Most people suffer more than necessary due to their inability to control their thoughts. But uncommon is the individual who takes concerted steps to correct of this deficiency, who strives in other words to master their inner discourse.
When we find ourselves in a difficult period in our life we tend to look outward, we blame our discontent on other people, the state of society or a lack of wealth social status power or fame; but while there is no denying that the external world offers up many challenges, our environment is not the most fundamental determinant of our well-being for as humans we have a unique power. We can create misery or joy independent of our surroundings by thought alone.
We can turn a peaceful environment into the worst of hell's or find internal peace in the midst of tragedy. Most people tend toward the former situation not the latter and for this reason we will turn to the wisdom of Epictetus the great stoic philosopher. His writings provide practical advice for escaping the self-imposed chains of our sometimes torturous thought patterns.
He writes- You must be one person either good or bad. You must either work on your ruling principle or work on externals, practice the art of either what is inside or of what is outside; that is play the role either of a philosopher or of a non philosopher.
Epictetus believed that we each have a choice we can take. The common path and structure our life around the pursuit of material good and external values such as social status or we can choose the path of the philosopher.
For epictetus philosophy was first and foremost a way of life. A philosopher was one who strove to master the art of living and for the stoics this was analogous to mastery of one's mind for a good life.
According to the Stoics,happiness is more likely to be achieved by those who learn to control their thoughts then for those who believe that before they can be content they must attain some preconceived notion of worldly success. The reason the Stoics held this view was because they recognised that our control over the external events of our life is limited.
Epictetus famously put it - “Some things are up to us and some are not up to us. Our opinions are up to us and our impulses desires aversions in short whatever is our own doing. Whereas our bodies are not up to us nor are our possessions our reputations or our public offices.”
If we tether our happiness to things not within our control be it wealth, beauty, social status or even our health we will suffer unnecessarily for chance luck randomness or whatever one wishes to call it plays a massive role in each person's life.
We can easily lose the external goods or accolades on which in ignorance we base our happiness or even fail to attain them in the first place but acceptance of this does not have to lead to fatalistic resignation in the assumption that because some things are out of our control so too is our well-being. For his epictetus explained it is not things that trouble us but our judgments about things and because we can control our judgments the quality of our life is also within our control but if we have lived a life where negative thought patterns have reigned supreme how can we begin moving in the direction of mastery over our inner discourse.
Epictetus suggested that we start off small for after years of neglect we need to strengthen inner capacities that have long laid dormant and this can effectively be done by practicing on the minor annoyances of life begin therefore with little things.
Epictetus realized do not accept and play the dice of life as they have been thrown. This is a product of a weak mastery of the inner self for while they can accept the good they try to deny and flee from challenges and hardships if however we have chosen the path of the Philosopher's we will discover that we do not need to view hardships as misfortunes but instead can regard them as opportunities to strengthen our inner resolve.
It is the circumstances which show men what they are. Conqueror but it is not accomplished without sweat.
After learning of the wisdom of the stoic philosophers many people feel a brief sense of empowerment in the realization that there are other ways of existing in this world. Ways far more conducive to a fulfilling life but fear and laziness often get the upper hand and rather than taking steps to change many people persist as they are. They tell themselves that tomorrow they will make amendments but in most cases this tomorrow never comes. When there is no tomorrow or at least not enough of them to make up for the vast amount of time that has been wasted if you now neglect things warns Epictetus and are lazy and are always making delay after delay and set one day after another is the day for paying attention to yourself then without realizing it you will make no progress but will end up a non philosopher all through life and death.
So decide now that you are worthy of living as a full-grown man who is making progress and make everything that seems best to be a that you cannot go against
And if you meet with any hardship or anything pleasant or reputable or disreputable, then remember that the contest is now and you cannot put things off anymore and that your progress is made or destroyed by a single day in a single action.
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