{"id":5764,"date":"2019-11-03T20:35:26","date_gmt":"2019-11-03T20:35:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/?p=5764"},"modified":"2019-11-03T20:35:26","modified_gmt":"2019-11-03T20:35:26","slug":"is-it-even-a-question","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/","title":{"rendered":"Is It Even A Question?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The little known Stoic philosopher Agrippinus was apparently the king of one-liners. There was the time he was informed he\u2019d been exiled and responded, \u201cVery well, we shall take our lunch in Aricia.\u201d There was another time, <\/span>we are told by Epictetus<\/span><\/a>, that Agrippinus was asked by a fellow philosopher whether or not he should attend some banquet put on by the abominable Nero.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Agrippinus told the man he should go. But why, the man asked? That\u2019s when Agrippinus got him with another one of his brilliant barbs: <\/span>Because you were even thinking about it.<\/span><\/i> For me, Agrippinus said, it\u2019s not even a question.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In a way, this is a pretty good\u2014albeit cavalier\u2014test of the progress we are making with our character. Hemming and hawing about the right thing and then doing the right thing\u2014now obviously that\u2019s better than doing the wrong thing. But what we should be shooting for is developing the kind of moral compass that\u2019s so clear and strong that we don\u2019t even have to do that. Where doing wrong isn\u2019t even a question. Where the right thing is just obvious.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Just do the right thing<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Marcus Aurelius said<\/span><\/a>. Don\u2019t think about it. Go with your gut. The rest can be sorted out later.<\/span><\/p>\n

P.S.\u00a0<\/i><\/b>This was originally sent<\/i><\/b><\/span><\/a> on November 6, 2019. Sign up today for <\/i><\/b>the Daily Stoic\u2019s email<\/i><\/b><\/span><\/a>\u00a0and get our popular\u00a0<\/i><\/b>free 7-day course on Stoicism.\u00a0<\/i><\/b><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The little known Stoic philosopher Agrippinus was apparently the king of one-liners. There was the time he was informed he\u2019d been exiled and responded, \u201cVery well, we shall take our lunch in Aricia.\u201d There was another time, we are told by Epictetus, that Agrippinus was asked by a fellow philosopher whether or not he should […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nIs It Even A Question?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Is It Even A Question?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The little known Stoic philosopher Agrippinus was apparently the king of one-liners. There was the time he was informed he\u2019d been exiled and responded, \u201cVery well, we shall take our lunch in Aricia.\u201d There was another time, we are told by Epictetus, that Agrippinus was asked by a fellow philosopher whether or not he should […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Daily Stoic\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"http:\/\/facebook.com\/dailystoic\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-11-03T20:35:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/Marcus.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2000\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1000\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@dailystoic\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@dailystoic\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Ryan Holiday\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\">\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\">\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Daily Stoic\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/\",\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/facebook.com\/dailystoic\",\"http:\/\/instagram.com\/dailystoic\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/dailystoic\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/dailystoic\"],\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#logo\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/daily-stoic.png\",\"width\":351,\"height\":121,\"caption\":\"Daily Stoic\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#logo\"}},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/\",\"name\":\"Daily Stoic\",\"description\":\"Stoic Wisdom For Everyday Life\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/?s={search_term_string}\",\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/#webpage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/\",\"name\":\"Is It Even A Question?\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2019-11-03T20:35:26+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-11-03T20:35:26+00:00\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/#webpage\"},\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#\/schema\/person\/62049dc1c11ca8e9b9d773a83783983f\"},\"headline\":\"Is It Even A Question?\",\"datePublished\":\"2019-11-03T20:35:26+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-11-03T20:35:26+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/is-it-even-a-question\/#webpage\"},\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#organization\"},\"articleSection\":\"Daily Stoic Emails\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/#\/schema\/person\/62049dc1c11ca8e9b9d773a83783983f\",\"name\":\"Ryan Holiday\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5764"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5764\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailystoic.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}