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Stoic philosophy, finding a meaningful life, and the cancer treatment struggle « The Story's Story

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If Marcus Aurelius got cancer, I like to think he’d be reasonably stoic about it. Since my tongue cancer diagnosis, I’ve found myself reaching for his and other stoic philosophers’ work as a companion to adversity. You’ll see stoic ideas threaded through the essays my wife and I have been writing about my fatal cancer diagnosis: “Every day I’m trying to make a good and generative day, and I remind myself that there are many things I can’t control, but, as both Frankl and the Stoics emphasize, I can control my attitude.” One way to see the virtues of this attitude is by process of elimination: What’s the alternative? Wallowing in bad days in which I accomplish and achieve nothing important? Getting angry about things I can’t control, and things that will remain the same whether I’m angry about them or not?* Lamenting that which cannot be, and will not be no matter how much I wish it so? Nothing will bring my tongue back. Bemoaning my fate will not avert it (though I’m also not passively

September 18, 2023 By Jake Seliger in Essays , Personal Tags: cancer , Essays , personal 4 Comments An essay in honor of me appearing on Ryan Holiday’s The Daily Stoic podcast. If Marcus Aurelius got cancer, I like to think he’d be reasonably stoic about it. Since my tongue cancer diagnosis , I’ve found myself reaching for his and other stoic philosophers’ work as a companion to adversity. You’ll see stoic ideas threaded through the essays my wife and I have been writing about my fatal cancer diagnosis : “Every day I’m trying to make a good and generative day, and I remind myself t

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