Epictetus Quotes
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You become what you give your attention to...If you yourself don't choose what thoughts and images you expose yourself to, someone else will, and their motives may not be the highest.
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We are not disturbed by what happens to us, but by our thoughts about what happens to us.
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People are not disturbed by things, but by the view they take of them.
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'But to be hanged-is that not unendurable?' Even so, when a man feels that it is reasonable, he goes off and hangs himself.
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Freedom is the name of virtue: Slavery, of vice…. None is a slave whose acts are free.
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What disturbs people's minds are not events but their judgments on events.
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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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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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Try not to react merely in the moment. Pull back from the situation. Take a wider view. Compose yourself.
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It's not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.
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Freedom and slavery, the one is the name of virtue, and the other of vice, and both are acts of the will.
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God has entrusted me with myself.
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It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows.
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Only the educated are free.
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Any person capable of angering you becomes your master; he can anger you only when you permit yourself to be disturbed by him.
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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?"
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The world turns aside to let any man pass who knows where he is going.
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There is a fine circumstance connected with the character of a Cynic,-that he must be beaten like an ass, and yet when beaten must love those who beat him, as the father, as the brother of all.
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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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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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Opportunity beckons more surely when misfortune comes upon a person than it ever does when that person is riding the crest of a wave of success. It sharpens a person's wits, if that person will let it, enabling him or her to see more clearly and evaluate situations with a more knowledgeable judgment.
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Men are not worried by things, but by their ideas about things. When we meet with difficulties, become anxious or troubled, let us not blame others, but rather ourselves. That is: our ideas about things.
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It’s time to stop being vague. If you wish to be an extraordinary person, if you wish to be wise, then you should explicitly identify the kind of person you aspire to become.