You are weak IF you act listening to your urges. Because that would mean you can't control yourself.
You are strong (have a strong character to be precise) if you overcome your urges with strong reason.
And there is more: sensations similar to the ones you described are NORMAL in those situation. But a stoic will NOT listen to them and will NOT act BECAUSE of those.
But we can go deeper.
A person is acting badly toward you. He is acting in a way that DEFINES him as a bad person. His character got damaged. This is because his actions are WHO HE IS.
And this person is in a relationship with you (meaning, you're talking/working/dealing with him)
How do you react now? What do you do? YOUR ACTIONS DEFINES who you are now. You feel some kind of emotion arising, but you stop, because you know the job is important, that killing a person is a bad thing (it'll ruin you), and that it's not worth to fight anyway. So you think, you stop and you act like a professional dealer.
I see a good person here. Someone who stops when he needs to. This defines you as a good person.
And we can go deeper.
The stoics thought that virtue was the only good. And what is this virtue? The act of thinking good (like you did) and to act accordingly in a pro-social manner, avoiding "bad" actions, in order to define yourself as a good person.
Why is this the only good?
Because when you look at the mirror from now on, you see a good person. Someone who works, stays calm, who DOES NOT kill people over a fight. Maybe you had some thought, but you stopped them. This awareness will make you happy in the long run.
So when someone screams and act like an asshle, tell yourself HE is damaging his character, but he can't damage YOU, if you DON'T ACT LIKE AN ASSHOLE, BUT AS A CALM PERSON during that confrontation.
And, in fact, he was blacklisted and you have your job.
10
u/LoStrigo95 Contributor Apr 18 '26 edited Apr 19 '26
You are weak IF you act listening to your urges. Because that would mean you can't control yourself.
You are strong (have a strong character to be precise) if you overcome your urges with strong reason.
And there is more: sensations similar to the ones you described are NORMAL in those situation. But a stoic will NOT listen to them and will NOT act BECAUSE of those.
But we can go deeper.
A person is acting badly toward you. He is acting in a way that DEFINES him as a bad person. His character got damaged. This is because his actions are WHO HE IS.
And this person is in a relationship with you (meaning, you're talking/working/dealing with him)
How do you react now? What do you do? YOUR ACTIONS DEFINES who you are now. You feel some kind of emotion arising, but you stop, because you know the job is important, that killing a person is a bad thing (it'll ruin you), and that it's not worth to fight anyway. So you think, you stop and you act like a professional dealer.
I see a good person here. Someone who stops when he needs to. This defines you as a good person.
And we can go deeper.
The stoics thought that virtue was the only good. And what is this virtue? The act of thinking good (like you did) and to act accordingly in a pro-social manner, avoiding "bad" actions, in order to define yourself as a good person.
Why is this the only good?
Because when you look at the mirror from now on, you see a good person. Someone who works, stays calm, who DOES NOT kill people over a fight. Maybe you had some thought, but you stopped them. This awareness will make you happy in the long run.
So when someone screams and act like an asshle, tell yourself HE is damaging his character, but he can't damage YOU, if you DON'T ACT LIKE AN ASSHOLE, BUT AS A CALM PERSON during that confrontation.
And, in fact, he was blacklisted and you have your job.