Stress Management Advice From A Roman Emperor

This blog post was originally published on The Stoic Student

Written by Andrew Kuttain

I remember sitting in my workspace, surrounded by friends frantically chatting and laughing. I had my head in my hands. Or should I say, I was holding my head in my hands. I was exhausted. Between brutal classes, two of the busiest weeks for my extracurricular roles, and my dating woes (something I was never good at), my mental health was taking quite a beating. And my physical health was starting to reflect that.

Stress is a fundamental part of a student’s life. Regardless, if you’re involved in extracurriculars like I was, or if you’re solely focused on your studies, you will come up against the obstacle that is stress. Managing it is integral to your success as a student and as a human being.

However, in much reliable education on stress management, the typical advice revolves around taking breaks, thinking positive, exercising (all valuable strategies), but if there’s one thing I know about stress, it’s how mental it is. A good mind can do more to manage and overcome stress than any habit can.

For the stoics, stress is not only a challenge: it’s a fundamental part of existing. Facing it is part of our duty as a human being. But what do the Stoics say about stress, challenge, and overcoming both?

Thankfully, there’s a wealth of knowledge and insight from the Stoics on this very topic. Today, I want to look at a few quotes & ideas from Marcus Aurelius.

Revert Back To Yourself

“When jarred, unavoidably, by circumstances, revert at once to yourself, and don’t lose the rhythm more than you can help. You’ll have a better grasp of the harmony if you keep on going back to it.”

This is a reminder to focus on your own mind & process: whenever things get tough, stop, and focus internally — on your own mind, your own thought, your own actions. Reverting back to yourself is a way to detach from whatever is stressing you out and focus on yourself.

Stress Is Normal

“It’s normal to feel pain in your hands and feet if you’re using your feet as feet and your hands as hands. And for a human being to feel stress is normal — if they’re living a normal human life. And if it’s normal, how can it be bad?”

Pain and stress are not anything bad. They are part of life. In school, it’s the pushing of mental and physical barriers as you take on more and more challenges. It’s expected. It’s nothing new, nothing bad, and nothing that can’t be overcome.

You Don’t Need To Make It Something

“You don’t have to turn this into something. It doesn’t have to upset you. Things can’t shape our decisions by themselves.”

I have seen (mostly in myself, but in others as well) people turn a setback into a problem all on their own. They do this by obsessively thinking about it, to the point of paranoia. Remember that whatever challenge you have (a bad grade, a falling out, etc.), you don’t have to make it something bad. It can be what it is: an occurrence, something to be noted, addressed, and left be.

Ask For Help

“Don’t be ashamed to need help. Like a soldier storming a wall, you have a mission to accomplish. And if you’ve been wounded and you need a comrade to pull you up? So what?”

And who said you couldn’t ask for help? Was it your teachers? Your idols? Your shame? Students have for too long lived in silos. We are in this together. If you are struggling, ask for help. You know what you need.

Expect Stress

“Remember, you shouldn’t be surprised that a fig tree produces figs, nor the world what it produces. A good doctor isn’t surprised when his patients have fevers, or a helmsman when the wind blows against him”

Were you expecting the school to not bring stress? It’s part of the experience of education. Whether intentionally or not, it is designed to challenge you to make you grow. To give you obstacles to overcome.

Use Stress To Your Advantage

“Just as nature takes every obstacle, every impediment, and works around it — turns it into its purposes, incorporates it into itself — so too a rational being can turn each setback into raw material and use it to achieve its goal.”

All challenges during school, all obstacles, can be used as raw material to forge you into something better. Something stronger. When I was stressed out beyond belief, I told myself that this stress was part of the “trials” on my journey to becoming the person I needed to be (cheesy but I watch a lot of hero movies). Years later, I’ve drawn on those experiences when advising other students on their own challenges.

To Conclude…

This is by no means an exhaustive list. But these are a handful of ideas that have helped me manage the stress of being a student and the stress that life brings.

I suggest you pick at least one quote that resonated with you and pocket it away somewhere: turn it into a background photo for your phone, write it on a note for your desk, or memorize it and recite it every morning.

The choice is yours.

Quam bene vivas refert non quam diu.

Bibliography

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. Translation by Gregory Hays.