“The First And Greatest Victory Is To Conquer Yourself”

This is a quote from Plato. It is a quote that tells you that you are your own biggest obstacle. You are the person that you must prove yourself to, more than anyone else. You are the person that you need to master and change. And most importantly, you are the person you should worry most about. The first and greatest victory is to conquer yourself. This is not a platitude, it is a lesson we should all learn.

Why is that? Obviously other people and their actions have impact on your life. But you are the only person who you live with every day. You are also the only person that you have ultimate control over. You are also the person who has ultimate say over your happiness, and how you perceive life in general.

Every day, you have the opportunity and the challenge to improve yourself. To improve a situation in your life. To create the path you want to go down. You also are the person who filters how you view your life and existence. You can choose to make a bad situation seem better than it is. And you can choose to make a good situation seem worse than it is. No other person has the power over you that you yourself do.

The quote “reality is what you make of it” resonates. Why does it resonate? Because we can feel deep down that it is true. No matter what an outside observer might see of your life, if you see it differently, then your lived experience will not match what an outside observer might think it should look like.

If you choose to focus on the positives and be happy, despite an ostensibly harsh situation, then your life is in effect good. And the reverse s true. So many people who have so much actually live in agony because of the world they create for themselves. That is also why those with mental illnesses can suffer so much.

This fact, that reality is what you make of it, illustrates the ultimate power you yourself have over your existence. That is why “the first and greatest victory is to conquer yourself.” If you can conquer yourself, you can have a happy, fulfilling life.

Conquering yourself is not just having a good attitude. It is confronting your negative traits and fixing them. Or at least learning to mitigate them. It is about growing as a person. And it is about not letting your own internal thoughts or insecurities prevent you from being the best version of yourself.

We all have work to do in conquering ourselves, including yours truly. But we should recognize that we have the ultimate power to make our own lives happy, worthwhile, and fulfilling. “The first and greatest victory is to conquer yourself.” Plato could not have said it any better.