Stoicism

Since the popularity of self help genre has skyrocketed in the recent years, stoicism has garnered a lot of attention, but long before this newfound fame stoicism has always prevailed as a characteristic, you may have seen a protagonist described as a stoic in books and movies, what makes a person stoic?, what are the principles of stoicism which gives this unique identity to the person who follows them?

Stoicism was founded in the ancient Greece by Zeno. The key principle in stoicism is rationality, rationality in stoicism is about living a thoughtful life with intent in every action and decision guided by reason, leading to personal and moral excellence. As all other Greek philosophies during the time, being virtuous was pursued by every practitioner. virtue in stoicism is about embodying wisdom, courage, justice, and temperance.

The philosophy teaches its pupils to align their lives with nature, accept the present moment, and focus on what they can control, while remaining indifferent to external events and emotions.

But the stoicism that we imagine today might look rather contrasting, though the school of thought originated in ancient Greece, it was adopted and popularized by the Romans whose scripts are still published to rival even the best authors of current day. Letters from a stoic by Seneca and meditations by Marcus Aurelius have garnered a cult like following in the recent years, with quotes from these texts circulating in every corner of the Internet. But in order to truly understand stoicism, reading these texts and bringing them into practice might be insufficient, firstly you would have to analyze it as a non practitioner, and understand what modern problems can be fixed (if any) by a school of thought from 2 millennia ago