On "cool, smart, or successful" and "deserving of happiness", you might want to hear what the Stoic philosopher, Epictetus, had to say: One central message [of

On "cool, smart, or successful" and "deserving of happiness", you might want to hear what the Stoic philosopher, Epictetus, had to say: One central message [of his book, "Discourses, Fragments, Handbook"] is that the basis for happiness or well-being is 'up to us' and that we all have the capacity to move towards this state, regardless of our specific social context or individual character. [...] Epictetus also stresses that this capacity forms an integral and inalienable part of what makes human beings distinctive in the natural universe, as well as the prime expression of what is 'divine' within us.