Chapter XXIII
by Epictetus • Book 23
This chapter helps you let go of the exhausting need for external approval and social validation. It guides you back to finding peace and sufficiency within your own inner character.
“Be content, then, in everything, with being a philosopher; and if you wish to seem so likewise to anyone, appear so to yourself, and it will suffice you.”
Related Remedies for Anxiety
See allChapter I
This chapter helps you reclaim your inner peace by distinguishing clearly between what is within your power and what lies completely outside of it. By releasing your attachment to uncontrollable outcomes, you liberate yourself from unnecessary distress and helplessness.
Chapter II
This chapter helps you release the agonizing urge to control outcomes beyond your reach, such as illness, loss, or hardship. By gently withdrawing your attachments and fears from external circumstances, you protect your inner peace from chronic disappointment.