Epictetus Quotes
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To get or not to get what we desire can be equally disappointing.
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You can be invincible, if you enter into no contest in which it is not in your power to conquer.
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Whatever you would make habitual, practice it; and if you would not make a thing habitual, do not practice it, but accustom yourself to something else.
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It is not he who gives abuse that affronts, but the view that we take of it as insulting; so that when one provokes you it is your own opinion which is provoking.
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It is unlikely that the good of a snail should reside in its shell: so is it likely that the good of a man should?
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We must ever bear in mind --that apart from the will there is nothing good or bad, and that we must not try to anticipate or to direct events, but merely to accept them with intelligence.
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Difficulty shows what men are.
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To a longer and worse life, a shorter and better is by all means to be preferred.
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Upon all occasions we ought to have these maxims ready at hand:
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A soul that makes virtue its companion is like an over-flowing well, for it is clean and pellucid, sweet and wholesome, open to all, rich, blameless and indestructible.
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He who exercises wisdom exercises the knowledge which is about God.
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The key is to keep company only with people who uplift you, whose presence calls forth your best.
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Freedom and happiness come from understanding - and working with - our limits. Begin at once a program of self-mastery. Stick with your purpose. Do not seek external approval. Do not worry about anything outside of your control. The only things you command are your thoughts and actions. We choose our response. Stop aspiring to be anyone other than your own best self: for that does fall within your control.
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No man is free who is not master of himself... Is freedom anything else than the power of living as we choose?
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When the Idea, of any Pleasure strikes your Imagination... let that time be employed in making a just Computation between, the duration of the Pleasure, and that of the Repentance sure to follow it.
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Every habit and faculty is preserved and increased by correspondent actions,-as the habit of walking, by walking; of running, by running.
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If you have assumed a character above your strength, you have both acted in this matter in an unbecoming way, and you have neglected that which you might have fulfilled.
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The beginning of philosophy is the recognition of the conflict between opinions.
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The appearance of things to the mind is the standard of every action to man.
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Try not to react merely in the moment. Pull back from the situation. Take a wider view. Compose yourself.
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Fight against yourself, recover yourself to decency, to modesty, to freedom. And, in the first place, condemn your actions; but when you have condemned them, do not despair of yourself. For both ruin and recovery are from within.
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In every affair consider what precedes and what follows, and then undertake it.
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Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens.
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Ask yourself, "How are my thoughts, words and deeds affecting my friends, my spouse, my neighbour, my child, my employer, my subordinates, my fellow citizens?"