This Is It, Isn’t It? | Circle of Control

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0:55This is it, isn't it? No one wants to have to use their contingency plans to do what they planned for in a worst-case scenario. No one wants to break that glass in case of emergency. No one wants to have to use stoicism, not at least the kind of stoicism that Marcus Aurelius used in the midst of plagues and wars and coups and strategies. At the same time, what was that planned for, if not for this? What was the emergency equipment for? And wasn't that why people taught this philosophy designed for adversity and difficulty for all these years? It was obviously for moments like this. Epictetus once said that the whole point of Stoicism was to be able to put ourselves in a position where whatever happened, we could say, this is what I trained for.

1:43Well, that's what this is, isn't it? One of those moments. Now you get to use it. Now you must use it. Focus on what you control. Keep your cool. Do the right thing. Be brave. Lead. Because if you're not going to do it now, when will you?

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4:59The Circle of Control. And I'm reading to you today from the Daily Stoic 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living by yours truly, my co-author and translator, Stephen Hanselman. You can get signed copies, by the way, in the Daily Stoic store. We have a premium leather edition at store.dailystoic.com as well. But let's get on with today's reading. We control our reasoned choice in all acts that depend on that moral will. What's not under our control are the body and any of its parts are possessions, parents, siblings, children, country, or anything else with which we might associate.

5:36That's Epictetus' Discourses 122. This is an important enough entry that it bears repeating. A wise person knows what's inside of their circle of control and what's outside it. The chief task in life is simply this, to identify and separate matters so I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control and what have to do with the choices I actually control. Where then do I look for good and evil, not to uncontrollable externals, but within myself, to the choices that are my own? The good news is that it's pretty easy to remember what's inside your control. According to the Stoics, the circle of control contains just one thing, your mind.

6:24That's right. Not even your physical body is completely within your control. After all, you could be struck with a physical illness or an impairment at any moment. You could be traveling in a foreign country and thrown in jail. But this is all good news because it drastically reduces the amount of things that we need to think about. There is clarity in this simplicity. while everyone else is running around with a list of responsibilities a mile long, things they're not actually responsible for, you have just got that one item list. You've just got one thing to manage, your choices, your will, your mind.

7:02So mind it. I said this in my talks many times, but I think about the circle of control as a kind of resource allocation issue, right? If you've got 100 energy points, where are you going to spend them? Are you going to spend 50 of them on what's in your control and then 50 % of them complaining about how you got there, wishing things were otherwise, trying to change things you don't control? Or are you going to spend all your energy on what you do control? Right. So so if if the typical ratio of a person is 50 50, and that's probably being generous, if we're being perfectly honest and you can get to a 60 40, that's a huge advantage.

7:48I mean, God forbid you get to, you know, 90-10. I don't know how possible that really is. But if, again, just any you can move from one category to another category, it's not just saving the energy from beating your head against a wall that will not budge or wishing something that did happen, hadn't happened. But you're moving it to the category where it does make a difference, towards something where that energy does make progress. It's more than a one-point shift. It's an enormous shift. And you have to think about it that way. And again, taking it as stipulating that the vast majority of people struggle to do this, they're not even aware that they're doing it.

8:34You think about how basic something like the serenity prayer is. God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Right? They say that in Alcoholics Anonymous. These are people who've lived their entire life. Some of them are very successful. Some of them have tried literally every other thing on the planet but this. Right? And I think to me that's just a humbling reminder of how much time, energy, life force is spent on things that we don't control. Right? Care about what other people are doing. We care about the weather.

9:08We care about external results. I try to remind myself of this as a writer over and over again. I control the work. I control what I write today. I control that I showed up. I control what I do, my choices, my mind, what I put in it. Everything else that comes after might be nice, might break my way, but it's not up to me. That's not what we're talking about. We control our reasoned choice in all acts that depend on moral will. What's not under our control are the body and any of its parts, our possessions, our parents, our siblings, our children, our country, anything else, anything with which you might associate.

9:54It's a little depressing reminder as you stare at where the world is on this day. But think about what that was for Epictetus, what was happening in Rome or Greece as he was saying these things. So instead, he focused on his mental freedom, on his choices, on his actions, because that's all he could do. And in so doing, he made himself one of the most powerful people in the world, even though he was very powerless inside the Roman hierarchy. He made himself so powerful that his words echo down to us today. all these years later. I hope you take them to heart. I hope you focus on what's in your control today and I hope you have a great week insofar as you focus on things that are up to you.

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