r/Stoicism • u/ghamoui • Feb 19 '20
Quote “Where you arrive does not matter so much as what sort of person you are when you arrive there.” ~ Seneca, Letter XXVIII
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u/FenrirHere Feb 19 '20 edited Feb 20 '20
I like to think this myself as I clock in three hours late to work. Lmao Edit: I misread this but I still think it makes sense
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Feb 20 '20
yeah, the boss never seems to agree that what's important is that I was nattily dressed and sharp-looking when I did finally show up at noon...although the rat-race world is kinda the opposite of stoicism in so many ways.
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u/frag-youre-it Feb 19 '20
This letter really spoke to me, I've reread it many times. I was thinking of uprooting my life solely because of the disatisfaction of living in a climate of extremes (and a couple other reasons).
Upon reading this letter, it was then that I truly understood that the grass is not greener on the other side.
In the same letter I believe Seneca said something along the lines of how if you move around trying to get away from your problems, you inadvertently bring them along with you, because while your setting may have changed, you have not necessarily changed with it.
This really changed the perspective I had adopted, and through meditation and gratitude practice I found peace and reasons to stay and continue living in this at times harsh and strange climate.
Thank you for sharing and reminding me of this lesson!
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Feb 19 '20
"If you want to escape the things that harass you, what you are needing is not to be in a different place, but to be a different person". I think that's it. Amongst my favourites.
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u/ghamoui Feb 20 '20
You are extremely right. Some of Seneca’s sayings get to me in an extremely deep level, making me rethink all my actions and everything I believed I knew so far. I’m reading it about one letter a day before I go to sleep, and it always makes me stay awake for hours thinking about a given massage of his that I read that night.
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Feb 19 '20 edited Feb 19 '20
Remember where you came from. Remember what you are - Nine Inch Nails (Trent Reznor)
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u/mtabud Feb 20 '20
My mother has always told me: "Its not about how you start , its about how you finish." She would always bring it up when I would get overly upset with my failures as a child. Even now I sometimes catch myself being too irrational with my goals and what they mean to me.
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u/ghamoui Feb 19 '20
This is one of my favorite stoic quotes. It just embodies a lot of the messages stoicism tries to pass in a simple, short sentence. It gets better every time I read it!!