5 Great INFJ Life Lessons from the Stoics
Apr 13, 2024About nine years ago I purchased a book written by Seneca (a Stoic philosopher). I must say that I never expected that I’d get valuable life lessons from Stoicism. Honestly, had no clue what Stoicism was and had no idea what it had to offer. However, after digging into the book I felt that it genuinely addressed many of the major issues of my INFJ life.
I then read more of the Stoic philosophers (many found on this list) and found their wisdom to be comforting and helpful in navigating my daily INFJ life. One of these was Marcus Aurelius, whose book, Meditations, is filled with common sense wisdom.
So, without further ado, here are five great INFJ life lessons I’ve learned from the Stoics:
- “You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.” -Marcus Aurelius Is this an excellent quote or what? As INFJs we need to realize that when others in the world make bad decisions – that is not our responsibility. Also, we are not to blame when things out of our control go awry in the world. Truly, if we can solidify this concept in our mind, we will gain tremendous strength.
- “No man is free who is not a master of himself.” -Epictetus As INFJs we should certainly master ourselves and our abilities. That means working on looking inward and knowing how we truly “feel” about issues and decisions. One solution I have used is to purposefully stop and ask myself “how do I feel about this situation?”. The act of purposefully asking myself seems to free me up to truly know my own thoughts and opinions on an issue instead of riding along on others emotions and opinions.
- “Men are disturbed not by things, but by the view which they take of them.” -Epictetus We have the ability to view things in the way that choose to view them. Take, for instance, a rainy day. We can choose to call this “bad weather” or we can choose to just call it “weather”. After all, it is neither good or bad, it’s what we think of it. Remember the quote from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”
- “No loss should be more regrettable to us than losing our time, for it’s irretrievable.” -Zeno Oh the time I have spent thinking. As an INFJ I think constantly, and honestly I don’t think there is anything wrong with that. However, thinking of things that are beyond our control or getting into the Ni-Ti loop is not a good use of our INFJ time. There is a time to think and a time to research and take action. I think us INFJs should consider trying to live in the present and put aside our more harmful overthinking tendencies!
- “Is a world without shameless people possible? No. So this person you’ve just met is one of them. Get over it.” -Marcus Aurelius The fact is that many people in this world are frustrating, vulgar, illogical, or worse. But if we remember this quote we can understand that that is OK. We aren’t responsible for their behavior, and this will not be the last time that we run into one of these people. So, we should consider following Marcus’ advice and “get over it”. As a bonus, thinking about this concept also puts us on guard not to become one of these people!
I hope that these five Stoic life lessons will help you through your day, week, and year. I know they have helped me. Remember, you are an INFJ and you are awesome. Stay strong.
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