Live Like A Stoic: 52 Exercises for Cultivating a Good Life

There are countless other examples of this principle. You should not desire to be loved by your partner, but only to be the most lovable person you can be. You should not indulge an aversion to losing a match when you play a game or sport, but instead focus on playing to the best of your ability. Once you internalize the distinction between proper

When we perceive that another person has behaved wrongly toward us, the first step is to figure out what incorrect notion led them to act as they did. We can imagine ourselves in the other person’s situation, and, by thinking about what they value, can make sense of their actions—even if we don’t agree with them—immediately squashing the rising sen

This tendency to think that other people’s actions reflect their character while our own actions depend on circumstance is called the fundamental attribution error, a term first coined by psychologist Lee Ross.

The ancient Stoics were pantheists—that is, they thought that God was the same thing as the universe. The God/universe was made of matter and regulated by cause and effect. In a sense, the cosmos itself was a living organism, and whatever it was doing was for its own benefit. However, since we are literally bits and pieces of the God/universe, we a

the Stoic premeditatio’s goal is to loosen our attachment to external events in general, from something as simple as breaking your favorite cup (to use Epictetus’s example from Week 3) to the death of a loved one. Since you’re only doing this for a day, we do not recommend starting with a serious situation.

Method 2: Premeditate on others’ adversity. Now we’re shifting gears. So far this week you have focused on your own experiences. Today we’re expanding the power of premeditatio malorum to internalize the reality that you may be subject to unexpected misfortunes that happen to others.

The final step is to create some “at-hand” phrases you can tell yourself when intentionally practicing discomfort. At-hand phrases are an important part of Stoic practice; we’ll encounter them more throughout this book. They’re generally used as reminders of basic Stoic principles. Here, the purpose of these phrases is to remind yourself why you’re

Some modern Stoics refer to this exercise by the Latin term premeditatio malorum, the premeditation of bad stuff happening. It’s not that Stoics are pessimists; on the contrary, they are among the most realistic of people—they know that sometimes things won’t go their way, and are always mentally prepared for that occurrence.

Now that we know what they value, we should ask ourselves whether we sometimes have the same values. If we don’t—and we are reasonably confident that our judgment is on the mark—then we know that they were acting on the basis of a wrong judgment, and we should pity them, just as we would be sorry for someone who made an elementary mistake in logic

For the next week, choose a time at the end of each day to think about someone you encountered who frustrated you or whom you perceived to do you wrong.