Epictetus — "First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do."
First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.
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More from Epictetus
"Don't seek to have things happen as you wish, but wish them to happen as they do happen, and all will be well with you."
"If a man should be in a passion and curse you, go away and say, 'This man is angry with me.' Do not say, 'He has cursed me.' For that is to add to the injury."
"Circumstances do not rise to meet our expectations. Events happen as they do. People behave as they are. Embrace what you actually get."
"God save me from fools with a little philosophy—no one is more difficult to reach."
"It is our attitude toward events, not events themselves, which determines how we will act."
About Epictetus (c. 50-135 CE)
Greek Stoic philosopher and former slave whose Discourses (recorded by his student Arrian) shaped Marcus Aurelius and the modern Stoic revival. Closely associated with Seneca (earlier Roman Stoic) and Marcus Aurelius (his student-by-text on the imperial throne). For an intellectual contrast, see Epicurus, Greek philosopher of pleasure-as-tranquility — the Stoic-Epicurean rivalry was the central philosophical debate of the Hellenistic and Roman world for 400 years — Epicurean materialist hedonism is the precise alternative the Stoic discipline-of-acceptance was built against.
The standard scholarly entry points to Epictetus's work: A.A. Long (UC Berkeley, Classics) — Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life (2002); Pierre Hadot (Collège de France) — Philosophy as a Way of Life (1995); Anthony R. Birley (Manchester, Roman historian) — Marcus Aurelius (1987) — the standard biography of Epictetus's most famous student. These are the works graduate seminars cite when teaching Epictetus.