From the Daily Stoic: (dailystoic.com)
“We’d all be better off if people were in less of a rush and didn’t take themselves and everything they do quite so seriously. In the long run, we are all dead, and many of the things that can eat people up inside are of little or no consequence. This is a central theme in Stoicism, whether we think about the ‘view from above’ or what Seneca has to say about the shortness of life. We see it throughout Marcus’s Meditations, and it’s in the background of Epictetus’s distinction between what is and is not up to us. Part of developing from an egotistical small child or a self-centred teenager into a well-balanced rational adult involves acknowledging and accepting the limits of our power and self-importance. We are not, it turns out, the centre of the universe. Much of what happens during the course of our lives is out of our control. Yet there’s a common implicit culture in the West that tries to say that if people are not fabulously rich and successful, then it is in some way their own fault for not working hard enough. This strikes me as both false and psychologically damaging for many people.”