Essay · By Stephen Pasquini · October 6, 2026
“We suffer more often in imagination than in reality.” It’s one of Seneca’s most-shared lines, and it comes from a short, practical letter about worry: Letter 13, On Groundless Fears. Here’s what Seneca actually said about anxiety, and five Stoic practices from his letters you can try today.
Where the quote comes from
Seneca wrote Letter 13 to his friend Lucilius, who was dealing with the kind of worries most of us know well: things that might go wrong, rumors, threats that hadn’t arrived yet. Seneca, who lived through exile, illness and the moods of three dangerous emperors, knew real danger when he saw it. His diagnosis was that most of what frightens us never actually happens.
“There are more things likely to frighten us than to crush us; we suffer more often in imagination than in reality.”
— Seneca, Letter 13
He wasn’t telling Lucilius that nothing bad ever happens. He was pointing out that we suffer three times over: by exaggerating real troubles, imagining ones that don’t exist, and anticipating ones that haven’t arrived. In his words, “We have a habit of exaggerating our sorrow, or imagining it, or anticipating it.”
5 Stoic practices for anxiety from Seneca’s letters
1. Separate what you hear from what you feel
Seneca’s first piece of advice is to check the evidence. “Pay attention not to what you hear but to what you actually feel.” A frightening email, a rumor, a symptom you looked up online: what is actually happening to you right now, as opposed to the story your mind is telling about it?
2. Ask the honest question
He gives Lucilius a question to ask himself, almost word for word what a good therapist might suggest today: “Am I tormenting myself without good reason? Am I making myself miserable, turning something that isn’t an evil into one?”
3. Notice that today is fine
Three short words from Letter 13 might be the most useful: “Today, there’s nothing wrong.” Most anxiety lives in the future. Seneca keeps pulling his friend back to the present, where, usually, the feared thing hasn’t happened. “Don’t be miserable before the crisis arrives. The dangers that made you turn pale, as if they were bearing down on you, may never reach you at all.”
4. Remember how often you were wrong
Seneca asks Lucilius to look at his own track record: “How often the unexpected has happened! How often the expected never came to pass!” If you list the things you dreaded last year, how many actually happened the way you feared? For most of us, the answer is humbling, and comforting.
5. Rehearse the thing you fear
In Letter 18, Seneca suggests a bolder exercise. Set aside a few days to live on the plainest food and roughest clothes, and ask yourself, “Is this the condition I so feared?” Fear shrinks when you’ve looked it in the face. As he puts it, “the time to prepare the soul for hardship is while things are still easy.”
Courage is built, not born
Letter 13 opens with an image of a boxer. The only fighter who enters the ring sure of himself, Seneca says, is the one who has already been knocked down and got back up. “Courage gains great strength from being challenged.” Every worry you’ve survived is practice for the next one.
A note on anxiety today
Seneca’s advice is wise and still useful, but it isn’t a substitute for care. If anxiety is constant, keeps you from sleeping or working, or comes with panic attacks or thoughts of harming yourself, please talk to a doctor, physician assistant or mental health professional. In the US you can call or text 988 any time. Seneca himself relied on doctors for his lifelong breathing illness, and he’d tell you to do the same.
Read the whole letter: Letter 13: On Groundless Fears. Then try Letter 98: On the Fickleness of Fortune and our page of letters for worry and anxiety.
Frequently asked questions
What did Seneca say about anxiety?
In Letter 13 he argues that “we suffer more often in imagination than in reality,” because we exaggerate, imagine and anticipate troubles. His remedy is to examine the evidence, stay in the present and remember how often our fears never come true.
Is “we suffer more in imagination than in reality” a real Seneca quote?
Yes. It comes from Letter 13 of his Moral Letters to Lucilius, “On Groundless Fears,” written around AD 63–65. Translations word it slightly differently.
Can Stoicism help with anxiety?
Many people find Stoic ideas helpful, and they share roots with modern cognitive behavioral therapy, which also focuses on examining anxious thoughts. But Stoicism is a philosophy, not a treatment. If anxiety is affecting your life, see a professional.
Go deeper
The Penguin Classics selection of Seneca’s letters. The best paperback to start with.
Ryan Holiday’s modern guide to turning setbacks into strength.
One short Stoic passage and reflection for every day of the year.
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