Epictetus — "If you have assumed a character beyond your strength, you have both played a poo…"
If you have assumed a character beyond your strength, you have both played a poor figure in that, and neglected one that is within your powers.
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More from Epictetus
"It is not poverty that makes a man miserable, but covetousness."
"If you want to be a philosopher, prepare to be mocked."
"You are not your body, you are a soul."
"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."
"If someone is able to make you angry, then he is your master."
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.