Peace is in Staying the Course

In Seneca’s essay on tranquility, he uses the Greek word euthymia, which he defines as “believing in yourself and trusting that you are on the right path, and not being in doubt by following the myriad footpaths of those wandering in every direction.” It is this state of mind, he says, that produces tranquility. Clarity of vision allows us to have this belief. That’s not to say we’re always going to be 100 percent certain of everything, or...

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You Don’t Have to Stay on Top of Everything

One of the most powerful things you can do as a human being in our hyperconnected, 24/7 media world is say: “I don’t know.” Or, more provocatively: “I don’t care.” Most of society seems to have taken it as a commandment that one must know about every single current event, watch every episode of every critically acclaimed television series, follow the news religiously, and present themselves to others as an informed and worldly individual. But...

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The Big Three

Perception, Action, Will. Those are the three overlapping but critical disciplines of Stoicism (as well as the organization of this book and yearlong journey you've just begun). There’s more to the philosophy certainly  and we could spend all day talking about the unique beliefs of the various Stoics: “This is what Heraclitus thought..” “Zeno is from Citium, a city in Cyprus, and he believed .” But would such facts really help you day to...

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Clarify Your Intention

Law 29 of The 48 Laws of Power is: Plan All The Way To The End. Robert Greene writes, “By planning to the end you will not be overwhelmed by circumstances and you will know when to stop. Gently guide fortune and help determine the future by thinking far ahead.” The second habit in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is: begin with an end in mind. Having an end in mind is no guarantee that you’ll reach it no Stoic would tolerate that assumption...

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What We Control and What We Don’t

Today, you won’t control the external events that happen. Is that scary? A little, but it’s balanced when we see that we can control our opinion about those events. You decide whether they’re good or bad, whether they’re fair or unfair. You don’t control the situation, but you control what you think about it. See how that works? Every single thing that is outside your control the outside world, other people, luck, karma, whatever still presents...

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If You Want To Be Unsteady

The image of the Zen philosopher is the monk up in the green, quiet hills, or in a beautiful temple on some rocky cliff. The Stoics are the antithesis of this idea. Instead, they are the man in the marketplace, the senator in the Forum, the brave wife waiting for her soldier to return from battle, the sculptor busy in her studio. Still, the Stoic is equally at peace. Epictetus is reminding you that serenity and stability are results of your choices...

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The Truth About Money

The author F. Scott Fitzgerald, who often glamorized the lifestyles of the rich and famous in books like The Great Gatsby, opens one of his short stories with the now classic lines: “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.” A few years after this story was published, his friend Ernest Hemingway teased Fitzgerald by writing, “Yes, they have more money.” That’s what Seneca is reminding us. As someone who was one...

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Reignite Your Thoughts

Have you had a bad couple of weeks? Have you been drifting away from the principles and beliefs that you hold dear? It’s perfectly fine. It happens to all of us. In fact, it probably happened to Marcus that may be why he scribbled this note to himself. Perhaps he’d been dealing with difficult senators or having difficulties with his troubled son. Perhaps in these scenarios he’d lost his temper, became depressed, or stopped checking in with himself....

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If You Want To Be Steady

The Stoics seek steadiness, stability, and tranquility traits most of us aspire to but seem to experience only fleetingly. How do they accomplish this elusive goal? How does one embody eustatheia (the word Arrian used to describe this teaching of Epictetus)? Well, it’s not luck. It’s not by eliminating outside influences or running away to quiet and solitude. Instead, it’s about filtering the outside world through the straightener of our judgment....

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Seeing Our Addictions

That we consider to be harmless indulgences can easily become full blown addictions. We start with coffee in the morning, and soon enough we can’t start the day without it. We check our email because it’s part of our job, and soon enough we feel the phantom buzz of the phone in our pocket every few seconds. Soon enough, these harmless habits are running our lives. The little compulsions and drives we have not only chip away at our freedom and...

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Never Do Anything Out of Habit

Worker is asked: “Why did you do it this way?” The answer, “Because that’s the way we've always done things.” The answer frustrates every good boss and sets the mouth of every entrepreneur watering. The worker has stopped thinking and is mindlessly operating out of habit. The business is ripe for disruption by a competitor, and the worker will probably get fired by any thinking boss. We should apply the same ruthlessness to our own habits. In...

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The Day In Review

In a letter to his older brother Novatus, Seneca describes a beneficial exercise he borrowed from another prominent philosopher. At the end of each day he would ask himself variations of the following questions: What bad habit did I curb today? How am I better? Were my actions just? How can I improve? At the beginning or end of each day, the Stoic sits down with his journal and reviews: what he did, what he thought, what could be improved....

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A Morning Ritual

Any successful people have a morning ritual. For some, it’s meditation. For others, it’s exercise. For many, it’s journaling just a few pages where they write down their thoughts, fears, hopes. In these cases, the point is not so much the activity itself as it is the ritualized reflection. The idea is to take some time to look inward and examine. Taking that time is what Stoics advocated more than almost anything else. We don’t know whether...

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Cut The Strings That Pull Your Mind

Think of all the interests vying for a share of your wallet or for a second of your attention. Food scientists are engineering products to exploit your taste buds. Silicon Valley engineers are designing applications as addictive as gambling. The media is manufacturing stories to provoke outrage and anger. These are just a small slice of the temptations and forces acting on us distracting us and pulling us away from the things that truly matter....

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Where, Who, What, and Why

The late comedian Mitch Hedberg had a funny story he told in his act. Sitting down for an on-air interview, a radio DJ asked him, “So, who are you?” In that moment, he had to think, Is this guy really deep or did I drive to the wrong station? How often are we asked a simple question like “Who are you?” or “What do you do?” or “Where are you from?” Considering it a superficial question  if we even consider it at all we don’t bother with...

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See The World Like A Poet And An Artist

There are some stunningly beautiful turns of phrase in Marcus’s Meditations—a surprising treat considering the intended audience (just himself). In one passage, he praises the “charm and allure” of nature’s process, the “stalks of ripe grain bending low, the frowning brow of the lion, the foam dripping from the boar’s mouth.” We should thank private rhetoric teacher Marcus Cornelius Fronto for the imagery in these vivid passages. Fronto, widely...

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Wherever You Go, There Your Choice Is

The Stoics all held vastly different stations in life. Some were rich, some were born at the bottom of Rome’s rigid hierarchy. Some had it easy, and others had it unimaginably hard. This is true for us as well we all come to philosophy from different backgrounds, and even within our own lives we experience bouts of good fortune and bad fortune. But in all circumstances adversity or advantage we really have just one thing we need to do: focus...

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Watching The Wise

Jeneca has said, “Without a ruler to do it against, you can’t make crooked straight.” That is the role of wise people in our lives to serve as model and inspiration. To bounce our ideas off and test our presumptions. Who that person will be for you is up to you. Perhaps it’s your father or your mother. Maybe it’s a philosopher or a writer or a thinker. Perhaps What would Jesus do? is the right model for you. But pick someone, watch what they...

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Push for Deep Understanding

The first book of Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations begins with a catalog of gratitude. He thanks, one by one, the leading influences in his life. One of the people he thanks is Quintus Junius Rusticus, a teacher who developed in his student a love of deep clarity and understanding a desire to not just stop at the surface when it comes to learning. It was also from Rusticus that Marcus was introduced to Epictetus. In fact, Rusticus loaned Marcus his...

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The Power of A Mantra

Anyone who has taken a yoga class or been exposed to Hindu or Buddhist thought has probably heard of the concept of a mantra. In Sanskrit, it means “sacred utterance” essentially a word, a phrase, a thought, even a sound intended to provide clarity or spiritual guidance. A mantra can be especially helpful in the meditative process because it allows us to block out everything else while we focus. It’s fitting, then, that Marcus Aurelius would...

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The Three Areas of Training

Today, let’s focus on the three areas of training that Epictetus laid out for us. First, we must consider what we should desire and what we should be averse to. Why? So that we want what is good and avoid what is bad. It’s not enough to just listen to your body because our attractions often lead us astray. Next, we must examine our impulses to act that is, our motivations. Are we doing things for the right reasons? Or do we act because we...

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The Only Prize

Warren Buffett, whose net worth is approximately $65 billion, lives in the same house he bought in 1958 for $31,500. John Urschel, a lineman for the Baltimore Ravens, makes millions but manages to live on $25,000 a year. San Antonio Spurs star Kawhi Leonard gets around in the 1997 Chevy Tahoe he’s had since he was a teenager, even with a contract worth some $94 million. Why? It’s not because these men are cheap. It’s because the things that...

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Philosophy As Medicine of The Soul

The busier we get, the more we work and learn and read, the further we may drift. We get in a rhythm. We’re making money, being creative, and we’re stimulated and busy. It seems like everything is going well. But we drift further and further from philosophy. Eventually this neglect will contribute to a problem the stress builds up, our mind gets cloudy, we forget what’s important and result in an injury of some kind. When that happens, it’s...

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Keep It Simple

Each day presents the chance to over think things. What should I wear? Do they like me? Am I eating well enough? What’s next for me in life? Is my boss happy with my work? Today, let’s focus just on what’s in front of us. We’ll follow the dictum that New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick gives his players: “Do your job.” Like a Roman, like a good soldier, like a master of our craft. We don’t need to get lost in a thousand other distractions...

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Circle of Control

This is important enough that it bears repeating: a wise person knows what’s inside their circle of control and what is outside of it. The good news is that it’s pretty easy to remember what is inside our control. According to the Stoics, the circle of control contains just one thing: YOUR MIND. That’s right, even your physical body isn't completely within the circle. After all, you could be struck with a physical illness or impairment at any moment....

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The Law of Divine Flow

By living in the moment, centering ourselves in love and being in service to others (as opposed to service to self), we live in the law of divine flow. We stay in the moment by moment flowing of our higher self, creating actions which reflect love and allow it. When we are able to do this, we notice how we say just the right things, do what is best for all, and refrain from doing that which we previously disliked in ourselves or others. We maintain...

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