Fear & Anxiety

Do not disturb thyself by thinking of the whole of thy life. Let not thy thoughts at once embrace all the various troubles which thou mayest expect to befall thee.

Today I escaped from anxiety. Or no, I discarded it, because it was within me, in my own perceptions — not outside.

Either the gods have no power or they have power. If, then, they have no power, why dost thou pray to them? But if they have power, why dost thou not pray for them to give thee the faculty of not fearing any of the things which thou fearest?

We suffer more often in imagination than in reality.

He robs present ills of their power who has perceived their coming beforehand.

Set aside now and then a number of days during which you will be content with the scantiest and cheapest fare, with coarse and rough dress, saying to yourself the while: 'Is this the condition that I feared?'

Rehearse this thought every day, that you may be able to depart from life contentedly; for many men clutch and cling to life, even as those who are carried down a rushing stream clutch and cling to briars and sharp rocks.

The man who has anticipated the coming of troubles takes away their power when they arrive.

No one confines his unhappiness to the present.

A man who suffers before it is necessary, suffers more than is necessary.

The day which we fear is out of all proportion greater than the fear itself. We suffer more in imagination than in reality.

Limiting one's desires actually helps to cure one of fear. Cease to hope and you will cease to fear.

You act like mortals in all that you fear, and like immortals in all that you desire.

Life is very short and anxious for those who forget the past, neglect the present, and fear the future.

The life of the fool is empty of gratitude and full of anxiety; it is thrown away in the expectation of what is to come and the regret of what is past.

If you would improve, lay aside such reasonings as these: 'If I neglect my affairs, I shall not have a maintenance; if I do not punish my servant, he will be good for nothing.' For it is better to die with hunger, exempt from grief and fear, than to live in affluence with perturbation.

When a raven happens to croak unluckily, don't allow the appearance hurry you away with it, but immediately make the distinction to yourself, and say, 'None of these things are portended to me... to me nothing can be portended, either dangerous or unfortunate, since whatever befalls me is up to me.'

Let death and exile, and all other things which appear terrible, be daily before your eyes, but chiefly death; and you will never entertain any abject thought, nor too eagerly covet anything.

When you have recourse to divination, remember that you know not what the event will be, and you come to learn it of the diviner; but of what nature it is you knew before coming, at least if you are a philosopher.

Every animal is so constituted that it flees from and turns from the things that appear harmful and the things that cause the harm.

No one who is either in fear or in sorrow or in perturbation is free; but whoever is delivered from sorrows and fears and perturbations, he by the very same means is delivered also from slavery.

It is not things that disturb us, but our judgments about things. Death, for example, is nothing terrible, or else it would have appeared so to Socrates. But the terror consists in our judgment about death.

It is not death or pain that is to be dreaded, but the fear of pain or death. He who has overcome this fear is free.

If you would have peace, give no man the power over your passions. For as soon as you desire or fear anything, you become a slave to him who can give or take it away.

When you have made the right the only good, and the wrong the only evil, what room is there for fear or anxiety? Nothing can harm you but your own wrongdoing.

It is not the things that disturb us, but our opinions about them. Death, for instance, is not terrible, or else it would have appeared so to Socrates. The terror is in our judgment.

The wise man is not free from the first movements of the soul, such as sudden fear or sudden desire, but he does not consent to them. For consent is in our power.

The passions are all in our own power. We cannot prevent the first movements of the soul, but we can prevent them from becoming passions by withholding our consent.

The wise man will be without passion. He will not grieve, because he knows that nothing is truly evil but vice. He will not fear, because he knows that nothing is to be feared but vice.

Whenever thou art troubled about anything, thou hast forgotten this, that all things happen according to the universal nature; and forgotten this, that a man's wrongful act is nothing to thee.

There is nothing that fear or grief may not extort from a soul which is not fortified by philosophy.

Men are disturbed not by the things which happen, but by the opinions about the things.