Donald Robertson

Wealth does not bring about virtue, but virtue makes wealth and everything else good for men, both individually and collectively

“It’s not things that upset me but my judgments about them.”

For Stoics, feelings of pleasure in themselves are neither good nor bad. Rather, whether our state of mind is good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, depends on the things we take enjoyment in.

The Stoics believed that entertainment, sex, food, and even alcohol have their place in life—they’re neither good nor bad in themselves. However, when pursued excessively, they can become unhealthy.

“You are just a thought and not at all the thing you claim to represent”—the thing itself having no intrinsic value. You might also adapt Epictetus and say “It’s not things that make us crave them but our judgments about things.” We are the ones who choose to assign value to things that look appealing.

we tend to slip into the habit of thinking about external things as if they were more important than fulfilling our own nature.

So having caught those feelings early and reminded yourself that it’s mainly your thinking that’s causing your feelings, just refrain from acting on the desire or go and engage in a different activity instead, something healthy that you find intrinsically rewarding. You are always free to do something else.

When people are really struggling, they focus on their inability to cope and the feeling that the problem is spiraling out of control: “I just can’t bear this any longer!” This is a form of catastrophizing: focusing too much on the worst-case scenario and feeling overwhelmed.

It’s not our pains or illnesses that upset us but our judgments about them, as the Stoics would put it.

Pain is just a sensation, in other words; what matters is how we choose to respond to it.