The Little Book of Stoicism: Timeless Wisdom to Gain Resilience, Confidence, and Calmness

You and I, we’re responsible for our own flourishing. We’re responsible for not letting our happiness depend on external circumstances—we shouldn’t let the rain, annoying strangers, or a leaking washing machine decide upon our wellbeing. Otherwise, we become helpless victims of life circumstances out of hand. As a Stoic student, you learn that only you can ruin your life and only you can refuse to let your inner self be conquered by whatever nasty challenge life throws at you.

remember that things don’t happen against you. So remove your sense of having been wronged. You haven’t. The universe isn’t against you.

Self-Discipline (or temperance) is about knowing how to act and feel right, despite emotions such as strong desire, inner resistance, or lust. Self-discipline includes orderliness, self-control, forgiveness, and humility. It opposes the vice of excess.

No tree becomes deep-rooted and sturdy unless strong winds blow against it. This shaking and pulling is what makes the tree tighten its grip and plant its roots more securely; the fragile trees are those grown in a sunny valley.

We must realize that external events are neutral, and only how we choose to react to them makes them good or bad.

No need to justify bad results, there are just too many uncontrollable factors influencing the outcome.

We must keep in mind that happiness depends more on what we make of what happens rather than what happens in the first place.

We’re responsible for not letting our happiness depend on external circumstances—we shouldn’t let the rain, annoying strangers, or a leaking washing machine decide upon our wellbeing.

If we want to be the best we can be in every situation, if we want to live with areté, then we need to be aware of our every step.

nobody will ever be perfect in all their actions and, as long as we’re trying our best, this doesn’t matter. The world isn’t black and white, we can’t always tell what the right thing to do is, but we can always try to act with our best intention.

Practice 1 The Stoic Art of Acquiescence: Accept And Love Whatever Happens “O world, I am in tune with every note of thy great harmony. For me nothing is early, nothing late, if it be timely for thee. O Nature, all that thy seasons yield is fruit for me.” – Marcus Aurelius

Don’t explain your philosophy. Embody it.” – Epictetus

I made a prosperous voyage when I suffered shipwreck.” – Zeno of Citium

In Stoicism, what you do with the given circumstances matters much more. Stoics recognized that the good life depends on the cultivation of one’s character, on one’s choices and actions rather than on what happens in the uncontrollable world around us.

The sword of justice is ill-placed in the hands of an angry man.

Often injustice lies in what you aren’t doing, not only in what you are doing.” – Marcus Aurelius

The blazing fire makes flames and brightness out of everything thrown into it.” – Marcus Aurelius

Seneca eloquently expressed something similar, “Life is neither good nor bad; it is the space for both good and bad.” Life and all its various situations can be used wisely or foolishly, it’s our actions that make it good or bad. That’s important. Although external things are indifferent, how we handle them is not. It’s exactly the way of use of indifferent things that makes a happy or crappy life.

You know if you do your very best, you will succeed no matter what. It’s all you can do. If you try your absolute best at your job, in your relationships, and for your health, then you’ll always feel confident and at peace with yourself.

The impediment to action advances actions. What stands in the way becomes the way.” – Marcus Aurelius

Demonstrate rather than instruct what you learn.

We waste our lives chasing after an illusion of Happiness, based on a mixture of hedonism, materialism and egotism—crazy, self-defeating values absorbed from the foolish world around us.

Practice 10 Review Your Day: The Stoic Evening Routine “I make use of this opportunity, daily pleading my case at my own court. When the light has been taken away and my wife has fallen silent, aware as she is of my habit, I examine my entire day, going through what I have done and said. I conceal nothing from myself, I pass nothing by. I have nothing to fear from my errors when I can say: ‘See that you do not do this anymore. For the moment, I excuse you.’” – Seneca

Practice 9 Prepare Yourself for the Day: The Stoic Morning Routine “When you first rise in the morning tell yourself: I will encounter busybodies, ingrates, egomaniacs, liars, the jealous and cranks. They are all stricken with these afflictions because they don’t know the difference between good and evil.” – Marcus Aurelius

Practice 8 Voluntary Discomfort “But neither a bull nor a noble-spirited man comes to be what he is all at once; he must undertake hard winter training, and prepare himself, and not propel himself rashly into what is not appropriate to him.” – Epictetus

Attention (prosochê) is the fundamental Stoic spiritual attitude,” explains author Pierre Hadot.

We negate our very humanity and fall to the state of a sheep when we let our actions become impulsive and inconsiderate.

A good character is the only guarantee of everlasting, carefree happiness.” – Seneca

Stoicism has nothing to do with suppressing or hiding one’s emotions or being emotionless. Rather, it’s about acknowledging our emotions, reflecting on what causes them, and learning to redirect them for our own good. In other words, it’s more about unslaving ourselves from negative emotions, more like taming rather than getting rid of them.

Live with Areté: Express your highest self in every moment. If we want to be on good terms with our highest self, we need to close the gap between what we’re capable of and what we’re actually doing. This is really about being your best version in the here and now. It’s about using reason in our actions and living in harmony with deep values. This is obviously easier said than done, what supports this ambitious goal is to separate good from bad and focus on what we control.