“Human beings are the same joyful, resilient, imperfect people today that we were 100 years ago, 1,000 years ago, and 10,000 years ago. We have the same beautiful minds.” — Phil Van Treuren
The most frequent misunderstanding about Stoicism is when people think that it means “having no emotions or feelings.” This is far from the truth; Stoics seek to do away with negative feelings like anger and fear, so that they can focus more on positive emotions like happiness and gratitude. Stoic quotes about feelings and emotions reflect that, but the misconceptions about Stoicism still persist.
Ancient Stoic philosophers like Marcus Aurelius frequently mention their desire to feel more love and fellowship with fellow humans, but they viewed emotions like anger to be something we should all strive to get rid of. The stoic quotes below reflect a desire by Stoics to become masters of their emotions, so they can accentuate the positive and mute negativity.
Ancient Stoic philosophers were like the original cognitive behavioral therapists; they sought to understand human thinking and behavior so they could use it to everyone’s advantage. Feelings and emotions are not all good, they said, and the bad ones should be tamed. It’s only then that we can live the most fulfilling lives possible.
Stoic Quotes on Emotions and Feelings from Marcus Aurelius
“To investigate and analyze, with understanding and logic, the principles we ought to live by. Not to display anger or other emotions. To be free of passion and yet full of love.“
“If all emotions are common coin, then what is unique to the good man? To welcome with affection what is sent by fate. Not to stain or disturb the spirit within him with a mess of false beliefs.”
“The first rule is to keep an untroubled spirit. The second is to look things in the face and know them for what they are.”
“The happiness and unhappiness of the rational, social animal depends not on what he feels but on what he does; just as his virtue and vice consist not in feeling but in doing.”
Stoic Quotes on Emotions and Feelings from Epictetus
“Any person capable of angering you becomes your master; he can anger you only when you permit yourself to be disturbed by him.“
“It is not a demonstration of kindness or friendship to the people we care about to join them in indulging in wrongheaded, negative feelings. We do a better service to ourselves and others by remaining detached and avoiding melodramatic reactions.”
Stoic Quotes on Emotions and Feelings from Seneca
“Who does not admit that all the emotions flow as it were from a certain natural source? We are endowed by Nature with an interest in our own well-being; but this very interest, when overindulged, becomes a vice. Nature has intermingled pleasure with necessary things — not in order that we should seek pleasure, but in order that the addition of pleasure may make the indispensable means of existence attractive to our eyes. Should it claim rights of its own, it is luxury. Let us therefore resist these faults when they are demanding entrance, because, as I have said, it is easier to deny them admittance than to make them depart.”