Stoicism 101: Stoic Philosophy Made Simple (The 3 Key Ideas)

Stoicism is making a comeback in the 21st century.

Chances are you’ve already heard someone raving about this ancient philosophy and how “being Stoic” can help you kick ass at life.

Well, here’s the truth:

Practicing Stoicism will make you a more rational person with fewer negative emotions.

Sound good? Lucky for you, we’re gonna break down Stoicism into 3 key ideas, with quotes from the Stoics themselves.

But first we’ll start by introducing the 3 Big Stoics. They’re arguably the most important Philosophers to know, because a lot of their work is still available to us today.

Now that you’ve met the Big Stoics, let’s go over the 3 big ideas of Stoicism:

“It is not events that disturb the minds of men, but the view they take of them” ― Epictetus

“We suffer more in imagination than in reality” — Seneca

Say you’re at a party. You’re hanging out with your friends, wearing this nice white shirt that you bought just for today aaaand splash, someone spills red wine all over you.

A lot of people would look down at their wine splattered shirt and become pissed off, embarrassed and feel like the whole night was ruined.

But that doesn’t have to be the case.

A Stoic would see things for what they really are: It’s just a shirt.

“Yeah, maybe it looks silly now, but I’ll be OK. I can still have fun at this party. Actually, I can use it as an icebreaker. I’ll laugh about it, and people will probably admire me for not letting it ruin my good time.” — Stoic Person

This guy doesn’t care about ruining a shirt, why should you?

So just like that, a simple change in your mindset can turn a bad experience into to a good one.

“The only thing that isn’t worthless: to live this life out truthfully and rightly. And be patient with those who don’t” — Marcus Aurelius

“If thy brother wrongs thee, remember not so much his wrong-doing, but more than ever that he is thy brother” — Epictetus

“Misfortune is virtue’s opportunity” — Seneca

We’re all in this thing called life together.

As unique as each of us may be, we all have one thing in common:

Problems.

Big or small, everyone has problems.

The Stoics said we should understand everyone is struggling in some way. Knowing this, we should help each other out whenever we can. This is a big part of Virtue, which is a very important Stoic trait.

The Stoic’s were big on living a life of virtue.

This means being unselfish and understanding, while doing right by other people.

After all, it feels good to help each other.

“To make the best of what is in our power, and take the rest as it occurs” — Epictetus

“Learn to be indifferent to what makes no difference” — Marcus Aurelius

“It is the power of the mind to be unconquerable” — Seneca

This is the Golden Rule of Stoicism. We’ll even go as far as calling it a Stoic Superpower.

You can only have total control over one thing in life: your mind. With control of your mind, you choose what to spend your precious time and energy thinking about.

You can worry about the things you can’t control: weather, what people think of you, Kim Kardashian and Kanye West’s relationship problems…

Stoics don’t give a f@ck about stuff like this.

…Or you can put that energy towards improving an area of YOUR life that YOU control: Getting in better shape, putting more effort in at work, reaching out more often to friends and family, etc.

We only have a limited amount of time on this planet. Why waste it on the things that don’t matter?, especially when you can’t change them anyway.

Just accept everything for what it is, and get back to what you can control.

So to sum up the 3 key points of Stoicism:

So there you have it, Stoicism in a nutshell. If you enjoyed this post and would like to learn more about Stoicism, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca or Epictetus check us out at StoicElite . We keep Stoicism simple.