“How long are you going to wait before you demand the best for yourself?” – Epictetus, Greek slave and philosopher
During my LinkedIn holiday, I reposted folks whose personal philosophies shape their work because this is how I increasingly chose to show up.
Today, I wish to share my own moral compass: the four virtues of Stoic philosophy. I offer only my lived experience of them. They feel particularly relevant today and I invite everyone to explore them.
Wisdom.
Temperance.
Justice.
Courage.
Wisdom comes from reflection and application. I journal to process experiences, to analyse them and tease out lessons. In my work, I become a thinking partner facilitating clients’ sense-making and learning. By reflecting regularly and applying what we learn, we develop our wisdom – visible in the way we choicefully steer ourselves.
A client recently taught himself how to both welcome others’ viewpoints and voice his own more often. He now applies that piece of personal wisdom in every meeting.
Wisdom allows the reflective mind to remain calm under stress. It can leverage both logic and intuition.
Instead of letting experiences shape us passively, wisdom is how we intentionally craft ourselves.
Temperance is synonymous with nuance and impulse control. Lately, a female coachee asked me how to respond to a colleague’s suggestive comments. I wondered whether she might perhaps thank him for complimenting her on her “lovely legs”. What do you think happened?
The answer is at the bottom of the post*.
The temperate individual knows a nuanced approach welcomes rather than resists. Their decision-making benefits whereas denial would limit the information they take in. Temperance results in perspective, helping us distinguish between what we can control and what we cannot.
Does any of the above resonate? Do you practice Wisdom and Temperance – if so, under what guise?🙏🏻
*: he first redoubled his salacious comments. She continued to thank him for his compliments. She also thanked him for his invitations to meet outside the office, graciously declining. She got amused. He got bored.