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- There’s a reason ancient philosophy fascinates us thousands of years later: Messages from the earliest recorded history still ring true.
- Aristotle offered advice on avoiding greed, Socrates knew how to live a meaningful live, and Confucius understood the difference between satisfaction and achievement.
- Here are some wise words of advice from the greatest philosophers to ever sit down and think.
- Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Modern humans have been around for about 200,000 years.
For those last 2,500 years or so, we’ve had philosophers, sages, and deep thinkers to help us guide and understand our behaviors.
Philosophers like Socrates, Seneca, Confucius, and Siddhartha Gautama offered solutions to problems such as suffering, greed, love, and living a worthwhile life.
Here’s a highlight reel of the finest in ancient wisdom. We’re confident they’re just as applicable to the modern life in Manhattan or Hong Kong as they were to the plains of the Ganges or the mountains of Greece.
"No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man." — Heraclitus, lived circa 500 BCE in Ephesus, modern-day Turkey.
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Heraclitus of Ephesus was born wealthy in Ionia, a city on the Greek coast, but lived in the woods to contemplate the universe.
About 2,300 years ago, he had an insight that would reverberate down intellectual history — that the universe is in a constant state of flux. As the above quote asserts, so are our very identities.
The sage "is ready to use all situations and doesn’t waste anything. This is called embodying the light." — Lao Tzu, alive circa 600 BCE in China.
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Lao Tzu established the tenets of Taoism 2,500 years ago in China. Scholars say he’s semi-legendary, since Lao Tzu just means "Old Man" and nobody knows his real identity.
More importantly, he left us the inscrutably playful text, the "Tao Te Ching." It’s full of zingers, such as the above observation, which basically says that every situation you find yourself in, no matter how bad it seems, is fundamentally workable.
"Most powerful is he who has himself in his own power." — Seneca, died 65 CE in Rome.
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The Roman Seneca was a Stoic philosopher and an advisor of the emperor Nero.
He’s beloved by contemporary philosophy nerds like the investor Nassim Taleb and marketing whiz Ryan Holiday.
Seneca anticipated what psychologists today call "locus of control." People with an external locus of control think that the events in their life stem from factors outside themselves, like fate or a deity. People with an internal locus of control think they are in charge of the events in their lives, and are more likely to turn the lemons of life’s tragedies into the lemonade of wisdom — which is precisely what Seneca exhorted the reader to do.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider
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Source: Business Insider – dbaer@businessinsider.com (Drake Baer)