Massimo Pigliucci

and say, okay, now what can I do about whatever the problem was, right?

Agency is still important.

But it is good, and as I said, there is very good empirical evidence from modern research, to from time to time sort of step back and give yourself the time to contemplate things from a broader point of view.

One way to do it, by the way, is to watch videos that are helpful in this manner.

One of my favorites is Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot.

And if you check it out, it's available on YouTube.

That's one way to do the view from above, the meditation from above.

It might.

First of all, that's a remarkable story.

This is an incredible example of presence of mind and actually doing something useful in a situation that might very quickly become desperate.

Now, the Stoics very often had mantras like that, that they repeated to themselves.

We talked about a couple of them.

Don't pine for things in winter.

If the cucumber is bitter, don't eat it.

And so the obstacle becomes the why.

All of these things.

In fact, they were very aware of this thing.

Epictetus says you should have a number of these phrases at hand for whenever the situation arises.

But the listener's story also reminded me of Seneca's own anger.

In own anger, Seneca writes about all of the techniques that might get you out of an immediate situation of anger.