Quote of the Week...from Epictetus

Be careful whom you associate with.  It is human to imitate the habits of those with whom we interact. We inadvertently adopt their interests, their opinions, their values, and their habit of interpreting events.                          Epictetus

Epictetus was a Greek Stoic philosopher from the late-first to early-second century A.D. and whose quotes are full of wisdom...here's a link to another of his I discussed three years ago: [link]. It seems that it's very popular nowadays to encourage people to be introspective about their childhood, paying attention to any early traumas they might have experienced that would lead to negative manifestations in adulthood.  I, on the other hand, believe more significant than this is that as children we unconsciously imprint ourselves after the personalities and habits not only of our own parents...be they beneficial or harmful...but also after others in our family as well as our friends, teachers...and even enemies.  And furthermore, with our age of mass media in full swing, by simply viewing them and listening to them regularly we can "associate" with complete strangers and emulate their worldview and demeanor, often without even knowing the source of what we are doing.  That's one reason why I have issues with what I see on my television screen with politics.  On one hand we have a president who takes everything said about him personally...positive or negative...and "doubles down" by attacking any critics in the most insulting personal terms.  You can object to his character and still unconsciously adopt some of his behavioral patterns...after all, he is the model of a success story in this world that exalts celebrity, politics and wealth.  On the other hand, we have a slew of people who repeatedly demonstrate their inability to discern the context of some of the more legitimate statements that Trump and others often make, commonly applying political correctness standards to them in order to condemn them as "racist" or some other condemnatory appellation...Democratic presidential candidate Julian Castro's recent accusation of conservative talk show host Laura Ingraham as "a white supremacist" is just one example of many.  I don't want to be like either Trump or Castro...both model a kind of knee-jerk reactiveness to others with aggressive and demeaning speech...it's kind of hard, though, to avoid them if I'm a regular follower of the news.  Still, I think that much more pervasive than these media figures are those with whom we personally associate as a matter of course in our daily lives.  I've said it before that in interactions with others I tend to remember much more clearly my own part in them other than others' contributions...yet I need to keep in mind that as a human being I am wired, as the great Greek philosopher has intimated, to emulate those around me whether I like them or not and whether I know what I'm doing or not.  Consciously avoiding loud and aggressive people, as Max Ehrmann wrote in his prose poem Desiderata, is a good step toward protecting myself in this regard...