Stoic Lessons That Will Change Your Life Forever
Many philosophies are of theoretical nature, and they lose their charm and their value with time.
Still, Stoicism is one of the few selected Philosophies which, despite being more than 2000 years old, has a lot of practical significance in our modern life.
Stoicism is a mindset or a tool with the help of which you can face the ups and downs in your life boldly.
You can increase your life satisfaction and permanently fill the emptiness you feel inside if you really follow some top 10 deep lessons from Stoicism listed below.
Lesson 1: Excellence is a fruit on the tree of difficulties.
Stoic Philosopher Seneca says that just as fire tests gold, difficulties test courageous men. Every animal in the world removes obstacles from its path to lead a comfortable life. But this comfort is never permanent. All the time, there is a danger of being eaten or dying due to changing weather. That’s why animals know that the harder they work, the higher their chances of survival.
But, we fail to adapt according to the changing situation and think that I wish I would get permanent comfort by doing little hard work. Still, this kind of thinking will kill you for life because a person who never took any challenge and always got what he wanted will be far away from reality.
According to Seneca, the life of such a person is nothing more than a tragedy and to live like this is just as if Mohammad Ali has spent his whole life without fighting or Michael Jackson has ever danced a step and sung a song.
Because without challenges, you will never know what you are capable of doing.
This is the reason why Stoicism does not just say that whatever life throws at you, face it. But you yourself try to go to your fears and challenge them for a fight.
Lesson 2: Death owns whatever time has elapsed.
This is one of our biggest mistakes. We think that death will come in the future, but in reality, death has already spent a second of our life, and a large part of death is already gone.
Stoic says that we should always prepare ourselves mentally as if we are going to die anytime. Stop postponing every important thing in your life and start correcting all the bad things you have done right now.
In this way, whoever is giving finishing touches to his life every day, never misses time. Because you were dying a little bit all the time, you are already dead while reading this article, and in this way, any minute, hour, day or year cannot be revived.
Seneca says that it is not that we have very little time to live, but the problem is that we waste this time. We should understand the importance of time and start living now.
Lesson 3: Humans were not only created to eat, reproduce, and sleep like animals.
Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius says that whenever you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning, then tell yourself that I am getting a chance to work as a human being. What do I need to complain about if I am doing what I was born to do?
Sometimes we don’t feel like working or studying and sometimes we are just lazy. We know that our work is important, but the comfort of being in bed feels like heaven at that time.
Marcus knew that the victory in the morning could bring him to win the whole day and the whole life. He has never forgotten discipline even after being so powerful because nature demands discipline from man.
The problems of the world and our own homes are waiting for us to wake up and be solved by us, and the more we delay our work by sleeping or taking rest, the more we have to do the hard work later.
So if you want to be more productive, tackle more tasks and achieve greatness, then wake up early in the morning and overcome your desire to rest and sleep.
Lesson 4: Always follow justice, honesty, self-control and courage.
Stoic says that no challenge or problem is so big that it can practically stop you from using these four words.
Doing the right thing, choosing the correct path, having the courage and speaking the truth do not let your basic instinct dominate your mind in any situation.
Don’t put yourself above others. Do not be afraid to see big problems. Take every step with courage and focus only on doing the right thing, not on the result. Just remember these principles, and you will be able to make even the biggest challenges simple.
Lesson 5: Divide everything into two categories. ( in your control & out of your control )
According to the Stoic philosopher Epictetus, this single skill of differentiating things will change your life.
If the weather outside is bad and you cannot go to your work or go for a walk, then in such a situation, no matter how much you shout or cry, nothing is gonna happen unless and until the weather decides to change.
As much as you pray for your height, more or less, your appearance or the country in which you were born is out of your control, and you cannot change them.
Every minute that you wasted on things that do not change, you could now spend all that time on things that would give you maximum results.
By applying these skills, you will have the advantage over those people who try to change every aspect of their life and waste all their time on the way.
Lesson 6: You are not bothered by the problem but by the perception of that problem.
This line has contributed a lot to modern psychology because based on this thinking, cognitive behaviour therapy, i.e. CBT, was born, which is our greatest strength.
No matter what is happening outside, we can decide from inside how to react to it. We can even decide whether a person’s words or failures make us cry, or they lose all their emotional value by simply teaching us something.
Lesson 7: It is impossible to learn things that you think you already know.
Always keep your ears, eyes and mind open because a lesson can unfold to you in any form. Everything and every human brings us opportunities to teach something new.
But we tend to reject these lessons when we think we already know everything. So instead of patting yourself on the back, look for everything that can make you better.
Lesson 8: Most things scare us instead of crushing us
Through this line, Seneca explains that the thing we should worry about is what we should worry about. We spend so much of our time just imagining things and torturing ourselves so much in advance.
Pain and suffering cannot be avoided because, at some point, these two will come to hug you. So we always have to prepare ourselves for the worst circumstances, but at the same time not to overthrow that situation before it comes, because the more we think about our fears, the more they will grow. So don’t fantasize about your fears but face them directly.
Lesson 9: Be with people who can make you better and whom you can teach something to.
Friendship should never be sided, nor should you make such people your friends who do not support you in your group.
The German poet Goethe once said, that just tell me who you spend your time with, and I will tell you your future. The kind of people we surround ourselves with will directly increase our thinking, attitude and idea generation capability.
Seneca says that I never bring the same character that I took with me while entering the house. All the human beings we meet put a stamp of their character on our character. So meet only those people whom you want to be like.
Lesson 10: Recognize the relationship between the world and yourself
Many people say that what does it matter to us, whatever other people do or our good actions alone, won’t change the world a little. But this thinking is absolutely wrong.
We are very closely connected. Our thinking and action directly influence the people with whom we spend our time, so both our good and bad actions go on multiplying. So why not decide which is good for all instead of considering ourselves as separate from every human being and becoming selfish.
Marcus Aurelius once said that we should always look at the world like a living organism made of only one material with only one soul. Observe how everything is connected to this bigger reality and is contributing something to this bigger living being. The way every single basic unit of our body is trying to promote our health, and that is its purpose.
Similarly, our life's purpose is also that we should promote the health and growth of the world instead of destroying it.
