Epictetus: Quotes & Memes

Please feel free to download, share, and enjoy these memes, featuring quotes from the stoic philosopher, Epictetus.

Stoic Memes: Epictetus Quotes

Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants.

Don’t explain your philosophy. Embody it.

There is only one way to happiness and that is to cease worrying about things which are beyond the power of our will.

Man is not worried by real problems so much as by his imagined anxieties about real problems.

Don’t just say you have read books. Show that through them you have learned to think better, to be a more discriminating and reflective person.

First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.

It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.

The key is to keep company only with people who uplift you, whose presence calls forth your best.

Any person capable of angering you becomes your master.

He who laughs at himself never runs out of things to laugh at.

Freedom is the only worthy goal in life. It is won by disregarding things that lie beyond our control.

Other people’s views and troubles can be contagious. Don’t sabotage yourself by unwittingly adopting negative, unproductive attitudes through your associations with others.

Circumstances don’t make the man, they only reveal him to himself.

It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows.

People are not disturbed by things, but by the views they take of them.

To accuse others for one’s own misfortune is a sign of want of education. To accuse oneself shows that one’s education has begun. To accuse neither oneself nor others shows that one’s education is complete.

Nature hath given men one tongue but two ears, that we may hear from others twice as much as we speak.

First learn the meaning of what you say, and then speak.

No man is free who is not master of himself.

He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has.

Seek not the good in external things; seek it in yourselves.

It is time to really live; to fully inhabit the situation you happen to be in now.

Take a moment before reacting, and you will find it easier to maintain control.

Whoever is going to listen to the philosophers needs a considerable practice in listening.

If any be unhappy, let him remember that he is unhappy by reason of himself alone.

Your happiness depends on three things, all of which are within your power: your will, your ideas concerning the events in which you are involved, and the use you make of your ideas.

If someone speaks badly of you, do not defend yourself against the accusations, but reply; you obviously don’t know about my other vices, otherwise you would have mentioned these as well

Control thy passions lest they take vengeance on thee.

You become what you give your attention to.

Give me by all means the shorter and nobler life, instead of one that is longer but of less account!

Tentative efforts lead to tentative outcomes.

We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak.

It is our attitude toward events, not events themselves, which we can control. Nothing is by its own nature calamitous; even death is terrible only if we fear it.

No great thing is created suddenly.

Men are not afraid of things, but of how they view them.

Know you not that a good man does nothing for appearance sake, but for the sake of having done right?

Events do not just happen, but arrive by appointment.

Difficulty shows what men are.

It is not so much what happens to you as how you think about what happens.

No man is free who is not master of himself.

Small-minded people blame others. Average people blame themselves. The wise see all blame as foolishness.

A ship should not ride on a single anchor, nor life on a single hope.

Preach not to others what they should eat, but eat as becomes you and be silent.

From this instant on, vow to stop disappointing yourself. Separate yourself from the mob. Decide to be extraordinary and do what you need to do, now.

If evil be said of thee, and if it be true, correct thyself; if it be a lie, laugh at it.

Know, first, who you are, and then adorn yourself accordingly.

Be discriminating about what images and ideas you permit into your mind.

Do not try to seem wise to others.

Don’t seek to have events happen as you wish, but wish them to happen as they do happen, and all will be well with you.