of step 2 is entirely my freedom. 'He just laughed. Can that smile erode even a millimeter of the nobility of my soul? Not at all.' The moment you suspend judgment like this, the detonator of anger disintegrates on the spot.
In On Anger, Seneca uses forceful metaphors for anger and warns against acting hastily while angry. His language belongs to ancient moral philosophy; it is not a mental-health diagnosis of an angry person. A reader today might ask whether there is room to pause before sending a message or making a decision.
Seneca emphasizes allowing time before responding. If the situation is safe, you might postpone a reply or first write the words in a note you do not send. Time does not erase an insult or guarantee that anger will fade. The suggestion is to make room for considering your response; if you are being harmed, safety and appropriate help come first.
Seneca also turned off the lights every night before going to sleep and asked himself questions in the dark. 'What emotional mistake did I make today? What rude behavior did you overlook? 'How will I become a better human being tomorrow?' This calm evening reflection was the secret to building the immunity of the soul.
Stoicism doesn't mean you should be cold-blooded or a robot that doesn't feel emotions. Shedding tears over the death of a family member or being startled by a sudden disaster are natural human body reactions.
What the Stoics were wary of was falling into that primal sadness and abusing the soul with irrational catastrophization, saying, ‘My life is ruined, God only hates me.’
Today, when you feel like your heart is breaking because of someone else's rudeness or an outcome beyond your control, whisper to yourself: 'Is this within my control or outside of my control?' If it's something external, boldly shake off your hands and say something. 'It has nothing to do with me.' At that moment, you gain an inner freedom that no one in the world can invade.