“Everything depends on opinion; ambition, luxury, greed, hark back to opinion. It is according to opinion that we suffer. A man is as wretched as he has convinced himself that he is.”
– Seneca in Letter 78, Letters from a Stoic (On the Healing Power of the Mind)
How easy!
Once we decide to be unperturbed, we take most things in our stride.
Once we decide you are “busy”, every little task added to our workload becomes an insurmountable addition.
Once we decide we like rainy days – the week of pouring rain, which was dismal, irritating, annoying last week, becomes a chance to enjoy hot chocolate, hot pho and petrichor – the heady sensuous fresh smell of rain in the air and the wet earth.
The acquaintance, once we decide is “my kind of person”, becomes a good buddy.
How easy and how profoundly difficult – to actually change our opinion.
February 08, 2017