Back to it...

Yesterday I didn't write in my blog.  I guess, I was feeling a bit down yesterday and chose to wallow for the day.  I am human and I guess the shock of last week was starting to catch up with me.  The Stoic reading for today was definitely applicable:

FOR, amidst perturbations and griefs and fears, and disappointed desires and incurred aversions, how can there be any entrance for happiness? And, where there are corrupt principles, there must all these things necessarily be.

EPICTETUS. DISCOURSES. Book iii. §22. ¶6.

When we are disappointed and depressed over what life has handed to us, it is because we put value on the wrong things. We held too much importance in things rather than valuing our character above all else.

 
This morning I got up, emptied the dishwasher, loaded the dishwasher and had breakfast with my hubby and daughter.  Time to start planning for the future, making the best decisions to allow more freedom to adjust and make changes. Life is certainly never boring and the sun is shining!  :)

Today is a day for banking, checking mail, etc. and running some errands.  Tonight we are out for supper with good friends.  :)  All in all a good day ahead of us.

Looking Through Rose Coloured Glasses...

MEN are disturbed, not by things, but by the principles and notions which they form concerning things. Death, for instance, is not terrible, else it would have appeared so to Socrates. But the terror consists in our notion of death that it is terrible. When therefore we are hindered, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never impute it to others, but to ourselves; that is, to our own principles. It is the action of an uninstructed person to lay the fault of his own bad condition upon others; of one entering upon instruction to lay the fault on himself; and of one perfectly instructed, neither on others nor on himself.

EPICTETUS. MANUAL. 5.

 

We need to learn to accept things as they are without colouring them with false circumstances and outcomes.  We all bring our particular biases and predispositions to situations in our life.  We don't actually see the situations for what they are but pile a bunch of baggage left over from past experiences and judgements onto the new situation.  This baggage becomes a lens or filter that we see the world through. We need to try to greet each circumstance as a new experience without automatically ascribing a variety of emotions to it.  We need to rationally analyze each experience or circumstance as a new land with a brand new landscape.  When we prejudge a situation or circumstance irrationally we predispose ourselves to failure, doomed to recreate mistakes from the past.  We also rob ourselves of the possibility of growth as we don't acknowledge the newness of the experience but greet it as a familiar occurrence and relegate it to the mundane and mediocre.

The Stoic practice of recognizing what is "in our control" and "not in our control" can help us eliminate a lot of these filters, allowing us to make new judgements and have new experiences.  I hope to cultivate an ability to analyze each situation as a new situation, making correct decisions without carrying negativity from the past.  Let's all strive to greet each new day as a new canvas rich and ripe for painting new vistas on.

"Make Good Choices"

When the children were in their teen years I used to tell them to "make good choices" before they would leave the house to go somewhere.   Just a subtle reminder of what they had been taught from a moral framework and to always let that framework be their guide for any actions/decisions that they might be called to make as individuals in the big wide world.

As a Stoic, it really is all about the choices we make.  The ability to discern right from wrong, a virtuous action from a vicious one, what is a good and what is an indifferent and what is just plain bad, is our main "weapon" in the battle of life.  Although there are some universal choices, saving a child, etc. based on the exercise of virtue versus vice, a lot of our choices are individual in nature.  What may be a correct choice for a friend or family member may not be the best choice for me.  Taking the Stoic yardstick of "good, bad or indifferent" we can measure our choices and decide whether the indifferents; where we live, food choices, clothing, employment, etc. are the best choice for us.  Sometimes they are a good choice but the timing at that moment is all wrong for us.  Often we have to choose between  an okay choice and an even better choice.  Looking forward to the possible outcomes or consequences of our choices is a great tool for the decision making process.  Although we are not possessed with 20/20 vision, except in hindsight, as we grow older the possible outcomes of choices become more predictable, following patterns that have already occurred in our lifetime.  The main thing needed in order to be discerning is a clear vision of what you want your life to look like, what your goals are.  You then craft your life like a discerning farmer, moving foward selecting good fruit and releasing the bad or the lesser.   We weed out the chaff and the less fruitful seedlings so that our harvest is a plentiful one.

Let us begin to work at planting good seed, discerning the weak plants from the strong, and looking forward to the bountiful harvest to come.