Quotes I've found interesting

We do not find virtue in a man by the quality of his circumstances, but the quality of his actions.

Unknown  

Deliberately designing one’s life isn’t only possible. It’s imperative.

@intentionally,   Twitter

If you’ve lost your job, if you went through a painful breakup, if you’ve been forced to start over, if your sandcastle or your ship has been swallowed up—congratulations, you’ve been gifted a remarkable opportunity. You get to choose the life you want to build. Well done, Fortune, to drive you thus to the life you’ve always wanted.

Ryan Holiday,   Daily Stoic Email, 8/10/2021

Small things were important. Seconds were small things, and if you heaped enough of those on top of one another, they became a man's life.

Brandon Sanderson,   Towers of Midnight

Whether you want to call yourself a Stoic or not, is not really the point. Actually, that is the point. Labels are _pointless._ They close your mind. They close you off to opportunities. They close you off to other people. And worst of all, with time, they close you off from the very things you identify with.

Ryan Holiday,   Daily Stoic Email, 8/10/2021

No one can alter how they are perceived or regarded in the minds of those who doubt and fear.

Terry Brooks,   The Last Druid

Excess in anything becomes a fault.

Seneca  

Life without design is erratic.

Seneca  

You deserve moments like that. Moments where you watch the snow fall. Moments where you sit quietly with a book. Moments where you look out the train window, not on a conference call, not checking email, not wondering how long until you arrive in the city, but a moment to check in with yourself, to think about your life and what you want to do with it. Moments with loved ones. Moments where you are grateful, connected, happy, creative, in the zone—doing whatever it is that you do best.  When the Stoics talk about stillness, they aren’t talking about some abstract notion. They are talking about maybe the most important thing you can be doing in your life. They are saying that all the “work” you are doing, all the thoughts you’re expending trying to get ahead, trying to force a breakthrough, are pointless.  The real way to charge ahead is to slow down. To clear your mind. To rejoice in perfect stillness, free of the future and the past, fully present and locked in. You can do it. You deserve that.

Ryan Holiday,   Daily Stoic Email, 4/23/2021

We are wrong to think that death is ahead of us. Much of our life has already passed. The years we have lived so far are in death's hands.

Seneca,   Moral Letters 1