February

15th
ONLY BAD DREAMS

“Clear your mind and get a hold on yourself and, as when awakened from sleep and realizing it
was only a bad dream upsetting you, wake up and see that what’s there is just like those
dreams.”
—MARCUS AURELIUS, M EDITATIONS, 6.31

T he author Raymond Chandler was describing most of us when he wrote in a letter to his publisher, “I
never looked back, although I had many uneasy periods looking forward.” Thomas Jefferson once
joked in a letter to John Adams, “How much pain have cost us the evils which have never happened!”
And Seneca would put it best: “There is nothing so certain in our fears that’s not yet more certain in the
fact that most of what we dread comes to nothing.”
Many of the things that upset us, the Stoics believed, are a product of the imagination, not reality. Like
dreams, they are vivid and realistic at the time but preposterous once we come out of it. In a dream, we
never stop to think and say: “Does this make any sense?” No, we go along with it. The same goes with our
flights of anger or fear or other extreme emotions.
Getting upset is like continuing the dream while you’re awake. The thing that provoked you wasn’t
real—but your reaction was. And so from the fake comes real consequences. Which is why you need to
wake up right now instead of creating a nightmare.
 February 16th
DON’T MAKE THINGS HARDER THAN THEY NEED TO BE

“If someone asks you how to write your name, would you bark out each letter? And if they get
angry, would you then return the anger? Wouldn’t you rather gently spell out each letter for them?
So then, remember in life that your duties are the sum of individual acts. Pay attention to each of
these as you do your duty . . . just methodically complete your task.”
—MARCUS AURELIUS, M EDITATIONS, 6.26

H ere’s a common scenario. You’re working with a frustrating coworker or a difficult boss. They ask
you to do something and, because you dislike the messenger, you immediately object. There’s this
problem or that one, or their request is obnoxious and rude. So you tell them, “No, I’m not going to do it.”
Then they retaliate by not doing something that you had previously asked of them. And so the conflict
escalates.
Meanwhile, if you could step back and see it objectively, you’d probably see that not everything
they’re asking for is unreasonable. In fact, some of it is pretty easy to do or is, at least, agreeable. And if
you did it, it might make the rest of the tasks a bit more tolerable too. Pretty soon, you’ve done the entire
thing.
Life (and our job) is difficult enough. Let’s not make it harder by getting emotional about insignificant
matters or digging in for battles we don’t actually care about. Let’s not let emotion get in the way of
kathêkon, the simple, appropriate actions on the path to virtue.
 February 17th
THE ENEMY OF HAPPINESS

“It is quite impossible to unite happiness with a yearning for what we don’t have. Happiness has
all that it wants, and resembling the well-fed, there shouldn’t be hunger or thirst.”
—EPICTETUS, DISCOURSES, 3.24.17

I ’ll be happy when I graduate, we tell ourselves. I’ll be happy when I get this promotion, when this
diet pays off, when I have the money that my parents never had. Conditional happiness is what
psychologists call this kind of thinking. Like the horizon, you can walk for miles and miles and never
reach it. You won’t even get any closer.
Eagerly anticipating some future event, passionately imagining something you desire, looking forward
to some happy scenario—as pleasurable as these activities might seem, they ruin your chance at happiness
here and now. Locate that yearning for more, better, someday and see it for what it is: the enemy of your
contentment. Choose it or your happiness. As Epictetus says, the two are not compatible.
 February 18th
PREPARE FOR THE STORM

“This is the true athlete—the person in rigorous training against false impressions. Remain firm,
you who suffer, don’t be kidnapped by your impressions! The struggle is great, the task divine—
to gain mastery, freedom, happiness, and tranquility.”
—EPICTETUS, DISCOURSES, 2.18.27–28

E pictetus also used the metaphor of a storm, saying that our impressions are not unlike extreme
weather that can catch us and whirl us about. When we get worked up or passionate about an issue,
we can relate.
But let’s think about the role of the weather in modern times. Today, we have forecasters and experts
who can fairly accurately predict storm patterns. Today, we’re defenseless against a hurricane only if we
refuse to prepare or heed the warnings.
If we don’t have a plan, if we never learned how to put up the storm windows, we will be at the
mercy of these external—and internal—elements. We’re still puny human beings compared with one-
hundred-mile-per-hour winds, but we have the advantage of being able to prepare—being able to struggle
against them in a new way.
 February 19th
THE BANQUET OF LIFE

“Remember to conduct yourself in life as if at a banquet. As something being passed around

comes to you, reach out your hand and take a moderate helping. Does it pass you by? Don’t stop
it. It hasn’t yet come? Don’t burn in desire for it, but wait until it arrives in front of you. Act this
way with children, a spouse, toward position, with wealth—one day it will make you worthy of
a banquet with the gods.”
—EPICTETUS, ENCHIRIDION, 15

T he next time you see something you want, remember Epictetus’s metaphor of life’s banquet. As you
find yourself getting excited, ready to do anything and everything to get it—the equivalent of reaching
across the table and grabbing a dish out of someone’s hands—just remind yourself: that’s bad manners
and unnecessary. Then wait patiently for your turn.
This metaphor has other interpretations too. For instance, we might reflect that we’re lucky to have
been invited to such a wonderful feast (gratitude). Or that we should take our time and savor the taste of
what’s on offer (enjoying the present moment) but that to stuff ourselves sick with food and drink serves
no one, least of all our health (gluttony is a deadly sin, after all). That at the end of the meal, it’s rude not
to help the host clean up and do the dishes (selflessness). And finally, that next time, it’s our turn to host
and treat others just as we had been treated (charity).
Enjoy the meal!