Quotes About Stoicism

So, despite the popular view of Stoicism as a philosophy that would strip us of most emotions, the ancient Stoics argue that the very best of us show rational exuberance and desire, and a cautious wariness, lest we be too easily led astray or deceived. We cherish friends and nurture warm and welcoming attitudes toward them. This is what it is to be righteous. Put bluntly, even sages have emotional skin in the game.

A lesser known Stoic writer, Hierocles, visualizes a series of extended, concentric circles with the self at the center. "To be at home" in the world requires striving to bring the outermost circles toward the center.

The Stoics are exhorters. And at their best, they exhort us to rise to our potential through reason, cooperation, and selflessness.

The sense of being at home in the world through social connection with others is a deep and pervasive Stoic theme. Stoicism, whether ancient or modern, sees social supports and not just inner strength as critical to how we surmount rather than succumb to adversity.

Epictetus opens the Encheiridion with that dichotomy of control: "Some things are up to us and some are not up to us . . . If is one of those things that is not up to us, be ready to say, 'You are nothing in relation to me.

For some, Stoicism will always put the accent note in the wrong place.

It's a sort of pride to her that she watched the whole thing without wincing or looking away or carrying on.

it's better to be sullen and strong than sullen and weak.

One of the reasons that so many women and girls are kidnapped, trafficked, raped, and otherwise abused is that they grin and bear it. Stoic docility—in particular, acceptance of any decree by a man—is drilled into girls in much of the world from the time they are babies, and so they often do as they are instructed, even when the instruction is to smile while being raped twenty times a day.

She had no idea why it was important and her heart was kicking like a hare. But she had been trained to show a still face so she raised her own mantle and looked back.

Agatha was brought up to get on with things, to keep her head and never make a fuss.

You can't worry about what you can't control,

There lies the whole crux of the matter; what cannot be prevented must be borne

If you can do something to change the circumstances, why be upset about it? And if you cannot do anything to change the circumstances, why be upset about it?

To proste - my?la? Mieczy? Wojnicz, ?ykaj?c ?zy, które miesza?y si? z krwi? zwierz?cia w jego w?t?ym ciele - by? m??czyzn? to nauczy? si? ignorowa? to, co sprawia k?opot. Oto ca?a tajemnica.

In the midst of the fire he stood, not like burning flesh, but like bread baking. Martyrdom of St Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna,

Now I have neither happiness nor unhappiness. Everything passes.

One of the many lessons that one learns in prison is, that things are what they are and will be what they will be.

Of this economic Stoicism of the Classical world the exact antithesis is Socialism, meaning thereby not Marx's theory but Frederick William I's Prussian practice which long prededed Marx and will displace him – the socialism […] that comprehends and cares for permanent economic relations, trains the individual in his duty to the whole, and glorifies hard work as an affirmation of Time and Future.

Sad? Oh, I don't see that; nothing in life is worth calling sad. According to Heraclitus, everything is sad; according to Democritus, nothing is sad. The true secret is to take things as they come, and not trouble yourself sufficiently about anything to give it power to trouble you.

You show you care, you die. You show you fear, you die. You show nothing, maybe you live.

Taoism shares quite a few similarities with Buddhism and Stoicism—Buddhism is about releasing all attachments, where Stoicism is about acknowledging and growing from discomfort. Together, these philosophies create an incredibly resilient mind.

Only a fool worries over what he can't control.

They drank with quiet determination, avoiding serious discussions of troubling news. In doing this they added a small, sullen silence to the larger, hollow one. It made an alloy of sorts, a counterpoint.