How to start practising Stoicism: a beginner’s guide

Start practising Stoicism by choosing one situation you find difficult, separating what you can do from what you cannot decide, and taking the next useful action. Tonight, look back at how it went.

Suppose someone criticises a piece of work you care about. Before replying, write down their actual words. Then write the meaning you have added: perhaps “They think I am incompetent” or “Nothing I do is good enough.” Those interpretations may feel convincing. They are still interpretations.

Now ask three questions: Is any part of the criticism accurate? What would a fair response look like? What can I improve, clarify or leave alone?

That is a practical place to begin. You have not made yourself indifferent to criticism. You have made room to examine it before acting.

This guide explains three habits, shows what they look like in an ordinary day, and gives you a first-week plan. The exercises are our modern applications of the original texts linked below.

What are you trying to practise?

Stoicism puts the quality of your choices at the centre of a good life. In practice, that means asking whether you are acting honestly, fairly, with restraint and with courage, even when the result is uncertain.

Before a difficult decision, try these questions:

• Judgment: What do I know, and what am I assuming?
• Fairness: What do I owe the other people involved?
• Restraint: What impulse would make this situation worse?
• Courage: What useful action am I avoiding because it feels uncomfortable?

These questions can point toward an apology, a firm boundary, a change of plan or a difficult conversation. Simply feeling calm is not enough if you have avoided something you ought to do.

In the opening of Book 2 of Meditations, Marcus Aurelius prepares himself to meet difficult people and reminds himself to cooperate with them. Expecting friction can help you prepare a response. It does not require agreeing with everyone.

1. Separate your next action from its outcome

Begin with section 1 of Epictetus’ Enchiridion. It distinguishes what belongs to our own choices from things such as reputation and possessions that do not depend on us alone.

Draw two columns on a page. Label them “My next action” and “What I cannot guarantee.” Use a problem you actually have, rather than an abstract worry.

If you are waiting for a job decision, your first column might say: send a clear follow-up, check whether another application needs attention, and practise an answer you struggled with. Your second might say: the hiring decision, the other applicants, and the speed of the reply.

The distinction does not make preparation pointless. Your actions can affect an outcome without giving you complete command of it. Put your effort where it has a job to do.

Make it specific: “I should worry less about the interview” is difficult to act on. “At ten, I will spend fifteen minutes preparing an example of how I solved a problem” tells you what to do next.

Finish your note with this line: “Even if the outcome disappoints me, I want to be able to say I ____.” Choose a standard for your conduct, such as being prepared, honest or respectful.

2. Read a little, and stay with it

A long reading list can become another way to postpone starting. In Letter 2, Seneca advises Lucilius to spend enough time with a few authors to absorb their ideas, rather than constantly moving between books.

Read a short section twice. After the first reading, write its point in everyday language. After the second, name a situation in which that point might change your behaviour. Then close the book and choose one action.

A first reading

On Discursiveness in Reading

Seneca’s short letter about giving an idea time to take hold.

Read Letter 2

For example, after reading Epictetus on control, your note could be: “I can ask clearly for what I need, but I cannot choose the answer.” Your action could be making a request you have been postponing, without rehearsing every possible reply.

Choose one place to start:

• Epictetus’ Enchiridion, section 1: start here if you want one compact distinction to apply.
• Seneca’s Letters, Letter 2: start here if you keep collecting advice without using it.
• Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations, Book 2: start here if you want to see philosophy used as a personal reminder before the day begins.

You do not need all three today. The linked translations are older and sometimes demanding. Work through a short section slowly, or choose a modern translation whose language you find clear.

3. Review one moment without putting yourself on trial

In Book III, section 36 of On Anger, Seneca describes examining his conduct at the end of the day. He returns to particular things he said and did, including occasions when his manner of correcting someone was unhelpful.

Borrow that specificity. “I was terrible today” gives you little to work with. “I interrupted before I understood the objection” gives you a behaviour you can change.

Tonight, write three short answers:

1. What did I handle well?
2. Where did I act too quickly or unfairly?
3. What will I try when that situation happens again?

Here is what a useful entry might look like:

Keep the entry about an observable action. “Be a better person” is too broad to test tomorrow. “Ask one question before making an accusation” gives you something to notice. If an apology is needed now, make it.

Your first week of Stoic practice

Keep the same small routine: a passage in the morning, an opportunity to use it, a brief review at night. Give each day one focus.

1. Day 1: Sort one problem. Make your two columns. Choose one action and a time to do it. Keep the note for your evening review.
2. Day 2: Check one assumption. When something bothers you, write what happened separately from what you think it means. Look for a fact that would help you judge more fairly.
3. Day 3: Read one short passage. Try Seneca’s Letter 2. Summarise its point in one sentence and choose where to apply it today.
4. Day 4: Prepare for an inconvenience. Read the opening of Meditations, Book 2. Name a likely interruption and write how you intend to respond if it happens.
5. Day 5: Practise fairness. In a disagreement, explain the other person’s concern in terms they would recognise before you give your answer.
6. Day 6: Repair a mistake. Pick one entry from your evening notes. Make the apology, correction or practical adjustment it calls for.
7. Day 7: Review what helped. Find one decision you handled differently. Keep the exercise that helped you make it, and choose a situation in which to practise it next week.

At the end of the week, measure something you can describe: did you ask before assuming, prepare instead of repeatedly worrying, or repair a mistake sooner? A week with difficult feelings can still contain better decisions.

Three common ways to get stuck

Trying to feel nothing. Start by naming what you feel. Then examine the judgment and action that follow. Forcing yourself to deny disappointment gives you less to work with.

Calling everything “outside my control.” An outcome may be uncertain while a responsibility remains yours. You can seek help, prepare carefully, challenge unfair treatment or change a situation without being certain you will succeed.

Turning the review into self-criticism. End each entry with a concrete next step. If the same mistake appears again, make that step smaller or more specific. Missing a day means returning at the next opportunity.

Make the practice easier to remember

Once you have an exercise that helps, attach it to a moment already in your day. Review your note after breakfast. Ask your judgment question before answering a difficult message. Leave your evening notebook where you will see it.

You can do all of this with a book and a scrap of paper. Choose the reminder you are likely to notice, and keep the instruction clear enough to use.

A phone widget is another option. That is where Stoic Widgets fits: a short Stoic passage on your Home Screen, with themes and saved favourites so you can return to ideas you want to practise. If that approach suits you, our article on keeping Stoic wisdom close explores it in more detail.

What users reported in our research

We wanted to understand whether people were doing anything with the quotes they encountered. In our internal pre-release research, the completed 24-week sample included 1,002 regular users and 943 low-use or delayed-start users.

• 64% of regular users said Stoic quotes were part of their daily routine, compared with 24% of the low-use or delayed-start group.
• 29% of regular users said they changed a behaviour because of a quote, compared with 12% of the comparison group.

Based on internal pre-release product research across web, beta, and mobile users. Results are self-reported and preliminary. These group differences show an association, not proof that the app caused the changes. Research details

Those reports are encouraging because they concern routine and action, the two things this guide asks you to practise. They do not tell us what any particular reader will experience.

About the writer

The Stoic Widgets Team

We make Stoic Widgets. WIDGET WORKS LLP publishes this magazine. This guide includes links to our app and to the original philosophical texts.