36 Powerful Stoic Quotes

7/29/2019 36 Powerful Stoic Quotes

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36 powerful stoic quotes to supercharge your lifeIve explored how adopting a stoic life philosophy can help me become a lothappier. In the bookA Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy Irvineargues that stoic philosophy can be adopted every day and, for example,Socrates was a great philosopher not via his arguments or conclusions, but,

the extent to which he allowed his way of life to be affected by hisphilosophical speculations . . . integrating his theoretical and speculativeconcerns into the context of his daily activities.

So with this in mind, heres a few of my favourite stoic quotes:1. Epictetus: First, decide who you would be. Then, do what you must do.2. When I see a man in a state of anxiety, I say, What can this man want? If

he did not want something which is not in his power, how could he still beanxious?

3. Freedom is secured not by the fulfilling of ones desires, but by theremoval of desire.

4. Nothing outside the will can hinder or harm the will; it can only harm itself.If then we accept this, and, when things go amiss, are inclined to blameourselves, remembering that judgment alone can disturb our peace andconstancy, I swear to you by all the gods that we have made progress.

5. If you would not fail of what you seek, or incur what you shun, desirenothing that belongs to others; shun nothing that lies beyond your owncontrol; otherwise you must necessarily be disappointed in what you seek,and incur what you shun.

6. In a word, neither death, nor exile, nor pain, nor anything of this kind, isthe real cause of our doing or not doing any action, but our opinions andthe decisions of our will.

7. Where is the good? In the will. Where is the evil? In the will. Where isneither of them? In those things which are independent of the will.

8. Who then is the invincible? It is he whom none of the things disturb whichare independent of the will.

9. Man is disturbed not by things, but by the views he takes of them.10. No man is free who is not master of himself.11. Wherever I go it will be well with me, for it was well with me here, not on

account of the place, but of my judgments which I shall carry away withme, for no one can deprive me of these; on the contrary, they alone aremy property, and cannot be taken away, and to possess them suffices mewherever I am or whatever Ido.

12. I am formed by nature for my own good: I am not formed for my own evil.13. If, therefore, any be unhappy, let him remember that he is unhappy by

reason of himself alone.14. Every person must deal with each thing according to the opinion that he

holds about it.15. Permit nothing to cleave to you that is not your own; nothing to grow to

you that may give you agony when it is torn away.16. He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but
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rejoices for those which he has.17. God is best worshiped in the shrine of the heart by the desire to know and

obey him.Marcus Aurelius:It loved to happen.18. The universe is in change, life is an opinion.19. Get rid of the judgment get rid of the I am hurt, you are rid of the hurt

itself.20. The mind in itself wants nothing, unless it creates a want for itself;

therefore it is both free from perturbation and unimpeded, if it does notperturb and impede itself.

21. Everything is right for me, which is right for you, O Universe. Nothing forme is too early or too late, which comes in due time for you. Everything isfruit to me which your seasons bring, O Nature. From you are all things, inyou are all things, to you all things return.

22. Let there be freedom from perturbation with respect to the things whichcome from external causes, and in actions whose cause lies in yourself,be just; that is, let impulse and action terminate in social acts, for this is

according to your nature.23. If you are distressed by any external thing, it is not this thing whichdisturbs you, but your own judgment about it. And it is in your power towipe out that judgment now.

24. Nothing happens to any man which he is not formed by nature to bear.25. It is in our power to refrain from any opinion about things and not to be

disturbed in our souls; for things in themselves have no natural power toforce our judgments.

26. If you work at that which is before you, following right reason seriously,vigorously, calmly, without allowing anything else to distract you, butkeeping your divine part pure, as if you were bound to give it back

immediately; if you hold to this, expecting nothing, but satisfied to live nowaccording to nature, speaking heroic truth in every word which you utter,you will live happy. And there is no man able to prevent this.

27. Everywhere and at all times it is in your power to accept reverently yourpresent condition, to behave justly to those about you, and to exert yourskill to control your thoughts, that nothing shall steal into them withoutbeing well examined.

28. How ridiculous and how strange to be surprised at anything whichhappens in life!

29. Outward things cannot touch the soul, not in the least degree; nor havethey admission to the soul, nor can they turn or move the soul; but thesoul turns and moves itself alone.

30. Even when the mind is feeling its way cautiously and working its wayround a problem from every angle, it is still moving directly onwards andmaking for its goal.

31. If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thingitself but your own estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke atany moment.

32. Seneca: The point is, not how long you live, but how nobly you live.
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33. That which Fortune has not given, she cannot take away.34. Let Nature deal with matter, which is her own, as she pleases; let us be

cheerful and brave in the face of everything, reflecting that it is nothing ofour own that perishes.

35. The soul should know whither it is going and whence it came, what is

good for it and what is evil, what it seeks and what it avoids, and what isthat Reason which distinguishes between the desirable and theundesirable, and thereby tames the madness of our desires and calms theviolence of our fears.

36. Virtue is nothing else than right reason.

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36 Powerful Stoic Quotes