Epictetus

Who are those people by whom you wish to be admired? Are they not these whom you are in the habit of saying that they are mad? What then? Do you wish to be admired by the mad?

Whoever then wishes to be free, let him neither wish for anything nor avoid anything which depends on others: if he does not observe this rule, he must be a slave.

It is unreasonable to think we can earn rewards without being willing to pay their true price. It is always our choice whether or not we wish to pay the price for life's rewards.

When something happens, the only thing in your power is your attitude toward it. It is not the things that disturb us, but our interpretation of their significance. Things and people are not what we wish them to be nor are they what they seem to be. They are what they are.

It’s time to stop being vague. If you wish to be an extraordinary person, if you wish to be wise, then you should explicitly identify the kind of person you aspire to become.

Things themselves don't hurt or hinder us. Things simply are what they are. How we view these things is another matter.People think what they will think; it is of no concern to us.

No man is able to make progress when he is wavering between opposite things.

Now is the time to get serious about living your ideals. Once you have determined the spiritual principles you wish to exemplify, abide by these rules as if they were laws, as if it were indeed sinful to compromise them. Don't mind if others don't share your convictions. How long can you afford to put off who you really want to be? Your nobler self cannot wait any longer.

Caretake this moment. Immerse yourself in its particulars. Respond to this person, this challenge, this deed. Quit evasions. Stop giving yourself needless trouble. It is time to really live; to fully inhabit the situation you happen to be in now.

It is better to die of hunger having lived without grief and fear, than to live with a troubled spirit, amid abundance

Man is troubled not by events, but by the meaning he gives them.

What really frightens and dismays us is not external events themselves, but the way in which we think about them. It is not things that disturb us, but our interpretation of their significance.

If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid with regard to external things. Don't wish to be thought to know anything; and even if you appear to be somebody important to others, distrust yourself. For, it is difficult to both keep your faculty of choice in a state conformable to nature, and at the same time acquire external things. But while you are careful about the one, you must of necessity neglect the other

When a man is proud because he can understand and explain the writings of Chrysippus, say to yourself, 'if Chrysippus had not written obscurely, this man would have had nothing to be proud of.'

At this time is freedom anything but the right to live as we wish? Nothing else.

Every difficulty in life presents us with an opportunity to turn inward and to invoke our own submerged inner resources. The trials we endure can and should introduce us to our strengths.

To live a life of virtue, match up your thoughts, words, and deeds.

Whenever you are angry, be assured that it is not only a present evil, but that you have increased a habit.

The universe is but one great city, full of beloved ones, divine and human, by nature endeared to each other.

It is not he who reviles or strikes you who insults you, but your opinion that these things are insulting.

The world turns aside to let any man pass who knows where he is going.