It is good to see ourselves as others see us. Try as we may, we are never
able to know ourselves fully as we are, especially the evil side of us.
This we can do only if we are not angry with our critics but will take in good heart whatever they might have to say.
Gandhi
My parents raised me according to their values and the values of the community we were part of. Be humble, they said. Don’t shy away from work. Preserve your dignity and have faith that things will pan out right. Eventually, sooner or later, somehow… If not in this world, probably in the next one…
Now, as a parent, I say to my son, learn how to asses your position in life. Neither underestimate nor over estimate your situation. If you want to make something different from what it is now you can work towards it. Just try. Trying will show you the way. Preserve your dignity. Life is a gift. And you’re gifted.
New habits are exciting. They are new and they are not habits yet.
To become habits, they require a time slot in your life and a little discipline to keep the repetitiveness going.
Each moment in our day is a timeslot for a habit.
To acquire a new habit you need to eliminate an old habit from its time slot and replace it with the new one.
Too many habits make you a busy person.
Traveling takes you out of your daily habits.
Chain stores maintain you in your daily habits even when you’re traveling. An internet connection too!
Older people become destabilized when they travel, they have well-established habits. The same with babies and toddlers, although they acquire new habits quickly and settle down.
Some people develop the habit of getting bored.
Why am I writing this stuff?
What’s the problem I want to solve?
Maybe I want to re-establish control over my life.
Monks resort to incantations. I could sing and walk around my apartment.
Or ask for help from our elders:
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“We are what we repeatedly do.”
Aristotle
“Choose the life that is most useful, and habit will make it the most agreeable.”
Francis Bacon
“Habit, if not resisted, soon becomes necessity.”
St. Augustine
“Winning is a habit. Unfortunately, so is losing.”
Vincent Lombardi
I want to eliminate pride and hope from my life.
Because, pride and hope do not modify the actual circumstances of my life; they taint my perception of it.
If I let go of my pride, I can accept any action and reaction or any thought as alternatives to my own; evaluate them as they come and live accordingly. Pride often acts as a filter and reduces my vision.
If I stop nourishing hope I can come to terms with what I experience, and what I will experience, as result of my efforts and under my specific life circumstances. Hope often prevents me from living the present fully, and sidetracks me from reaching towards a probable outcome.
Also, more often then not, my pride is injured and my hopes are dashed thus exposing me to unnecessary pain.
I can’t live life as what it should be; I live what it is and what it will be.
Wouldn’t you call this a stoic attitude?
“Those who never philosophized until they met with disappointments, have mostly become disappointed philosophers”
Arthur Helps (1813-1875)
“Let us not look back in anger, nor forward in fear, but around in awareness.”
James Thurber (1894-1961)
“I dreamed a thousand new paths. . . I woke and walked my old one.”
Chinese Proverb
Being busy does not always mean real work. … Seeming to do is not doing.
Thomas A. Edison (1847 – 1931)
Sometimes (often), I prefer being. Just being. No pretense.
I took a test in Existentialism. I left all the answers blank and got 100.
- Woody Allen (1935- )
All philosophy lies in two words, sustain and abstain.
- Epictetus (c.55–c.135)
I don’t know why I’m into this philosophical discourse. The only reason I can think of is that language is the tool for philosophy, just like sound is for music and the color is for images.
I’d rather live with sounds and colors then with words.
But, I guess one can’t get away from needless bla, bla…
A small silence came between us, as precise as a picture hanging on the wall.
- Jean Stafford (1915-1979)
Sometimes I wonder if I can make a distinction between “being stubborn” and “persevering”. Is there a difference?
According to my online dictionary the words below are synonyms:
Firm, stanch, unyielding, stubborn, unbendable, determined, unwavering, steadfast, tenacious, persevering, purposeful, resolute.
In French, there is a (slight) difference between being stubborn
(têtu, buté, entêté, obstiné, volontaire)
And persevering
(acharnement, assiduité, constance, détermination, entêtement, fermeté, insistance, obstination, opiniâtreté, persistance, résolution, suite dans les idées, ténacité, volonté).
In my experience, if you succeed in what you’re doing you celebrate your perseverance.
If you fail, you reproach your stubbornness.
The outcome of your effort defines your intent and qualifies your action. Bizarre.
This is another metaphor Epictetus employs to illustrate what the Stoic attitude to life should be.
I have a hard time to practice this one.
I like the idea of life being a game. It puts a lighter touch on everything we go through in our lives.
I also like the statement “What’s important is the way you play the game. The game itself has not much value or meaning”.
But so far, I haven’t been able and willing to be so detached from the actual game of life. I do care for what it is all about and what its outcome will be.
I also believe that if you play the game well the game should reward you somehow, more then the great satisfaction of having played the game well.
Epictetus continues:
“If you don’t like the game, stop playing it.
If you stay, stop moaning.
Remember, the door is open.”
Certainly a drastic statement! Although, I have heard it many times in my life.
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The text below comes from The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
http://www.iep.utm.edu/e/epictetu.htm#SH4h
Life as a game. At Discourses 2.5.2, in encouraging his students to appreciate that external things are indifferent (being neither good nor bad), Epictetus says that we should imitate those who play dice, for neither the dice nor the counters have any real value; what matters, and what is either good or bad, is the way we play the game.
Similarly at 2.5.15–20, where Epictetus discusses the example of playing a ball game, no one considers for a moment whether the ball itself is good or bad, but only whether they can throw and catch it with the appropriate skill. What matters are the faculties of dexterity, speed and good judgement exhibited by the players, for it is in deploying these faculties effectively that any player is deemed to have played well. (See also Discourses 4.7.5/19/30–1.)
Epictetus also uses the metaphor of playing games when discussing suicide, for just as someone stops playing a game when they are no longer amused by it, so it should be in life generally: if life should become unbearable, no one can force us to keep living it.
To summarize: remember that the door is open. Do not be more cowardly than children, but just as they say, when the game no longer pleases them, ‘I will play no more,’ you too, when things seem that way to you, should merely say, ‘I will play no more,’ and so depart; but if you stay, stop moaning. (Discourses 1.24.20, trans. Hard; see also 1.25.7–21 and 2.16.37)
The more I read about stoicism, the more I realize how much my upbringing followed this philosophy.
This realization does not mean yet that I have accepted to live according to the rules of this philosophy.
I believe that it is not necessary to “belong” to a philosophical thought, like you become a member of a club.
It is helpful though, to recognize the guiding principles of your life.
Even though these principles evolve and change, as you grow old, they follow a pattern of change.
And this helps you play the right beat on your drum.
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The text below comes from The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
http://www.iep.utm.edu/e/epictetu.htm#SH4h
Epictetus employs a number of metaphors to illustrate what the Stoic attitude to life should be.
Life as a festival.
Epictetus encourages us to think of life as a festival, arranged for our benefit by God, as something that we can live through joyously, able to put up with any hardships that befall us because we have our eye on the larger spectacle that is taking place. Epictetus asks his students:
“Who are you, and for what purpose have you come? Was it not he [i.e., God] who brought you here? … And as what did he bring you here? Was it not as a mortal? Was it not as one who would live, with a little portion of flesh, upon this earth, and behold his governance and take part with him, for a short time, in his pageant and his festival? (Discourses 4.1.104, trans. Hard)”
The whole thrust of Stoic ethics aims to persuade us that we should ourselves contribute to the festival by living as well as we may and fulfilling our duties as sociable citizens of God’s ‘great city of the universe’ (Discourses 3.22.4, trans. Hard). (See also Discourses 1.12.21, 2.14.23 and 4.4.24–7/46.)