#stoicism

Wild beasts flee from the dangers they see -
and when they have fled they are calm.
– Seneca

Remember:
Matter.
How tiny your share of it.
Time.
How brief and fleeting your allotment of it.
Fate.
How small a role you play in it.
– Marcus Aurelius

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.

Marcus Aurelius

The best revenge against your enemy is not to become like your enemy.

– Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 6.6

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.

– Marcus Aurelius

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.

– Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

Ergib dich nicht der Stimmung dessen, der dich beleidigt, und folge nicht dem Weg, auf den er dich schleppen möchte.

– Marcus Aurelius

Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.

– Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

“No person has the power to have everything they want, but it is in their power not to want what they don’t have, and to cheerfully put to good use what they do have.”

-— Seneca, Letters From a Stoic

“It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.”

„Nicht wer wenig hat, sondern wer viel wünscht, ist arm.“

– Seneca

Heute habe ich Marion Giebels Übersetzung von Senecas “Das Leben ist kurz” hinzugefügt. Der Text ist auch über den Menüpunkt “Stoicism” erreichbar.

Today I have added Marcus Aurelius’ “Meditations” , translated by Gregory Hays. You can also access it via the menu bar in the “Stoicism” section.

Today I have added Seneca’s “On the Shortness of Life” , translated by C.D.N. Costa. You can also access it via the menu bar in the “Stoicism” section.

“It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.”
– Marcus Aurelius

“Don’t waste the rest of your time here worrying about
other people—unless it affects the common good. It will
keep you from doing anything useful. You’ll be too
preoccupied with what so-and-so is doing, and why, and
what they’re saying, and what they’re thinking, and what
they’re up to, and all the other things that throw you off and
keep you from focusing on your own mind.

You need to avoid certain things in your train of thought:
everything random, everything irrelevant. And certainly
everything self-important or malicious. You need to get used
to winnowing your thoughts, so that if someone says, “What
are you thinking about?” you can respond at once (and
truthfully) that you are thinking this or thinking that. And it
would be obvious at once from your answer that your
thoughts were straightforward and considerate ones—the
thoughts of an unselfish person, one unconcerned with
pleasure and with sensual indulgence generally, with
squabbling, with slander and envy, or anything else you’d be
ashamed to be caught thinking.”
– Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 3, Verse 4 (Gregory Hays)

„Ziehe dich in dich selbst zurück, so viel du kannst; verkehre mit denen, die dich besser machen, und erstatte solchen den Zutritt, die du besser machen kannst.“
– Seneca

“Think of yourself as dead. You have lived your life. Now, take what’s left and live it properly. What doesn’t transmit light creates its own darkness.”
– Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

“True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears but to rest satisfied with what we have, which is sufficient, for he that is so wants nothing.”
– Seneca

“A rock thrown in the air. It loses nothing by coming down, gained nothing by going up.”
– Marcus Aurelius

“We are more often frightened than hurt; and we suffer more from imagination than from reality.”
– Seneca