Welcome Eoghan Gardiner!

Well my story is probably a common one around Epicureans, I was 22 and used to drink a lot and sleep around a lot. Anyway I grew disillusioned with the unhinged hedonism lifestyle (because it led to dissatisfaction and pain overall and the pleasure while nice wasn't worth it). I eventually found my way to "Stoic Joy" by William Irvine and thought it was great! He pushed the idea that if you practice Virtue you will have a tranquil life, in fact he stated that "you can't live virtuously without living tranquilly and vice versa".

So I bought more Stoic books and they really praeached the idea of Virtue for it's own sake, which I bought into. I didn't question WHY or how can value something abstract like that for it's own sake but I digress. Anyway after 2 years of Stoic practice I became very happy but then it hit me "I am not practicing Virtue for it's own sake, it just makes me feel really good" Which led me to Epicureanism and here I am today.

Epicureanism just makes sense, there is no god telling us what to do, everything is valued in a way that can be measured (pleasure and pain) and the goal is one which is noble to the truth of human nature (pleasurable living) rather than some church or gods idea of what we should be (virtue/afterlife/whatever other woo woo) EDIT:b Also the idea that the hedonistic calculus is individual for the most part.

Thanks for welcoming me!

Eoghan, your story is similar to mine with regard to Stoicism. I too dipped my toes into the Stoic pond for a while although I came to it through my curiosity about Virtue (that's another story). I too stared at the question of "why is virtue itself a good?" and its obvious answer "because it feels good".

Further, I kept coming across nasty comments about Epicurus so started wondering more about him. His goal of pleasure fit with my other passion, Buddhism, with its goal of reduced suffering. (also no gods, eternal universe etc.).

So welcome and may you have conversations here that build a pleasant life.