Category: epictetus
Quotes of Category: epictetus
The Yogic path is about disentangling the built-in glitches of the human condition, which I'm going to over-simply define here as the heartbreaking inability to sustain contentment. Different schools of thought over the centuries have found different explanation for man's apparently inherently flawed state. Taoists call it imbalance, Buddism calls it ignorance, Islam blames our misery on rebellion against God, and the Judeo-Christian tradition attributes all our suffering to original sin. Freudians say that unhappiness is the inevitable result of the clash between our natural drives and civilization's needs. {As my friend Deborah the psychologist explains it: "Desire is the design flaw."} The Yogis, however, say that human discontentment is a simple case of mistaken identity. We're miserable because we think that we are mere individuals, alone with our fears and flaws and resentments and mortality. We wrongly believe that our limited little egos constitute our whole entire nature. We have failed to recognize our deeper divine character. We don't realize that, somewhere within us all, there does exist a supreme Self who is eternally at peace. That supreme Self is our true identity, universal and divine. Before you realize this truth, say the Yogis, you will always be in despair, a notion nicely expressed in this exasperated line from the Greek stoic philosopher Epictetus: "You bear God within you, poor wretch, and know it not. book-quotephilosophyepictetuselizabeth-gilbertWhy should we place Christ at the top and summit of the human race? Was he kinder, more forgiving, more self-sacrificing than ? Was he wiser, did he meet death with more perfect calmness, than ? Was he more patient, more charitable, than ? Was he a greater philosopher, a deeper thinker, than ? In what respect was he the superior of ? Was he gentler than , more universal than ? Were his ideas of human rights and duties superior to those of ? Did he express grander truths than ? Was his mind subtler than 's? Was his brain equal to 's or 's? Was he grander in death – a sublimer martyr than ? Was he in intelligence, in the force and beauty of expression, in breadth and scope of thought, in wealth of illustration, in aptness of comparison, in knowledge of the human brain and heart, of all passions, hopes and fears, the equal of , the greatest of the human race? book-quotewisdomkindnesspatience
