if i had to define stoicism the philosophy i've dedicated my life to in just a few minutes i wouldn't start in ancient greece and make my way to ancient rome i wouldn't talk to you about seneca and marcus cerritos i wouldn't read you these big books or tell you what they look like or where they were born [Music] i think i would start with the first exercise which comes to us from epictetus a former slave he says the chief task of the philosopher he says is to determine what's up to us and what's not up
to us and so in a sense that's really the definition of stoicism we don't control what happens to us but we control how we respond to what happens to us in this life and for the stoics everything was an opportunity to respond with what they called the four virtues the touchstones of goodness to the stoics they were really simple they were courage temperance justice and wisdom courage bravery the endurance and strength and fortitude self-discipline that's what temperance means moderation the right amount abstaining from the things that don't matter justice that's fairness and honesty and good
conduct and then wisdom that's the study that's the lifelong journey that's education that's what stoicism is the stokes believe that anything and everything that happened to us in this life was an opportunity to practice one of those virtues they knew stuff was going to go wrong and stuff does go wrong all the time but that nothing can prevent us from using those virtues because we always have the opportunity to accommodate and adapt and adjust i have this tattoo on my arm the obstacle is the way that's a pretty good short definition of stoicism as well
forget three minutes that's that's five words the obstacle is the way what stands in the way becomes the way everything is an opportunity to be your best self to get better to practice this philosophy there's a lot of writing in the stokes they wrote a lot of brilliant books but stoicism wasn't about what they wrote it wasn't about what they said it's about what one does marcus really says waste no more time talking about what a good man is like be one the only other thing i might say to someone who's totally new to stoicism
and trying to figure it out would be that there's a difference between what we call uppercase stoicism and lowercase dosism lowercase stoicism is that the stoke has no emotions that the stoic is closed off stoic the word is not the same as the philosophy the philosophy is this vibrant thing this inspiring thing this thing that challenges you to be better to be who you're meant to be that's why i love stoicism that's why i love talking about it it's taken me 15 years to distill it down into this little block but i hope that's helpful
to you it's not what happens it's how you respond to what happens and you can always respond with courage justice temperance and wisdom hey it's ryan holiday thank you so much for watching our videos every day i send out an email inspired by the best stoic wisdom marx realist seneca epictetus all designed to help you live a better life that's what i'm trying to do the email takes five minutes to read over 300 000 people get it that's the largest community of stoics ever in the history of the world i'd love to have you check
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