Six Timeless Lessons and Advice From Seneca to Live By: Gain Inner Peace
Image of Seneca’s bust in the Neues Museum, Berlin.
Source: Wikimedia Commons / Photographer: Till Niermann, License: Public Domain
One of the most prominent Roman Philosophers was Lucius Annaeus Seneca. He went down in history as a consul, Nero's educator, and the wealthiest man in the Roman Empire, who was also a philosopher. His practice of philosophy was eclectic but rooted in stoicism.
Stoicism is a life attitude whose goal is to live by virtue, understood as the harmony of rational human activities. They are marked by inner peace, self-control, and immovability towards what does not depend on a human being.
Stoicism, from the works of Roman Stoics, shaped the attitude of life from ancient Christianity, through the Middle Ages to modern times.
Seneca appears in his works as a doctor of the soul, a life therapist, who treated his philosophical activity as a vocation to teach his fellow citizens to live in virtue. Only by virtue dictates man will achieve long-lasting happiness.
These are my main lessons from Seneca.
1. Shift Your Perspective - don’t overthinking
“We are more often frightened than hurt; and we suffer more from imagination than from reality”
Lately, I was reading “The Way to Love” by Anthony de Mello, who was a famous Indian Jesuit priest and spiritual teacher. I found an interesting parallel between de Mello and Seneca because they both point to the main source of our suffering and unhappiness as our beliefs that distort our perspective on reality.
De Mello wrote that there is only one cause of unhappiness: the false beliefs you have in your head, beliefs so widespread, so commonly held, that it never occurs to you to question them.
Seneca wrote that we are more often frightened than hurt, highlighting the subjective aspect of our beliefs. Being hurt is more objective, more grounded in reality than being frightened, which is more about our cycling thoughts in mind - overthinking, worrying about the future, and so on.
Think about your worries when you were in high school, now, in hindsight, you can say that it was mostly trivial. You were experiencing something more in your head than in reality. Overthinking is a highly counter-productive and unhealthy tendency that we should work on.
Lately, I’ve been trying slightly to shift my perspective on given events and put more emphasis on the long-term effects, that I will be smarter, that I’ve gained experience and I saw much improvement in terms of mental clarity and calmness.
2. Accept the reality - Live in harmony with Nature
“A happy life is one which is in accordance with its own nature”
To understand why, according to Seneca, it is worth living in harmony with nature, we must mention the school of stoicism, from which, in a sense, Seneca derives.
Stoics believed that nature is unity, the whole universe ruled by an omnipresent force called "pneuma" that constantly strives to achieve its goal. Therefore, it makes no sense to go against the laws of nature, which fulfill its rational and divine plan, and since this plan is rational, it leads to virtue, which is only one way to achieve happiness.
“If you live in harmony with nature you will never be poor; if you live according what others think, you will never be rich”
“For those who follow nature everything is easy and straightforward, whereas for those who fight against her life is just like rowing against the stream”
Living in symbiosis with all reality provides peace, strength, and endurance amid hardships and adversities. As a consequence, for an individual, functioning according to the norms and dictates of the reason leads to the highest good which is happiness.
This is why Seneca accepted all the events that were happening because he believed that all events have a purpose and fulfill a larger plan that he may not see. Despite unfavorable circumstances, the happy spirit is the one who will obey the dictates of nature
Seneca also looked at life through the long-term lens. He saw that after each negative event he would become wiser and stronger, which would help him achieve harmony and peace in the long run.
My personal belief is that the universe is good and every man has his place in the universe that he surely will find if he follows the virtue and accepts that all the events in his life are happening for that goal. I know there are a lot of bad things going on in the world, but I don't think the universe is bad, it's just people who get lost and don't see the bigger picture. They do not fulfill the rational mission given by the universe.
3. Daily Journal as a Self-Care practice
“Anger will cease, and become more gentle, if it knows that every day it will have to appear before the judgment seat. What can be more admirable than this fashion of discussing the whole of the day's events? how sweet is the sleep which follows this self-examination? how calm, how sound, and careless is it when our spirit has either received praise or reprimand, and when our secret inquisitor and censor has made his report about our morals? I make use of this privilege, and daily plead my cause before myself:”
Seneca used a lot of self-management techniques. They require self-discovery, which in the Stoic system consisted in discovering the rules of conduct instilled by nature.
Seneca, like many Stoics, used writing as one of the techniques of spiritual practice for the mind. He emphasizes that the purpose of working on oneself understood in this way is not judgment aimed at punishment or awards, but an evaluation to guide you as to what to do.
Seneca's examination of the state of one's consciousness took the form of a daily account of the acts performed on a given day and, above all, of the thoughts, desires, and emotions that arose in front of oneself.
Writing as a method of meditation on oneself, often taking the form of a dialogue, is a reflection of a conversation with oneself, an attempt at meta-existence that allows for distanced self-esteem. The dialogue was the best way to reach the truth in terms of the principles of Plato's works.
This habit of introspective writing down our everyday life seems to perform miracles for many people. In my case, it gives me proper mental performance and peace of mind in some sense. Seneca also used daily journaling to be free from emotions and focus on his inner thoughts to understand himself better.
I also wrote one blog post on the benefits of writing. I encourage you to read if you're interested in this topic.
Seneca was also a great writer, and he’s well known for his insightful letters.
4. Be free of judgment
“Other men's sins are before our eyes; our own are behind our backs.”
Instead of using our energy for emotions marked by negativity, such as critique or judging others, it is better to use it to create yourself. Being free of judgment can provide long-lasting peace of mind.
But the effects of this point are multi-layered and may not be visible at first glance. Because being free from judging others makes us more open, not only to others but also to something we don't know, such as a new hobby we only associate with "weird" people.
Criticizing and constantly pointing out the faults of others can turn out to be destructive. Not to mention that it can worsen our relationships with others, we can also be filled with anger and turn into narcissists. Which can have tragic consequences for us, because unnoticed our own flaws distract us from developing ourselves.
5. Live in Presence
“True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears but to rest satisfied with what we have, which is sufficient, for he that is so wants nothing. The greatest blessings of mankind are within us and within our reach. A wise man is content with his lot, whatever it may be, without wishing for what he has not.”
Living in presence is a popular term, especially nowadays, when people live in a constant rush. People do not have time to be happy in the present moment, but their happiness is always delayed in time - until Friday, holidays, Christmas, etc.
We often hear things as “I'll be happy when we finish this project and I have a day off". Most of us probably impost conditions to be happy. But true happiness, according to Seneca, is unconditional. It just comes from within us - regardless of external circumstances.
Happiness is a state where all the fears, worries, hopes, and challenges don't matter at all. This state cannot be bought by any external things, it must be truly earned within you, regardless of anything.
Living in presence is about happiness, and it's a state where nothing is missing, you just enjoy your time, sitting by yourself, without any kind of neediness. You do not sacrifice this moment for “imaginary” tomorrow.
6. Essential effort rather than pleasure leads to lasting happiness.
“Pleasure dies at the very moment when it charms us most.”
We as human beings have unhealthy tendencies to go from extremes to extremes. We often identify happiness as an empty pleasure or overworking to achieve something and feel better about ourselves. It’s neither.
On the one hand, happiness is not gained simply by pleasures, on the other, overworking is denying the practice philosophy of Seneca, which is therapeutic and related to self-care techniques.
It’s about a bare minimum effort that can lead you to virtue, which is in Seneca's words a “perfect good”. Virtue is the only way to gain true happiness.
Seneca's advice that pleasures cease to exist when they obscure our reality can be very easily translated into our daily lives, so as not to seek pleasure for the sake of pleasure.
This pleasure should come from deeper meaning and sense. For example, the pleasure of resting after hard work that helped us acquire some virtue, or be a better version of ourselves.
The ethical ideal of the Stoics is a wise man for whom understanding the changeability of the world and his own fate allows him to maintain inner peace, so-called ataraxia.
Summary:
Shift your perspective - “we suffer more from imagination than from reality”
Accept the reality and its consequences, such as unfavorable circumstances and events. All the things in life happen to fulfill the bigger goal, that we can’t see yet.
Write down your thoughts, lead your daily journal to examine the state of your consciousness. To gain mental clarity take the form of a daily account of the acts performed on a given day.
Be free of judgment - “Other men's sins are before our eyes; our own are behind our backs.”
Live in presence without anxiety, just sit by yourself and enjoy your life, regardless of external things and circumstances. Happiness comes from within you.
Don’t seek pleasures for sake of pleasures, it should come from a deeper meaning.
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