r/Stoicism

I want to kind of understand more of the actual theory and foundations of stoicism

Sorry if this question seems a bit basic. I'm admittedly pretty rusty in my application of Stoicism, it isn't a big of a part of my life as it used to be but I'm now rediscovering its importance.

I'm assuming everyone here knows about the stoic story of the archer. But in case you don't it's basically about preferred indifference. Instead of focusing on the outcome of your actions, simply focus on taking the best possible actions that could achieve that outcome. It's a seemingly small change in perspective that is supposed to have the potential to make a huge difference.

I've tried applying this viewpoint in a recent part of my life. This is gonna sound kinda embarrassing, but I feel like it's worth explaining. I started college a in late August and surprisingly I found a girl who I liked in early september. Things were going very good for about a month until recently she became a bit distant, and we just discussed tonight how she couldn't see herself getting with me.

I did everything that was under my control in the situation to get the preferred outcome. Intellectually, I know that there is nothing to be worried about. But that doesn't help too much with the fact that emotionally, I still feel very sad about things not working out how I wanted.

I still will try my best to keep my emotions from clouding my judgement no matter what. But this would be so much easier if my emotions align with my rational mind. It's a pattern beyond just this situation with the girl; I've noticed that a lot of the time, I will rationally know that the preparations are more important than the outcome, yet the emotional part of my mind will just not get the memo. How can I get my emotions to be less focused on the outcomes of my actions so both the emotional and logical sides of me can work together?

Cómo se puede usar esta corriente para sobrellevar la idea de que esa felicidad que tenías con una persona ya no será posible .

Stoicism helped me save a life. A few months back I read an article in the local town paper about a local woman who was in need of a live liver donor. She has a genetic liver disease for the past 26 years and is now in stage 4 cirrhosis. She was slowly dying and in desperate need. I said to myself “well someone will do it” I paused, and thought “yeah, SOMEONE has do it.”

I looked up what a live liver donor entails. They take 70% of your liver and give it to her, the recipient, and your liver grows back. There are no long term affects and essentially no death rate. She has a 95% success rate.

After lots of pre-op testing etc. a few weeks ago I had the surgery and donated part of my liver to her and we are both doing great!

I said to everyone that to me this was temporary pain for someone to live. I couldn’t think of a reason not to do this. And it was all worth it. The first couple weeks were tough. I’m still tired because my liver is growing back but I would absolutely do it again. All my thoughts on this came back to stoic virtues of Courage and Justice. She needed this, 17 others tried but were either not a match or ghosted her. I was the only one to stay around. I never wavered. There are so many times in our lives where we do small just things. Those are great. Sometimes that opportunity comes along where it costs real pain, but you need to have the courage to pull through for justice. For a benefit that far outweighs your sacrifice.

I have two young boys. My oldest who is 6 told me when I asked if he thought it was worth it even though it’s going to be painful to me for a little bit. He said “well yeah you are going to save her life, duh”. That makes it worth it as well.

If anyone is interested please visit: https://liverfoundation.org/liver-diseases/treatment/living-donor-liver-transplant-information-center/

It's been 10 years since I stumbled upon Meditations, and thanks to the fact that I was already casually studying psychology and a bit of philosophy for a few years, I was able to follow the book and got hooked on Stoic practice.

I have since read the letters of Seneca and then decided to make a quick stop in modern time with "The Practicing Stoic" as a way to check my own understanding and see if my own Stoic practice is close to what is intended, and I mostly found I was on the right path.

But now I only have Epictetus to read, and I have avoided him for a reason, while Senca says stuff like "a man who didn't grieve is a lucky man not a more stoic man" from my basic understanding of Epictetus he would say death is out of our control so we shouldn't grieve.

Now, from my basic understanding of Epictetus life his views make sense to me; he is a free slave who was probably born into it or at least became one at a young age. When nothing is ever in your control, it is much easier to "let go" of it since you've been practicing since childhood with no real choice in the matter.

In the modern western world I feel we do have so much control over our life, even the option to walk away from anything is not an option people in rome had. I am not sure how much Epictetus teachings will help me, or create logical conflicts I might have to struggle with for a while. If it's the latter I wonder how you guys have made Epictetus' teachings work in the modern world.

Hey everyone,

I'm trying to work on myself and I have a problem that I really want to get better at.

I tend to get way too emotionally affected by things that either don't really concern me or that I can't change.

I can get angry or annoyed very quickly, especially when I feel like someone is deliberately provoking me, treating me unfairly, disrespecting me(like ignoring me), crossing my boundaries or doing something that I consider stupid or unnecessary.

The bigger problem is that I often don't just get annoyed in the moment... I keep thinking about it afterwards... for way too long ...

I'll replay situations in my head, think about what happened, what I should have said, what the other person should have done differently, how unfair it was, etc.

I also struggle with jealousy sometimes. I don't necessarily want to be jealous of other people, but I still catch myself comparing myself to them or thinking about things they have that I don't.

And when someone has emotionally hurt me (especially people who were important to me), I can have a really hard time letting it go. Even when I logically understand that thinking about it won't change anything, my brain keeps going back to it.

I don't want to become emotionless or stop caring about people. I basically want to learn how to choose what deserves my attention and what doesn't.

I'd really like to learn how to:

- Stop being so easily provoked

- Not take everything personally

- Stop caring so much about things that don't actually affect my life

- Stop replaying situations where I felt treated unfairly

- Let go of things that happened in the past

- Deal with jealousy in a healthier way

- Stop comparing myself to other people

- Stop caring so much what others think

- Control my reaction when I'm angry instead of reacting immediately

- Accept things that I can't change

- Spend less time thinking about people or situations that hurt me

- Become more emotionally resilient without becoming cold or uncaring

I'm especially interested in practical things I can actually practice, rather than just "don't think about it" or "just ignore it."

If you've personally struggled with this and managed to improve, I'd really like to hear what actually helped you.

Books, exercises, mental techniques, journaling methods, therapy approaches, Stoicism, meditation, whatever... I'm open to pretty much anything that can help.

I'm basically trying to become someone who can think:

"That sucks, but it's not worth ruining my day over."

…and actually mean it.

Thanks in advance. :)