Saturday, April 20, 2019

Stoic philosophy - One path upon which to search for truth and meaning


Articles on stoic philosophy appear on the UU A Way Of Life blog on Saturdays.


Seneca points out that the things on the path of the ego have robbed us of our life. We have been seduced in engaging in illusions of happiness which have failed to make us happy at the deeper level in any substantive way. In our contemporary society advertising and marketing in a consumer culture make it harder than ever to distinguish the couterfeit promises of happiness from the actual and we find out in retrospect that we have wasted our lives chasing after false gods of happiness.

Unitarian Univeralism points out that justice, equity, and compassion in human relations are more likely to make us happy and make our lives meaningful and worth living than the trinkets dangled before our eyes by the marketers.

People who implement stoic philosophy into their lives are less likely to experience useless sorrow, foolish joy, greedy desire, the allurements of society, and distraction from the deeper satisfactions and fulfillment of life well lived.

Unitarian Univeralism encourages the free and responsible search for truth and meaning and stoic philosophy is one such path upon which that search can take us.

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