The Goal of This Post

This post is an excerpt from the book The Daily Stoic, by Ryan Holiday.
In this post, I share some of my favorite passages from the month of January, with a focus on Clarity.

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January: Clarity

Jan 1: Control and Choice

“The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control. Where then do I look for good and evil? Not to uncontrollable externals, but within myself to the choices that are my own…”

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Jan 4: The Big Three

“All you need are these: certainty of judgment in the present moment; action for the common good in the present moment; and an attitude of gratitude in the present moment for anything that comes your way.”

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Jan 5: Clarify Your Intentions

“Let all your efforts be directed to something, let it keep that end in view. It’s not activity that disturbs people, but false conceptions of things that drive them mad.”

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Jan 7: Seven Clear Functions of the Mind

“The proper work of the mind is the exercise of choice, refusal, yearning, repulsion, preparation, purpose, and assent. What then can pollute and clog the mind’s proper functioning? Nothing but its own corrupt decisions.”

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Jan 9: What We Control and What We Don’t

“Some things are in our control, while others are not. We control our opinion, choice, desire, aversion, and, in a word, everything of our own doing. We don’t control our body, property, reputation, position, and, in a word, everything not of our own doing. Even more, the things in our control are by nature free, unhindered, and unobstructed, while those not in our control are weak, slavish, can be hindered, and are not our own.”

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Jan 22: The Day in Review

“I will keep constant watch over myself and – most usefully – will put each day up for review. For this is what makes us evil – that none of us looks back upon our lives. We reflect upon only that which we are about to do. And yet our plans for the future descend from the past.”

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Jan 27: The Three Areas of Training

“There are three areas in which the person who would be wise and good must be trained. The first has to do with desires and aversions–that a person may never miss the mark in desires nor fall into what repels them. The second has to do with impulses to act and not to act–and more broadly, with duty–that a person may act deliberately for good reasons and not carelessly. The third has to do with freedom from deception and composure and the whole area of judgment, the assent our mind gives to its perceptions. Of these areas, the chief and most urgent is the first which has to do with the passions, for strong emotions arise only when we fail in our desires and aversions.”

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All content credit goes to the author. I’ve shared the bits I’ve enjoyed the most and found most useful.

Cheers ’till next time! Saludos!
Alberto