Stoic Quotes & Sayings

Here is your great soul - the man who has given himself over to Fate; on the other hand, that man is a weakling and a degenerate who struggles and maligns the order of the universe and would rather reform the gods than reform himself. — Seneca.

I - though forced through lack of space to assume the form of a stoic guinea pig crouched between the girl's shoe and the glove compartment - was my usual dignified self. — Jonathan Stroud

I think Joy sleeps in strange places. We're always looking for her in shiny, happy, fun times, assuming that Joy prefers her twin brother, Pleasure, when she often hangs out with her somewhat stoic big sister, Strength. Joy is not always easy to recognize, dirt-smudged and sweating, brambles in her hair. I want to believe she sometimes wears a ski mask. — Edmond Manning

I'm stoic like a statue of Stonewall Jackson. I'd make a great U.S. President, but I'd make an even better chiseled piece of marble - and that's what makes me such an amazing lover. — Jarod Kintz

You want to know how I'm feeling? Just look at me, and I'll tell you how I'm feeling. Nothing is hidden. I'm all out there. I cry like a baby, I get upset, I stamp my feet. I'm not stoic. — Marcia Gay Harden

Until we have begun to go without them, we fail to realize how unnecessary many things are. We've been using them not because we needed them but because we had them. — Seneca.

I wanted to wait until after the baby and when we'd saved up enough to have a real, big wedding."
Blake was stoic as she picked the right words.
"But to have heard him say I do ... " She trailed off and ran her hand through her hair. — Debra Anastasia

To find and enjoy profound happiness, learn from nature and emulate her stoic calmness. — Debasish Mridha

Ash went over to the closet, and Sloane maintained his stoic expression. There was no way Dex would be hiding in the closet. It was too obvious. Ash opened the door, looking unimpressed. "There's a fuckwit naked in your closet."
Dex looked up at Ash with wide eyes. "This isn't what it looks like. I dropped some change, it rolled under the closet door, and when I went to pick it up, my clothes fell off. True story. — Charlie Cochet

Hour by hour resolve firmly to do what comes to hand with dignity, and with humanity, independence, and justice. Allow your mind freedom from all other considerations. This you can do, if you will approach each action as though it were your last, dismissing the desire to create an impression, the admiration of self, the discontent with your lot. See how little man needs to master, for his days to flow on in quietness and piety: he has but to observe these few counsels, and the gods will ask nothing more. — Marcus Aurelius

Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present. — Marcus Aurelius

It is a ridiculous thing for a man not to fly from his own badness, which is indeed possible, but to fly from other men's badness, which is impossible. — Marcus Aurelius

No doubt, much of the joy of a great romance is the moment when these stoic heroes crack open and reveal themselves to their heroines - the only women strong enough to match them. — Sarah MacLean

The shaman helps you figure it out. I already know what I'm going to be."
I prodded him in the ribs. He couldn't just leave me hanging like that.
"A speech therapist." he said.
The whole world could have stopped. I wouldn't have noticed.
Rafael gave me an unusually stoic look. "I'm going to get your voice back someday," he said. "I though that was obvious. — Rose Christo

The Christian stoic who has crushed his feelings is only two-thirds of a man; an important third part has been repudiated. Holy feeling had an important place in the life of our Lord. "For the joy that was set before Him" He endured the cross and despised its shame. He pictured Himself crying, "Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. — A.W. Tozer

Why be concerned about others, come to that, when you've outdone your own self? Set yourself a limit which you couldn't even exceed if you wanted to, and say good-bye at last to those deceptive prizes more precious to those who hope for them than to those who have won them. If there were anything substantial in them they would sooner or later bring a sense of fullness; as it is they simply aggravate the thirst of those who swallow them. — Seneca.

So the life of a philosopher extends widely: he is not confined by the same boundary as are others. He alone is free from the laws that limit the human race, and all ages serve him as though he were a god. — Seneca.

The main thing was finding this ... voice that I had interest in, which I'll call the quiet-yet-stoic voice: the very quiet yet very strong voice that I developed, that people would want to hear and that was worth paying attention to. — Gillian Welch

A more promising hypothesis is that happiness comes from within and cannot be obtained by making the world conform to your desires. This idea was widespread in the ancient world: Buddha in India and the Stoic philosophers in ancient Greece and Rome all counseled people to break their emotional attachments to people and events, which are always unpredictable and uncontrollable, and to cultivate instead an attitude of acceptance. This ancient idea deserves respect, and it is certainly true that changing your mind is usually a more effective response to frustration than is changing the world. — Jonathan Haidt

Belief in God and a future life makes it possible to go through life with less of stoic courage than is needed by skeptics. — Bertrand Russell

Let a stoic open the resources of man, and tell men they are not leaning willows, but can and must detach themselves; that with the exercise of self-trust, new powers shall appear. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

It seemed that my identity had necessarily split, that I'd turned into a different person. I could look at her now and see all that stoic ferocity in her eyes, how she wanted to do something that could never be undone. Something permanent. Some little forever. But I'm not interested in forever. Not anymore. — Catherine Lacey

While the melodrama of hucking crates of tea into Boston Harbor continues to inspire civic-minded hotheads to this day, it's worth remembering the hordes of stoic colonial women who simply swore off tea and steeped basil leaves in boiling water to make the same point. What's more valiant: littering from a wharf or years of doing chores and looking after children from dawn to dark without caffeine? — Sarah Vowell

Remember, it is not enough to be hit or insulted to be harmed, you must believe that you are being harmed. If someone succeeds in provoking you, realize that your mind is complicit in the provocation. Which is why it is essential that we not respond impulsively to impressions; take a moment before reacting, and you will find it easier to maintain control. — Epictetus

Yeah, and so Max and Dylan are supposed to, like, go to Germany and have kids together," I heard Gazzy say.
My eyes popped open and I bolted upright.
"What?" Fang said, his voice icy.
"Gazzy!" I yelled.
Wide blue eyes looked at me in surprise, then back at Fang's stoic face. "Oh. Was I not supposed to say anything?" Gazzy asked. — James Patterson

Man doesn't realize his real purpose on earth so long as he rolls in comforts. It is absolutely true that adversity teaches a man a bitter lesson, toughens his fiber and moulds his character. In other words, an altogether new man is born out of adversity which helpfully destroys one's ego and makes one humble and selfless. Prolonged suffering opens the eyes to hate the things for which one craved before unduly, leading eventually even to a state of resignation. It then dawns on us that continued yearnings brings us intense agony. But the stoic mind is least perturbed by the vicissitudes of life. It is well within our efforts to conquer grief. It's simple. Develop an attitude of detachment even while remaining in the thick of terrestrial pleasures. — V.S. Naipaul

I've intentionally played things very straight with Batman. I didn't want to be too jarring for fans. Zero Year accommodates a bit more style. But, on the whole, I feel Batman - a stoic, methodical, detective - is better served a wee bit reserved. And, I'm anything but comfortable. Zero Year is pressure, man. — Greg Capullo

[Philosophers] have come to envy the philologist and the mathematician, and they have taken over all the inessential elements in those studies - with the result that they know more about devoting care and attention to their speech than about devoting such attention to their lives. — Seneca.

We look up to see if it is day or night. If stars burn cool and moon does shine, we take to smoke divine and wine.
If breath of sun does belch its heat,
we boil coffee and prepare to eat. — Roman Payne

Also because the two young women working the kiosk seemed profoundly unconcerned by what was unfolding on CNN, either that or they were extremely stoic or they hadn't noticed yet, so visiting them was like going back in time to the paradise of a half hour earlier, when he hadn't yet known that everything was coming undone. — Emily St. John Mandel

She has many names and many visages. She has loves and desires. She dares to dream of a future for herself and her people, despite living under the shadow of the gun, the acrid odour of devastation clogging her nostrils. For the most part she is stoic, for the garrison is also her home, her workplace, her field and her playground. Sometimes, she cries out in anguish, but the sound is muted, for there are few who want to hear. Her suffering and courage would be the stuff of legend, if only legend consisted of ordinary women carrying out extraordinary acts, going about the daily business of survival, displaying super-human strength in countering a mighty military juggernaut. — Laxmi Murthy

Remember to act always as if you were at a symposium. When the food or drink comes around, reach out and take some politely; if it passes you by don't try pulling it back. And if it has not reached you yet, don't let your desire run ahead of you, be patient until your turn comes. Adopt a similar attitude with regard to children, wife, wealth and status, and in time, you will be entitled to dine with the gods. Go further and decline these goods even when they are on offer and you will have a share in the gods' power as well as their company. That is how Diogenes, Heraclitus and philosophers like them came to be called, and considered, divine. — Epictetus

He [Ryan white] spoke to me that my life was out of order. My life was a mess. I had no values anymore. And he was so stoic with his infection. He wasn't bitter. He wasn't angry. He just was a kid. He wanted to go to school and play football, drive his car. And he had no bitterness about him. — Elton John

The best CEOs in our research display tremendous ambition for their company combined with the stoic will to do whatever it takes, no matter how brutal (within the bounds of the company's core values), to make the company great. Yet at the same time they display a remarkable humility about themselves, ascribing much of their own success to luck, discipline and preparation rather than personal genius. — James C. Collins

To be a good sportsman, one must be a stoic and never show rancor in defeat, or triumph in victory, or irritation, no matter what annoyance is encountered. One who can not help sulking, or explaining, or protesting when the loser, or exulting when the winner, has no right to take part in games or contests. — Emily Post

Die - you will have to die. But die gracefully. I am not saying die like a stoic, I am not saying die like a very controlled man. No, I'm saying die gracefully, beautifully, as if a friend is coming, knocks at your door, and you are happy. And you embrace the friend and invite him in, and you have been waiting for him so long ... — Rajneesh

Lucifer's most stoic warrior shook his head. "I say we put a plastic bag over his head and put him out of his misery," muttered Xaphan. "The Lord I knew wouldn't want to live this way. — Eve Langlais

"Sound, sound the clarion, fill the fife! To all the sensual world proclaim, One crowded hour of glorious life Is worth an age without a name". Do not then (concludes the Stoic) take good words in your mouth, and prate before applauding citizens of honour, duty, and so forth, while you make your private lives a mere selfish calculation of expediency. We were surely born for nobler ends than this, and none who is worthy the name of a man would subscribe to doctrines which destroy all honour and all chivalry. The heroes of old time won their immortality not by weighing pleasures and pains in the balance, but by being prodigal of their lives, doing and enduring all things for the sake of their fellow-men. — W. Lucas Collins

The guy behind the counter scratches his neck. "Are you being serious?" Her face is stoic. "Absolutely. I never kid about teddy bears. — Jessica Sorensen

Indeed, the application of the adjective "stoic" to a person who shows strength and courage in misfortune probably owes more to the aristocratic Roman value system than it does to Greek philosophers. Stoicism — Marcus Aurelius

Better than a shove in the eye with a dry stick. [- Jack] — Patrick O'Brian

Normal people think we're highly dependent and can't live without ongoing support, but in fact there are times when we're stoic heroes. — Naoki Higashida

I have learned to be a friend to myself Great improvement this indeed Such a one can never be said to be alone for know that he who is a friend to himself is a friend to all mankind — Seneca.

Even the most stoic of men will be childlike at least once in a day. — Claire Bloom

You are still on your own; be stoic; don't panic; get through this hell to the generous sweet overflowing GIVING love of spring ... dawn came, black and white gray into a frozen hell.
I lived: that once. And must shoulder the bundle, the burden of my dead selves until I, again, live. — Sylvia Plath

I practice stoic philosophy. As a human being, you may have emotions, but these don't need to affect your soul. The two are not one. — Daphne Guinness

The soul of man is thus an emanation from the godhead, into whom it will eventually be re-absorbed. The divine ruling principle makes all things work together for good, but for the good of the whole. The highest good of man is consciously to work with God for the common good, and this is the sense in which the Stoic tried to live in accord with nature. In the individual it is virtue alone which enables him to do this; as Providence rules the universe, so virtue in the soul must rule man. — Marcus Aurelius

Even the least of our activities ought to have some end in view. — Marcus Aurelius

Any port in a storm. — Michael J. Tougias

There is nothing worse than a proud stoic. -- The Big Why — Michael Winter

When you're wearing an animal costume and something bad happens, your facial expression doesn't change. The animal is deadpan the whole time. If you're skiing in a gorilla suit and you fall, you just see a gorilla who has no emotion. It's just a stoic gorilla, wildly falling down a hill, out of control. — Demetri Martin

Back when he had first come to the monastery, they had given him a very simple ritual called Forgiving the Day. Even the youngest child could do this; all it required was looking back over the day and dismissing the day's pains as a thing that were past while choosing to remember as gains lessons learned or moments of insight. As initiates grew in the ways of Sa, it was expected they would grow more sophisticated in this exercise, learning to balance the day, taking responsibility for their own actions and learning from them without indulging in either guilt or regrets."
p. 240 — Robin Hobb

Fourteen years without a mother had me believe I could be stoic when I finally met her. — Maria V. Snyder

If I were a person of color in Florida, I would pick up a brick and start walking toward that courthouse in Sanford. Those that do not, those that hold the pain and betrayal inside and somehow manage to resist violence - these citizens are testament to a stoic tolerance that is more than the rest of us deserve. I confess, their patience and patriotism is well beyond my own. — David Simon

So all that is said of the wise man by Stoic or Oriental or modern essayist, describes to each reader his own idea, describes his unattained but attainable self. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

It wasn't even one of those stoic pimples that goes quietly when you pop it; this one was cystic and painful and had roots that seemed to extend into my brain. — Mindy Kaling

Looking at a photograph by Helen Levitt of four boys in a New York street, we are likely to find ourselves longing to comfort the grim-faced, stoic young man in the corner, whose mother perhaps only half an hour ago did up the many buttons of his handsome coat, and whose distressed expression evokes a pure form of agony. But how very different the same scene would have looked from just a metre away and another viewpoint. To the boy at the far right, what appears to matter most is a chance to take a closer look at his friend's toy. He has already lost any interest in the overdressed crybaby by the wall, whom he and his classmates have just slapped hard for a bit of fun, on this day as on most others. — Alain De Botton

In his numerous historical and Scriptural works Bauer rejects all supernatural religion, and represents Christianity as a natural product of the mingling of the Stoic and Alexandrian philosophies ... — Joseph McCabe

He thinks my hair smells like spring rain. I'm really trying to remain stoic and unaffected. I remind myself that I don't like poetic language. I don't like poetry. I don't even like people who like poetry.
But I'm not dead inside either. — Nicola Yoon

You adopted him," I said when Romeo sat on the coffee table in front of me.
"You love him," he said simply. Like that was all he needed to know.
"But you'll have to take care of him. Feed him. Give him water. Change the litter box."
"Thought maybe you'd want to help."
I looked up. Our eyes locked.
"What if I say no?" I asked. "What happens to Murphy then?"
He shrugged. "He's a cook cat. I'll keep him. He can watch football with me on Sundays."
I couldn't help but smile at the image that cast in my head.
"You'd really do that?" I whispered.
He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "Yes." Then his stoic eyes turned playful and his smile came out. "You wanna watch football with me on Sundays too?"
- Rimmel & Romeo — Cambria Hebert

There are times when a man should sleep entwined in the warm flesh of a woman, his flanks plummeting into the perfumed bedding while she lovingly rolls her sweet shoulders into his chest. Whereas, there are times to be stoic and solitary - sleeping alone on a wooden board with twill sheets and splinters that scratch the skin. — Roman Payne

One is a careful distinction between things which are in our power and things which are not. Desire and dislike, opinion and affection, are within the power of the will; whereas health, wealth, honour, and other such are generally not so. The Stoic was called upon to control his desires and affections, and to guide his opinion; — Marcus Aurelius

A Stoic is someone who transforms fear into prudence, pain into transformation, mistakes into initiation, and desire into undertaking. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Many of us assume that we have to do things a certain way: ignore passion in favor of safer bets, act stoic amid inner turmoil, run on an upward trajectory of success and money acquisition at any emotional cost. But these are not rules. — Martha Beck

To expel hunger and thirst there is no necessity of sitting in a palace and submitting to the supercilious brow and contumelious favour of the rich and great there is no necessity of sailing upon the deep or of following the camp What nature wants is every where to be found and attainable without much difficulty whereas require the sweat of the brow for these we are obliged to dress anew j compelled to grow old in the field and driven to foreign mores A sufficiency is always at hand — Seneca.

A nation is born stoic, and dies epicurean — Will Durant

Hammer does not think he will make it through this next winter. His breath comes short in his chest, and it takes much effort for him to get up and dressed. My body is still creaky and sound, but with every labor of his breath, I think that my heart will not endure. Enduring were Hammer's gift, not mine, and I will not endure a life in which he does not laugh by my side and touch my hand, wish for the best things for me, and rejoice when I have them. My sturdy, blessed, stoic Hammer - how can life be, without him? — Amy Lane

At first I felt dizzy - not with the kind of dizziness that makes the body reel but the kind that's like a dead emptiness in the brain, an instinctive awareness of the void. — Fernando Pessoa

She saw it over and over again in her male patients, she said - it could probably qualify as an epidemic among American men: this stubborn reluctance to embrace our wholeness - this stoic denial that we had come from our mothers as well as our fathers. It was sad, really - tragic. So wasteful of human lives, as our wars and drive-by shootings kept proving to us; all one had to do was turn on CNN or CBS News. And yet, it was comic, too - the lengths most men went to to prove that they were tough guys. — Wally Lamb

From forty to fifty a man is at heart either a stoic or a satyr. — Arthur Wing Pinero

Who is the more righteous? The stoic farmer who dutifully tends his fields while the world burns? Or the man who brings merciless violence to the enemies of peace? Is the common criminal an equal villain to the agent who kills on behalf of a cause greater than himself? I've answered these questions and made peace with their consequences. As I mounted my horse alongside Vettias, my mentor in the dark arts, I would need to draw on the fortitude these answers provided more than ever. We — Christian Kachel

I've sat in sushi bars, really fine ones, and I know how hard this guy worked, how proud he is. I know you don't need sauce. I know he doesn't even want you to pour sauce. And I've seen customers come in and do that, and I've seen him, as stoic as he tries to remain, I've seen him die a little inside. — Anthony Bourdain

A jitendriya or stoic remains composed and converts his weakness and threats into his strength and opportunities — Rohit Omar

Had he stood outside my door as I'd stood outside his, fists at his sides, lips drawn back? Did it have him as bad as it had me? Was it eating at him, gnawing at him with the same sharp vicious little teeth that wouldn't let me sleep?
Yes, it was. I could see the rage of insatiable uninvited lust in every line of that dark, stoic face that had once been too subtly etched for me to read. I wasn't the only one lying awake at night, fevered with memories, tossing, turning, soaking my sheets, burning up
not for Fae sex, but him, damn it all to hell, him. — Karen Marie Moning

She was lost.
Stumbling around the uneven floors and precarious book towers falling against each other for support, Alice realised she would have to do the unthinkable and talk loudly in a bookshop.
Maybe even shout.
Where were the staff?
Where were all the people who had ever read or owned these volumes? Where were the writers who created them? She walked on carefully through this purgatory of print, assuming the stoic reserve of a war widow seeking a lost husband among the silent names blurring past. — Josh Redman

It makes a tremendous emotional and practical difference to one whether one accepts the universe in the drab discolored way of stoic resignation to necessity, or with the passionate happiness of Christian saints. — William James

Can you catch the expression of the Sperm Whale's there? It is the same he died with, only some of the longer wrinkles in the forehead seem now faded away. I think his broad brow to be full of a prairie-like placidity, born of a speculative indifference as to death. But mark the other head's [Right Whale] expression. See that amazing lower lip, pressed by accident against the vessel's side, so as firmly to embrace the jaw. Does not this whole head seem to speak of an enormous practical resolution in facing death? This Right Whale I take to have been a Stoic; the Sperm Whale, a Platonian, who might have taken up Spinoza in his latter years. — Herman Melville

Horace, fit, and athletic and light on his feet, gave their guards the fewest opportunities to beat him, although on one occasion an angry Tualaghi, furious that Horace misunderstood an order to kneel, slashed his dagger across the young man's face, opening a thin, shallow cut on his right cheek. The wound was superficial but as Evanlyn treated it that evening, Horace shamelessly pretended that it was more painful than it really was. He enjoyed the touch of her ministering hands. Halt and Gilan, bruised and weary, watched as she cleaned the wound and gently pated it dry. Horace did a wonderful job of pretending to bear great pain with stoic bravery. Halt shook his head in disgust.
"What faker," he said to Gilan. The younger Ranger nodded.
"Yes. He's really making a meal of it isn't he?" He paused, then added more ruefully, "Wish I'd thought of it first. — John Flanagan

I think for me, beauty is sincerity. I think that there are so many different ways that someone can be beautiful. You know, someone so funny that it makes them beautiful no matter how they look, because they're sincere in it. Or somebody who's really emotional, and moody and thoughtful and stoic, but that makes them beautiful because that's sincerely who they are — Taylor Swift

My childhood was very difficult. I had every childhood disease and then some, but my parents didn't mollycoddle me. They left me to fight those battles on my own. I guess that was very Canadian, very stoic. But it's good. I had to become a warrior. I had to give up hope and find a substitute for hope that would be far more stable. — Joni Mitchell

You're a pretty cool customer, huh?" says Agent Hunt.
"I hide my inner pain under my stoic visage."
Agent Hunt looks like he would like to put his fist through my stoic visage. — Holly Black

If given a choice between stoic justice and compassion, I choose compassion. And if given a choice between worldly leadership and heaven at my feet - I choose heaven. — Yasmin Mogahed

Dammit, Billy. You had one job. One. Job.

I moved my glare to my brother. "May I have a word?"

"Now?" he asked, looking and sounding almost delighted. Of note, delighted for Billy was imperturbably stoic for everyone else.

"Yes. Now." I bared my teeth in a grin.

Billy's eyes moved between mine and I cursed his fastidious grooming. He'd taken extra care with the beard trimmer this afternoon. He also smelled like a profligate, cologne, and unrequited infatuation.

My older brother turned and whispered something into Jennifer's ear. I stiffened, barely restraining the urge to grab him by his shirt collar and yank him down the hall.

But I didn't. Instead I made a list of all his most treasured possessions for . . . reasons. — Penny Reid

Before you realize this truth, say the Yogis, you will always be in despair, a notion nicely expressed in this exasperated line from the Greek stoic philosopher Epictetus: 'You bear God within you, poor wretch, and know it not. — Elizabeth Gilbert

Japanese often use the expression shikata-ga-nai (there is nothing you can do) as a fatalistic response to a given circumstance. They assume that circumstance is all there is; they face that shikata-ga-nai with stoic resignation. But the Christian God offers a reality far greater, a possibility of the infinite breaking through, even though the fallen world is cursed and operates within the limitations of a natural, closed mechanism. — Makoto Fujimura

Her stoic attitude contributed to the air of mystery surrounding her, long before she had any secrets to keep. — Isabel Allende

From here on out, there's just reality. I think that's what maturity is: a stoic response to endless reality. But then, what do I know? — Carrie Fisher

I'm not sure how I feel about you 'handling my life energy,' Cal."
He grinned, and I was taken aback by how different it made him look. Cal spent so much time being stoic and solemn that it was easy to forget he even had teeth. "I'll buy you dinner first next time, I promise."
Okay, the grin was one thing, but that had definitely been flirting. — Rachel Hawkins

I wonder if God cries. Or gets sad, even. Or happy. Or elated. Does he ever have a good belly laugh? Does he sense contentment? Does he feel pride or remorse? Is he stoic? We know from the Old Testament that he experiences bloodthirsty, murderous rage and fierce pride. He imbued mankind with all of these emotions, but it's hard to imagine him feeling any of these. It's almost a little embarrassing to think of him feeling jealousy. Of course he's WAY more advanced and evolved than we are. So I guess the ultimate stage of humanity is when we don't laugh or cry or experience emotion at all. God gave us laughter as a constant remind of what lesser-evolved beings humans are. Stupid humans! — David Cross

Golden Rule has been rediscovered many times: by the authors of Leviticus and the Mahabharata; by Hillel, Jesus, and Confucius; by the Stoic philosophers of the Roman Empire; by social contract theorists such as Hobbes, Rousseau, and Locke; and by moral philosophers such as Kant in his categorical imperative. — Steven Pinker

My advice is really this: what we hear the philosophers saying and what we find in their writings should be applied in our pursuit of the happy life. We should hunt out the helpful pieces of teaching, and the spirited and noble-minded sayings which are capable of immediate practical application - not far-fetched or archaic expressions or extravagant metaphors and figures of speech - and learn them so well that words become works. No one to my mind lets humanity down quite so much as those who study philosophy as if it were a sort of commercial skill and then proceed to live in a quite different manner from the way they tell other people to live. — Seneca.

My eyes finally make the brave journey up to his. When I see the stoic look on his face, I want to step back, but I'm afraid I'll trip over my heart. I don't want him to watch me fall. — Colleen Hoover

Christianity is in no way a stoic faith. It fundamentally rejects the "stiff upper lip" school of thought. — Tullian Tchividjian

According to Bertrand Russell, the virtuous stoic was one whose will was in agreement with the natural order. He described the basic idea like this: In the life of the individual man, virtue is the sole good; such things as health, happiness, possessions, are of no account. Since virtue resides in the will, everything really good or bad in a man's life depends only upon himself. He may become poor, but what of it? He can still be virtuous. A tyrant may put him in prison, but he can still persevere in living in harmony with Nature. He may be sentenced to death, but he can die nobly, like Socrates. Therefore every man has perfect freedom, provided he emancipates himself from mundane desires. — Piper Kerman

Unfortunately for Hegel, both common sense and genius are more readily accessible than a continuous chain of reasoning that is directed at establishing the identity of one's world-knowledge with one's self-knowledge, slowly and painfully, without ever letting one slip back into the comfortable conviction of Stoic and Sceptic alike that what happens, or has happened, in one's world does not really matter to one. — H.S. Harris

It is better to be a well-rounded Christian than a stoic, hypocrite. — Lisa Askew

I love 'The Sportswriter' by Richard Ford. Ford really captures for me the bittersweetness of the quietly suffering American man. It's stoic, sad, and really beautiful. — Mark Ruffalo

I thought that you said that your name was reserved only for family." A small smile broke through his stoic expression.
"The way I see it, even if you don't come around and realize that you can't resist my striking looks and enticing charm, and that you desperately want to spend the rest of your life in my arms - "
"Which will never happen ... "
" - you'll eventually end up with my silly little brother. Who, just to warn you, despite being a great guy, is nowhere near as handsome and charming as I. — Ada Adams

For all of us, the time is short and the span of life is brief On top of that, our real human problem, the Stoic philosopher Seneca said in a direct rebuke to the modern illusion, is not just that life is short but that we waste so much of it-so that life ceases for us "just when we are getting ready for it."35
But — Os Guinness

There was a lot of pretense floating around; not just with aunties and all that but with emotions and how people saw you. They had a point. There's a lot to learn from that generation
the stoic approach. I think it's disgusting how they've been forgotten about in this way. It's the American hippies' fault, they saw an in there, a way of making money out of bad moods. That's all it is most of the time. You can't expect to feel cock-a-hoop every minute of every day. My mam and dad's generation understood this. They were just thankful the bombs had stopped threatening their lives. They just wanted to get on with living. — Mark E. Smith