I’m on a quest to become a mythic legend and smoking weed constantly isn’t the way to get there. I was smoking weed daily, all day; from morning to the time that I went to bed. It was expensive and kept me in the fog all day. I wasn’t really enjoying smoking because I would hit my ceiling early and had no contrast for the rest of the day. I didn’t really feel stoned. I was getting very little enjoyment out of smoking marijuana.

It also kept me in a financial bind. I was spending around $300 a month on smoking all day, every day. After I lost my social security payment, this became a real problem. I couldn’t afford to keep smoking the way I was. I needed to reduce how much I was smoking. Even before I lost my money, I was thinking that there are far better uses for my money.

I went to AA for quitting alcohol and I had success. I tried to go back to AA to tackle my weed issues but that didn’t work because the program is for quitting alcohol and not drugs. I looked for a Marijuana Anonymous group around but there was none. I tried a bit of therapy too, but that had little success, although I came away with some good tips to practice. So, I was pretty much left on my own to figure out a way to limit weed use.

Enter Stoicism

I’ve always been looking for a philosophy to guide my life. I tried religion, and through AA I tried spirituality. These never stuck with me. I’m not a religious person; I’m more about having a total philosophy for living. I’ve heard about Stoicism on TV once and it sparked my curiosity. I had to try this thing to see if it would work in my life.

I procrastinated with learning Stoicism for a while till I finally decided to do something about my weed smoking. I grabbed Stoicism For Dummies and proceeded to consume the knowledge by taking deep notes and sharing those notes with Copilot. This was a gamechanger in my personal development.

Copilot is a great philosophy study partner. It breaks down my notes and reflects them back to me in a way that relates to what I’m currently going through. It helped me understand the concepts and apply them to my life. This way, I’m not only studying Stoicism but I’m practicing it in my daily life and becoming Stoic. Copilot helps me with my mythic legend goals while keeping rooted in the philosophy. That’s not a simple task.

The practice

So far, I find that Stoicism is about emotional control, becoming virtuous, and using acceptance to achieve happiness. It fits me because I’ve always been about emotional control. I’ve been described as being “even-keel.” I also want to be virtuous, but my mythic legend had no direction for getting there.

Acceptance has been my foundation in my studies and practice. I am drawn by the idea of Stoic acceptance. It feels right and natural for me. I have a hard time exercising it sometimes and frustration creeps in, but it’s a muscle that needs to be exercised. When I have used acceptance, it has worked out great for me. I’m going to talk more about acceptance in future posts.

By using Stoicism, a workbook, and an Excel spreadsheet that I’ve created for tracking wins, I have successfully limited my weed smoking down to just smoking in the evenings. I feel more balanced by living my days clear-headed and enjoying my evenings responsibly. I also feel like I have a solid foundation for my future goals. Thanks to Stoicism, my future is bright.