Lucien Samms @LucienSamms

We must choose our better part—to bear and forbear, to be kind and just—not the part that is a selfish animal, acting only through the unbridled desires of our guts and groins. Zen-Stoic Synopsis of Epictetus' Discourses, 1.3 (archive.org/details/zen-in…)

We are each a fragment of the God of Nature: By forbearing pleasure and bearing pain, we exercise a divine liberty, choosing to do what is right after properly sifting our perceptions of things. Zen-Stoic Synopsis of Epictetus' Discourses, 1.2 (archive.org/details/zen-in…)

We must bear pain and forbear pleasure. To practice such non-attachment, such indifference, is to acquire equanimity: To die cheerfully daily by being kind and just to everyone, everything, and ourselves. Zen-Stoic Synopsis of Epictetus' Discourses, 1.1 (archive.org/details/zen-in…)

Zen-Stoic Hymn 6 I accept everything right now, just as it is. Everything changes. Everything is my own mind, watching itself change. Everything is change. My own mind is everything, watching itself change. My own mind is change. Because everything changes, I bear pain and I…

Zen-Stoic Hymn 5 I accept everything right now, just as it is. Everything changes. Everything is my own mind, watching itself change. My own mind is everything, watching itself change. Because everything changes, I bear pain and I forbear pleasure. Everything changes. I accept…

Zen-Stoic Hymn 4 My own mind is the Absolute, everything perceiving, perceived, and changing. Bear and Forbear: Zen in “The Art of Living” archive.org/details/zen-in…

Zen-Stoic Hymn 3 I accept everything right now just as it is. My mind is the one mind, the unborn self, the everything (perceiver and perceived). One whole being: Seer and Seen. Bearer and born, forbearer and forborne: Kind and just. Bear and Forbear: Zen in “The Art of Living”…

Zen-Stoic Hymn 2 I accept everything, right now, just as it is. My own mind mirrors and is mirrored by the One Mind, the Unborn Self, the everything that I perceive and by which I am perceived: One body, one mind, one self, one whole being—eternal and infinite; alive, awake and…

Zen-Stoic Hymn 1 I accept everything, right now, just as it is. Everything is empty. Everything is unfolding. So I smile in fellowship, and I smile in resignation because things unfolding outside my power, finally, are nothing to me. The only thing that matters, the only…

Honorable, virtuous persons care only for what is in their own power: To bear pain (to be strong, to accept things as they happen, as received and perceived) because they have chosen first to forbear pleasure (to be virtuous, to express kindness and justice through restraint and…

We must follow the principal rule of the God of Nature and of Man: Providential restraint, that is, freedom within limits (the only true freedom). We must bear pain and forbear pleasure, cheerfully dying each moment at our assigned posts until the call of taps. Zen-Stoic…

A clean body mirrors a clean soul and mind, both of which are required of a cosmopolitan, a Citizen of the World. Zen-Stoic Summary, Epictetus, Discourses, 4.11 archive.org/details/zen-in…

How can we be happy and free? Do only what is in our power—To bear with courage and confidence what is out of our control because we have forborne with care and caution what is in our control (Epictetus 75). In a word, we must forbear pleasure to bear pain: We must work,…

Nothing can change easier than our own minds. We must learn to control ourselves—assume a habit of bearing and forbearing—since satiety is born from restraint. We must eliminate desire, become self-sufficient, and so be prepared for anything that happens. Zen-Stoic Summary,…

Jesus says, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” “Remove the beam from your own eye before you try to remove the speck from another’s eye.” We must detach ourselves from all externals to see…

No one can be afraid who is not attached to externals, including one’s own body, but is instead attached only to one’s own mind, one’s own ruling faculty, one’s own good judgments, which make proper use of all externals, no matter one’s station in life: The decision to bear pain…

We will convince ourselves of the value of bearing and forbearing (that is, of self-restraint) by practicing, habituating, or abandoning it as we see fit, moment by moment. Zen-Stoic Summary, Epictetus, Discourses, 4.6 archive.org/details/zen-in…

What is eternal and naturally free in human nature is choice, i.e., the correct use of (the proper judgment concerning) impressions. A right choice is the only good, and a bad choice is the only evil; therefore, non-attachment, finally, to all external things (including one’s…

We must, as the saying goes, “Go with the flow” since we really have no other logical choice. We must control what is in our power as rational, mortal, and universal beings (that is, forbear what can be avoided, i.e., pleasure), and endure everything else (that is, bear what…