3 Simple Stoic Lessons For A Better Life

welcome to Orion philosophy where we explore discuss and dissect areas of practical Philosophy for use in everyday life to Bear trials with a Calm Mind Rob's Misfortune of its strength and burden the world around us is full of things that threaten our Peace of Mind whether it's someone cutting us off in traffic our boss asking us to work late again an argument with our partner crashing the stocks or crypto markets or comparing your life to the meticulously selected and edited photos you see scrolling through social media generally there are two ways we process these kind of things for this explanation I'll call them default and deliberate default is the state where we're essentially on autopilot we react impulsively and because we're on autopilot and there's no filter between the stimulus and the response we essentially allow these impulses to dictate our mental state if we get cut off in traffic we get angry if we're asked to work late we get resentful if we argue with our partner we get defensive and every day every week and every year of our life our well-being is in the hands of the events around us our mental state becomes tightly bound to these externals and as a result it becomes fragile our mood comes and goes like the tide and we wonder why we can't find lasting happiness on the other hand deliberate is the state in which we take responsibility for how we perceive what happens around us how we respond to it and how much we allow externals to influence our well-being instead of reacting impulsively we put a mental gate between stimulus and our response this gate allows us to quarantine stimulus for a while allows us to question it and look at it from different angles and then ultimately allow us to decide deliberately how we react the more we exercise this the stronger the game becomes and the faster we are able to process stimulus our well-being is no longer in the hands of externals it is ours to decide our mental state becomes resilient to what happens around us and we are better able to find lasting happiness and well-being this is the value that the stoics have left with us a practical life philosophy that gives us the tools to hold stimulus in a sort of mental quarantine before they can infect the rest of our mind with whatever negativity may come from perceiving them in a destructive way especially when we get into the habit of responding to negative things by default more than two thousand years ago the ancient stoics gathered in Athens to discuss how to live a good life a life of flourishing well-being and mental resilience they considered the question how to live with virtue the four core stoic virtues being wisdom discipline Temperance and courage and we'll go into a bit more detail about what these four mean later on stoicism is a school of ancient Hellenistic philosophy founded around 300 BC by a man named Zeno of cydium before choosing the path of the philosopher Zeno was a wealthy Merchant and he made good money sailing from port to port around Cyprus and Greece Xeno was described as a thin dark-skinned man and despite his wealth he was said to have lived a Frugal and simple life and to his Misfortune he found himself washing up on the shores of Greece after losing his ship to Sea without his livelihood Zeno made his way to Athens here he is said to have read the accounts of Socrates in an Athenian booksellers so impressed with Zeno with what he read that he asked the Bookseller where he can find men such as Socrates to which the Bookseller pointed out crates of Thebes a prominent cynic philosopher at the time in Athens so then Xeno began to study cynic philosophy under crates and expanded his learning with a handful of other teachers and schools of thought like platonism in 301 BC Zeno began to teach his own philosophy in The Colonnade of the Agora of Athens known as the stowakeley or painted porch it is this stower which gave his students the name of stoics anyone was welcome to come and listen and debate ideas Zeno's philosophy concerned itself with finding ways to live the best possible life one which through living in accordance with nature led to happiness well-being virtue and free from needless suffering I will note that being free from needless suffering is not the same as being free from all suffering it's simply not suffering any more than is necessary so what did the stoics believe and how did they go about finding happiness and well-being or what they called eudaimonia stoic philosophy is one of practicality a toolbox that we can all use for everyday life and focuses on one question how can we find a path to happiness in ancient Greece and Rome stoicism was the philosophy for the everyday men and women of the world not just for educated Aristocrats or isolated philosophers in their Halls of books or silent sages up their mountains it was practiced anywhere from Emperors to soldiers and was applicable to both for the stoics the Practical path to eudemonia is grounded in a few core principles the ability to view ourselves the world and its people objectively and accept their nature as it is rather than projecting our own opinions onto them about how we think they should be generally the greater the distance between what we think something should be and what it is in reality the greater the amount we suffer the discipline to prevent ourselves from being controlled by the desires for pleasure or the fear of pain and suffering the ability to behave with stoic virtue wisdom Temperance Justice and courage and making the distinction between what is within our power to influence and what is not using this information we can act what can be acted upon and we can dismiss what can't stoic philosophy grew to be one of the most prominent schools of thought in ancient Greece and Rome and it became so popular because it works this was a time in history where War famine exiled death and disease was far more common than it is today in our modern world the potential for suffering was everywhere and these are exactly the conditions in which stoic philosophy thrives and while we don't live in the same world as our ancestors we do have our own problems to contend with and the philosophy of the stoics is just as applicable today stoic philosophy teaches us that we are not disturbed by events only how we respond to them they also teach that very little is inside our control simply our thoughts beliefs perceptions and actions these two ideas are important for a number of reasons firstly it instructs us to take responsibility for how we view things understanding that our perceptions of things is a core source of suffering rather than just blaming the world or other people for our situation or our mood we are empowered to accept that it is us who create our own happiness secondly it draws a line between what we do and do not have control over many people suffer because we get upset about or try to control the things in life that we have no control over and of course this ultimately leads us to feel helpless ineffective powerless bitter resentful and therefore we suffer however when we focus on what we can control we start to become effective and efficient we problem solve more easily and we suffer less the key to this is to accept that there is very little within our control and focus our efforts on the small patch of land that we own a farmer will have a better Harvest if they focus on planting tending to and harvesting their own crops rather than focusing on their neighbor's field which they have no control over but instead of crops we have our thoughts our actions our perspectives and our beliefs the ancient stoics used four core stoic virtues as a guide for their actions and in a compass to point them in the right direction during times of hardship times of confusion and the day-to-day decisions of everyday life many even went so far as to suggest that virtue is the path to happiness and that ethics is the primary concern for human understanding and that through ethics the ability to tell right from wrong and living in line with the nature of the world around you we naturally become happier and are better able to work to the betterment of the self and the community the stoics believe that people who lack virtue are blindly pulled Along by whatever pools at their desire the philosopher clianthis once said that these people are like a dog tied to a card compelled to go wherever the cart goes rather than being pulled behind the cart of Desire the stoics would look at a situation and decide how to respond they learned to untie themselves from being pulled along and in doing so they learned the ability to be happy in hardship content in adversity and accepting in loss in part it is the development of virtue that helps cut these strings that drag our emotions and well-being through the dirt whenever we experience pain loss and hardship these stoic virtues are wisdom seeing things for what they are not what we wish they would be in his lectures Epictetus said the chief task in life is simply this to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control and which have to do with the choices I actually control where then do I look for good and evil not to uncontrollable externals but within myself to the choices that are my own courage acting in the right way despite fear or reservation historic philosopher Seneca wrote there are misfortunes which strike the sage without incapacitating him of course such as physical pain infirmity the loss of friends or children or the catastrophes of his country when it is devastated by War I grant that he is sensitive to these things for we do not impute to him the hardness of a rock or of iron there is no virtue in putting up with the fact that one does not feel it Justice acting fairly despite the pressures not to the stoic Emperor Marcus Aurelius wrote and a commitment to Justice in your own acts which means thoughts and actions resulting in the common good what you were born to do temperance acting in discipline and self-control despite the draws of passion and greed Marcus Aurelius also wrote If you seek Tranquility do less or more accurately do what's essential what the logos of a social being requires and in the requisite way which brings a double satisfaction to do less better because most of what we say and do is not essential if you can eliminate it you'll have more time and more tranquility ask yourself at every moment is this necessary while the stoics use these virtues to direct their actions and behavior they are useless if we can't develop the headspace to use them if we're too consumed by our unconscious feelings in the moment to become conscious and decide how to respond simply put if we remain like the dog being pulled by the cart we will always go where the cart goes and never go where we would like to go the author of man's search for meaning Victor Frankl wrote about stimulus and response and he said that between stimulus and response there is a space and in that space lies our growth and our freedom we need to learn how to create this space and when we find ourselves in it we are able to decide how to react to a situation rather than letting our unconscious react for us regardless of whether we want to live in alignment with the stoic virtues or reflect different virtues that we've chosen for ourselves if our aim is to live deliberately and unhitch ourselves from impulsive behavior and snap judgments learning to find this space is essential [Music] [Music] there is a concept in stoic philosophy that can transform our frustrations into acceptance our anger into understanding and can help us focus our limited time each day on the things that create real impact and change in our life rather than mistakenly and unknowingly focusing on the things that waste it this is the stoic concept of control simply put we can't always control what happens to us but we can always decide how we react to it our response is our responsibility and it's a choice today we're going to explore the ancient historic philosophy behind this concept and look at how we can implement it in our daily life the philosopher Epictetus was born into slavery in ancient Greece he was permitted by his master to study stoic philosophy under the guidance of philosopher masonius Rufus Epictetus earned his freedom around the age of 18. shortly after the death of Emperor Nero with this newfound Freedom he took to Rome to teach his Philosophy for a further 25 years until Emperor the mission banned philosophers from the city because of the threat their free thinking had on the control of his rule this meant the Epictetus ended up leaving Rome and settling in the newly formed city of necopolis in ancient Greece here he lived a simple life and founded a school of philosophy where he taught until he passed away from old age sadly Epictetus didn't write any of his work down however we are left with the work of one of his students who transcribed the lectures of Epictetus close to word for word of eight books written only for survive but for me these four contain some of the best practical Philosophy from the ancient world within this is one of the core teachings of epictetus's stoic philosophy the concept of control he taught that a path to a happy life a life of what the stoics called eudaimonia can be found in two things the first is correctly identifying what is within our control and identifying what is not the second is focusing our efforts on the things within our control and learning to accept what is not with Grace and understanding this distinction is an important one because no matter how much we try no matter how upset we get or frustrated we become we cannot change the things outside the reach of our control a life of attempting to do so will undoubtedly result in bitterness frustration and wasted effort on the other hand a life focused on doing what we can with what we have and focusing on what's within our power is much more likely to be productive effective and altogether more constructive Epictetus said the chief task in life is simply this to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control and which have to do with the choices I actually control where then do I look for good and evil not to uncontrollable externals but within myself to the choices that are my own this particular Concept in stoicism is widely known as the dichotomy of control so called because things are really only divided into what we can control and what we can Epictetus took this further and helped describe exactly what's within our power and what's not he also helped us understand the pitfalls of spending too much time focusing on changing what we have no power to change and the benefits of focusing on the areas of life within our power to change in his writing his student recounts the following there are things that are within our power and things that fall outside our power within our power are our own opinions aims desires dislikes in a sum our own thoughts and actions outside our power are our physical characteristics the class into which we were born our reputation in the eyes of others and honors and offices that may be bestowed on us working within our sphere of control we are naturally free independent and strong beyond that sphere we are weak limited and dependent if you pin your hopes on things outside your control taking upon yourself things which rightfully belong to others you are liable to stumble fool suffer and blame both Gods and Men but if you focus your attention only on what is truly your own concern and leave to others what concerns them then you will be in charge of your interior life no one will be able to harm or hinder you you will blame no one and have no enemies if you wish to have peace and contentment release your attachment to all things outside your control this is the path of freedom and happiness if you want not just peace and contentment but power and wealth too you may forfeit the former in seeking the latter and will lose your freedom and happiness along the way historic Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius also wrote about similar Concepts in his journal he wrote you have power over your mind not outside events realize this and you will find strength so how can we harness this stoic practice and turn it into a daily Habit to increase our happiness and resilience for me a good and important first step is training our mind to quickly sort the things around us and within us into one of two categories essentially inside our control or outside our control and then something a lot easier said than done we have to learn to accept the things that are outside our controllers they are and at the same time take full responsibility for everything inside our control these two things are important because when we get it wrong we suffer and we normally suffer in one of two ways the first way we suffer is trying to control things in life we have no influence over this can be other people their beliefs their thoughts actions and values the weather the traffic the economy politics time and many many other things obviously when we try and control the uncontrollable we're putting effort into an Endeavor in which we have no leverage this results in us having little or no impact and this result ends up with us feeling powerless frustrated anxious and effective bitter and angry in a nutshell we suffer no one likes to put effort into something and get nothing in return or worse yet put effort into something and get the complete opposite we want in return and because we have no control over these situations if we attach our happiness to them we're essentially putting our happiness into the hands of chance and the hands of the whim of the world around us so it's easy to see why this is not a resilient form of Happiness if everything is going well around us we'll be happy if everything is going poorly we'll be sad our happiness will come and go based on external events and how they transpire which is a very fragile way of living the second way we suffer is we don't take responsibility for what we can control these are our beliefs our values our perspectives and our actions when we don't take responsibility for these things and instead blame the world are other people for things like our actions we're essentially saying that we don't have autonomy over what we do and who we are this is a very helpless mindset to have and it will wear you down over time people stuck here often complain moan point fingers whinge and create a mentality of victimhood because the world is always acting upon them and as they respond to the world acting upon them they blame what happens in the world for their response this is not a healthy place to be because if we believe that we don't have any control over our actions our perspectives values and beliefs there's nothing we can do to get out of the situation we're in we just have to wait until the world around us does something that creates an outcome in us that we're happy with and again it's probably easy to see by this way of living doesn't produce lasting and resilient happiness because everything is still at the whim of the world around us our well-being is beholden to externals rather than being our responsibility to cultivate the stoic dichotomy of control helps us shift our perspective of these things in two important ways when we are able to determine what is outside our control we no longer waste our time and energy trying to change it we see it for what it is we accept it and we move on to what we can control when we are able to determine what is within our control we are able to focus our time and energy here to taking responsibility and taking actions in these areas to move forward Epictetus also said make the best use of what is in your power and take the rest as it happens and it's all well and good understanding these logically but it takes practice and it requires deliberate effort to start building those mental Pathways but if you stick with it soon splitting these things into two different categories becomes second nature and you'll naturally see these two Pathways and use it to determine how to act in the face of events around you and to leave you with some final thoughts in his book a guide to the good life William Irvine explores this subject of control and describes the following remember that the things over which we have complete control are the goals we set for ourselves I think that when a stoic concerns himself with the things over which he has some but not complete control such as winning a tennis match he will be very careful about the goals he sets for himself in particular he will be careful to set internal rather than external goals thus his goal in playing tennis will not be to win the match something external over which he has only partial control but to play to the best of his ability in the match something internal over which he has complete control by choosing this goal he will spare himself the frustration or disappointment should he lose the match since it was not his goal to win the match he would not have failed to attain his goal as long as he played his best his Tranquility will not be disrupted Irvine also wrote stoics would recommend for example that I concern myself with whether my wife loves me even though this is something over which I have some but not complete control but when I do concern myself with this my goal should not be the external goal of making her love me no matter how hard I try I could fail to achieve this goal and would as a result be quite upset instead my goal should be an internal goal to behave to the best of my ability in a lovable manner similarly my goal with respect to my boss should be to do my job to the best of my ability these goals I can achieve no matter how my wife and my boss subsequently react to my efforts by internalizing his goals in daily life the stoic is able to preserve his Tranquility while dealing with things over which he has only partial control foreign [Music] death in our impermanence has a profound impact on the way we view the world the way we view ourselves and the people around us if we view death in a destructive way it will hang over us clouding everything we do however there is a way to view death that adds gratitude and Vibrance to life and this perspective employed by the stoics is exactly what we're going to explore today the fear of death is something we all encounter at different points in our life whether it's dealing with the grief and feelings of loss of the death of a loved one coming to terms with the fact that a loved one may soon pass or simply the struggle we all have knowing that one day we will be gone today we're going to primarily be exploring stoic philosophy to find out how not only we can reduce our fear of death but also use the ever-present reality that one day we won't be here anymore as a tool to look at everything around us and use our mortality as a tool for gratitude this practice is widely known as Memento Mori roughly translating from Latin as remembering mortality when you strip humans down to our Bare Bones generally our basic instinctive wiring is to survive and replicate and given that that is true death is clearly an undesirable so much so that we don't even like thinking about it we don't like contemplating it and in extreme cases we don't even like accepting it as a reality and while the denial of death can make us feel warm and fuzzy it can also lock us out of the Practical benefits that come from its contemplation after all we are all going to die we're all temporary our time is limited and our experience of this life will come to an end stoicism tells us that reminding ourselves of this reality can have a huge Improvement on the way we live the stoics taught that in the constant reminder of death we can learn how to live almost counter-intuitively thinking about death can help us live better happier and more present lives so we've gone through a bit about what momentumori is now let's have a look at how exactly it can achieve what I've just described the concept of Memento Mori has spanned both time and culture we've already seen that the stoics use Memento Mori but it's also been used by people like the Buddhists all in an effort to learn how to live better lives and as we've said it's the reminder that your death is inevitable that your time is limited and one day there will be a day where you and I won't wake up to enjoy the beautiful experience of life with modern medicine as it is death is a guarantee no matter where you were born how rich you are or what you were doing during your life there will be a day where you die at least until someone comes up with a way not to and on that day we will be asking ourselves entirely new philosophical questions ultimately death is simply change and change is the nature of the universe however for those of us who know how to use it the reality of death helps us cultivate a greater appreciation of life if you could humor me for a moment and imagine that you only have one week left to live now imagine that in this last remaining week you have a list of things you want to do people that you want to spend time with in places that you want to go for most of us we have a pretty short list of things that we do in a week and it normally includes the people we love the things we love doing all the things we've always wanted to do but never have Memento Mori uses this same principle but instead of only having a week to live and think about death we have our entire life Memento Mori allows us to look honestly at our mortality and in doing so it helps us clarify what's important it helps us find our values it helps us be grateful for things because we know that these things are limited and it helps us focus on problems that really matter not the small insignificant bickering that ultimately wastes our time and doesn't add any value to our lives ancient historic philosophy is full of examples that instructed students to meditate on death and to contemplate their mortality in his letters Seneca speaks of the benefits from meditating on death he wrote The Following let us prepare our minds as if we'd come to the very end of life let us postpone nothing let us balance life's books each day the one who puts the finishing touches on their life each day is never short of time the stoic philosopher epic Titus recommends that whenever you spend time with your loved ones whenever you hug your family or kiss your partner you should remind yourself that they are mortal there will come a day where the people you love will no longer be there this reminder is not intended to make us sad and it's not intended to be morbid but it does help us to appreciate what we have and really focus and be present when we're with these people because we never really know how much time we have left with them the stoic philosopher and emperor of Rome Marcus Aurelius also practiced Memento Mori contemplating his own mortality to guide his actions in the book meditations he wrote you could leave life right now let that determine what you do and say and think stoic philosophers did not see death as a morbid idea to be avoided it was a core aspect of life that needed to be accepted even embraced and ultimately used as a tool to appreciate each new day remaining grateful for the time that we have and guiding our actions after all death is ultimately outside the reach of our control it's true that we can't eat well we can exercise we can sleep well and do what we can to live a long and happy life but ultimately our end will come and like anything outside our control worrying too much and focusing too much energy here ultimately does us no good shifting to another philosopher in Plato's recount of The Death of Socrates arguably Athens most famous philosopher Socrates famously Met Death with a calm indifference and his last words were said to be uttered to a close friend about paying a debt of chickens Plato argues that the study of philosophy is about nothing else but dying it is a path taken to find a way of living and a way of thinking about life that ultimately allows us to face death calmly and with Grace the concept of Memento Mori is not just found in Western philosophy it also echoes in eastern philosophy as well I'm sure we've all heard of the Samurai as a kid we probably wanted to be one or at least at some point pretended to be one the samurai used death as a mental practice to enjoy life to conquer fear and ultimately become better Warriors The Way of the Samurai is morning after morning the practice of death considering whether it will be here or there Imagining the most sightly way of dying and putting one's mind firmly in death although this might be a most difficult thing if one will do it it can be done there is nothing that one should suppose cannot be done there is a comparison that can be made between human life and the Japanese cherry blossoms in Japan the cherry blossom has become part of the culture and the pink white blossoms can be followed through the country as the blossom moves with the change in temperature a large part of what makes the blossom beautiful is that they only last for a short period of time in a similar way enjoyment of life becomes more profound because it's fleeting the Buddhists of Tibet have a practice called the four thoughts that turn the mind one of these thoughts is the contemplation of death and of our impermanence it consists of the following all things made from other things are impermanent the human body is a thing made from other things therefore the death of the body is certain the time of death is uncertain and beyond our control it's very easy to see a parallel here between Buddhism and stoicism but this Buddhist idea specifically was designed for daily contemplation it was done to prevent the natural human tendency to behave as though we have all the time in the world this Central teaching of Buddhism is called marasanati or death awareness and is thought to be a core part of living a better life this is a tool that we can all use in day-to-day life all of this helps us become aware of how short our time really is and in doing so helps us question whether or not we are making the most of the time we have and to close with some final thoughts for me Memento Mori is made up of a certain amount of Order and Chaos left to its own devices are based human nature is pretty chaotic without us putting in some effort to stop it our mind starts to take over and over in unconscious Loops essentially putting us into autopilot and with how busy our modern day is it's easy for our mind to always have something to pick up and think about before we know it we've woken up we've had breakfast we've gone to work we've come home from work we've stuck the TV on and we've gone to bed and in that time we're mostly on autopilot we haven't really been present and we take a lot of what's around us for granted this unconscious chaos can be balanced with order when we take the time to consciously be aware of what's around us consciously be aware of the moment and consciously be grateful not only for the time we have but for the people and experiences that fill that time and also grateful for ourselves we're often far too hard on ourselves magnifying our mistakes and pushing aside our achievements but balance gratitude for me Isn't just about being grateful for what's around us it's also being grateful for who we are and what we've gone through this order helps us appreciate what we have and prevents that autopilot from ticking over and taking everything for granted foreign life can be chaotic and frustrating at times we've all had days where we felt overwhelmed with work responsibilities grief pain and any number of external events that threatened to destabilize our Peace of Mind here at around philosophy we bring out videos every week specifically to tackle the imbalance between sources of suffering in the world around us and the tools that we're given to deal with them it's great to see the community growing around this goal and if you think it's something you'd like feel free to sub and join us to that end today we're going through the stoic principle of amor fatty and the practice of Shifting our perception of the things around us from resistance and suffering to acceptance understanding and ultimately love ancient stoic philosophy contains a number of core practices that help the practitioner change the way they look at life and in such a way that their burdens are lessened their stress is eased and in many cases they go through a transformation of things they once thought to be sources of pain and hardship and shift them into sources of strength and understanding we'll be covering exactly what Amor Fati means and looking specifically at how you can use it in your day-to-day life to help balance develop and maintain your mental well-being Socrates once said that we are the caretakers of our soul and hopefully today you'll take away some tools to become exactly that first of all if Amo fatty is learning to love fate what exactly do we mean when we say Fate To be honest this can be interpreted in many different ways for me personally a practical definition of fate in this context is simply the unraveling of everything that has happened everything that is happening and everything that will happen these happenings are determined by the nature of the world around us they're determined by the laws of physics and the events that have transpired previously leading to subsequent events like complex dominoes knocking into one another this Domino analogy might bring up questions about determinism or free will and it's outside the scope of this video however if you personally have an opinion on Free Will or determinism let me know in the comments down below because I think it's a fascinating topic but coming back to fate I don't think that fate in this context has anything to do with an overall Universal Consciousness or anything deliberately dictating what doesn't doesn't happen so then what is Amor fatty Marcus Aurelius once wrote accept the things to which fate binds you and love the people with whom fate brings you together but do so with all your heart literally speaking Amor fatih is a Latin phrase that translates roughly as love of fate and it's been used for thousands of years to describe a state of mind or a practice in which you accept and even Embrace everything that has happened is happening and has yet to happen it's the mindset of understanding and accepting that the nature of the universe is change that much of this changes outside the reach of our control and that without this change we would not exist our relationships wouldn't exist we wouldn't laugh cry love create or grow without everything that has come before now and without everything that is happening now we wouldn't experience any of what life has to offer both the good and the bad and in this way from this perspective we can learn to love everything that has come before us and everything that's happening around us and then by extension learn to love fate Marcus Aurelius also wrote frightened of change but what can exist without it what's closer to Nature's heart can you take a hot bath and leave the firewood as it was eat food without transforming it can any vital process take place without something being changed can't you see it's just the same with you and just as vital to Nature hopefully this gives context about what Amor Fati actually means and some insight into the practice itself but it's one thing to understand something and another thing to implement it so how can we practically use our Fati in our day-to-day lives Victor Frankel was a Jewish psychotherapist who lived during World War II and during the war he was sent to various concentration camps including Auschwitz Frankel ultimately survived the horrors of the war and went on to write a book called man search for meaning it's not a very big book but I highly recommend reading it almost every page has some value on how to develop a resilient personal philosophy and to anyone who's interested I'll include a link Down Below in the description Franco had a very simple personal philosophy one that he credited for helping him survive the hardships and adversities of the concentration camps until he was ultimately rescued by Allied Forces in April 1945. his philosophy Echoes the teachings of the stoics you can't always control the events to happen to you in your life but you can always control how you respond to them and this is how we use concepts of practical philosophy not to exert any more control over the world around us but to take full responsibility and ownership for how you view it and how you respond to it making a conscious decision to change your perceptions for the better if we take responsibility for this we no longer point fingers and blame the world at other people when we're upset or angry or frustrated or sad we look inward to find out why we're acting like this and then we make conscious decisions to change our perceptions for the better of course I'm not saying that all negative emotion is bad but what I am saying is those emotions are our responsibility and not just those emotions but how we act and respond to the world as a result of them so if we take responsibility for our response to the world and we take responsibility for making conscious decisions to change our perception of things for the better with Amor fatty this means changing how we perceive what's happened to us or is happening to us we can start by asking ourselves pointed questions have we suffered and struggled yes can we go back and avoid The Struggle No so if we can't go back and change the past the next best thing is accepting that it has happened and finding the good in it whether it's something in the hardship that taught us more about ourselves or a lesson learned that can help us or others avoid similar in the future have we experienced loss how did that teach us to appreciate what we have and not take things for granted did we lose our job what doors did that open that may have remained closed did someone mistreat us did that person showing that side of them end a relationship that could have gone on for longer and been more destructive this may seem overly optimistic but when these events have already happened really we get no benefit from walking around with negativity or resentment about them negativity won't change the past however optimism and a deliberate Choice regarding how we look at the past can improve how we live right now in the present one thing about Amor Fati that I do want to touch on quickly is that it often gets confused with a passive defeatist acceptance of the world around us that this practice leads us to accept the wrongs of the world and to lie down as we observe the passing of things that we don't agree with or wrongdoing we see being committed this is not the case acceptance of reality is not the same as submitting to it it's simply learning the ability to see objectively and accepting that in this moment that is the state of the world there's often little value in seeing the world as you want to see it rather than seeing it as it is other than getting a warm fuzzy feeling as you pull the wool over your own eyes and this acceptance of reality is the ability to look at reality clearly and not through the lens of our own bias and expectations in doing so we are more able to understand what's within our control and what is not and then if we deem it appropriate we can look to leverage that control to affect change first in ourselves and then if possible in the world around us for the better Amor Fati is often credited to the stoics Epictetus the slave who later became a philosopher talked about similar Concepts and as we've already seen the stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius wrote about fate in his journal a journal that later became known as meditations later philosophers like Nietzsche explicitly use the term Amor fatty in their writings Nietzsche wrote my formula for greatness in a human being is Amor fatty that one wants nothing to be different not forward not backward not in all eternity not merely bear what is necessary still less conceal it but love it my interpretation of this is that Nietzsche is saying that we should not hide from fate we shouldn't conceal fate nor should we wish it to be different ultimately fate is what it will be not what we wish it will be so we should accept it however more than just acceptance we should learn to love fate and embrace it he went on to write further for nothing is self-sufficient neither in US ourselves knowing things and if our soul is trembled with happiness and sounded like a harp string just once all eternity was needed to produce this one event and in this single moment of affirmation all eternity was called good redeemed Justified and Affirmed for me here Nietzsche is saying that when we are happy the entire world in all of history was necessary to lead up to that moment of Happiness without that history you would not be here and you would not have felt that happiness so if you resist hate or complain about fate you are resisting the conditions that have given you life again like a set of dominoes knocking over one another the first Domino is needed for the last to fall in the same way all of the conditions of the past were needed for you to be here right now [Music] [Music]

Channel: Orion Philosophy

Views: 300,965

Keywords: stoic, stoicism, stoic philosophy, quotes, stoic quotes, philosophy, stoicism philosophy, practical philosophy, amor fati, memento mori, dichotomy of control, epictetus, seneca, marcus aurelius

Id: _-y5EorR9nU

Length: 42min 46sec (2566 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 24 2023