Ask Fewer Questions

August 16, 2019 • #

Seneca had great advice 2000 years ago on how to calm ourselves down:

“It is not to your benefit to see and hear everything. Many injuries ought to pass over us; if you ignore them, you get no more injury from them. You want to be less angry? Ask fewer questions.”

I read “ask fewer questions” metaphorically as “don’t feel compelled to engage in every single dialog”. Much of the media discourse fans these flames: show everyone incendiary content, get them annoyed, make it easy to respond, beget another response — an ever increasing turning of the dial toward destructiveness, anger, and negativity.

It’s a daily reminder to, when seeing something that irks you, disengage and redirect attention.

Topics:   quotes   philosophy   stoicism   Seneca