More on The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius (180 CE) and Ryan's The Daily Stoic (2016). We talk Stoicism as "pre-mourning," love of fate even with trauma, are Stoics committed to a divine plan, Stoic political ethics, ethical models for emulation, and the idea of overwriting your brain with the Stoic operating system. Hear part 1 first, or get the full, unbroken Citizen Continue Reading …
Ep. 201: Marcus Aurelius’s Stoicism with Ryan Holiday (Part One)
On The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius (ca. 180 CE) plus Ryan's The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living (2016), which was co-written with Stephen Hanselman and features original translations and interpretations of passages from Marcus, Seneca, Epictetus, and others. What does Stoicism look like in practice, in both ancient and modern Continue Reading …
Ep. 201: Marcus Aurelius’s Stoicism with Ryan Holiday (Citizen Edition)
On The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius (ca. 180 CE) plus Ryan's The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living (2016), which was co-written with Stephen Hanselman and features original translations and interpretations of passages from Marcus, Seneca, Epictetus, and others. What does Stoicism look like in practice, in both ancient and modern Continue Reading …
Life-Hack Stoicism—Is It Worth It?
Millennials in the West have graduated into or grown up in one of the worst and most prolonged recessions. Granted, this isn’t 1929, and most young people caught up in it are stuck in their parents’ basement and not on the breadline. And, with that, any notion of public sympathy is generally tossed aside and replaced with calls of “toughen up” and “get over Continue Reading …
What Epictetus Really Thinks Is in Our Power
The distinction between what is "up to us"—"under our control", "in our power," or if you prefer, "our business" (ep'humin in Greek)—and what is not up to us (ouk ep'humin), eventually becomes a central doctrine of the Stoic school and tradition of philosophy. This particularly so in the thought of the late Stoic Epictetus, where the presently much-discussed "dichotomy of Continue Reading …
Books of Wisdom
What good are philosophy books? Can they make us any the wiser? There’s a funny story about reading philosophy books by the Irish writer Robert Wilson Lynd, an essay titled “On Not Being a Philosopher: Epictetus and the Average Man” (1930). Lynd wonders whether you can get wisdom from kicking back with a philosophy book. He gives it a try. He recounts his efforts in a Continue Reading …
Episode 132: Living Stoically with Seneca and Massimo
On selected "moral epistles" (from around 65 CE) by Lucius Annaeus Seneca: 4. On the Terrors of Death, 12. On Old Age, 49. On the Shortness of Life, 59. On Pleasure and Joy, 62. On Good Company, 92. On the Happy Life, 96. On Facing Hardship, and 116. On Self Control. We're joined by Massimo Pigliucci of the How to Be a Stoic blog, who for a long time was on the Rationally Continue Reading …
Episode 132: Living Stoically with Seneca and Massimo (Citizen Edition)
On selected "moral epistles" (from around 65 CE) by Lucius Annaeus Seneca: 4. On the Terrors of Death, 12. On Old Age, 49. On the Shortness of Life, 59. On Pleasure and Joy, 62. On Good Company, 92. On the Happy Life, 96. On Facing Hardship, and 116. On Self Control. We're joined by Massimo Pigliucci of the How to Be a Stoic blog, who for a long time was on the Rationally Continue Reading …
Episode 124: The Stoic Life with Epictetus
On the Manual of Epictetus, aka The Enchiridion, from around 135 CE. What's a wise strategy for life? What is freedom? Stoicism says that the secret is mastering yourself. If you let yourself be perturbed by things that happen to you, then you're a slave to those external things. Your good lies only in the things you can (with practice) control, i.e., your own attitudes, Continue Reading …
Episode 124: The Stoic Life with Epictetus (Citizen Edition)
On the Manual of Epictetus, aka The Enchiridion, from around 135 CE. What's a wise strategy for life? What is freedom? Stoicism says that the secret is mastering yourself. If you let yourself be perturbed by things that happen to you, then you're a slave to those external things. Your good lies only in the things you can (with practice) control, i.e., your own attitudes, Continue Reading …
Topic for #124: The Stoic Life with Epictetus
On 8/30/15, the full foursome plus Alex Fossella (Danny's researcher on the Modern Day Philosophers podcast) discussed the Manual of Epictetus, aka the Handbook or Enchiridion, written around 135 CE by Epictetus's pupil Arrian (but unlike Plato's accounts of Socrates, these seem more likely to be Epictetus's actual words noted down). Stoicism is one of the big ancient wisdom Continue Reading …