Posts by Mike Anyayahan

Cassius Thanks. I'll take note on that. There's no problem with me reading secondary literature along with original works. I am an open-minded person.

Cassius Thanks for a warm welcome. Let me introduce myself then.

I'm Mike Anyayahan from the Philippines. I'm a freelance writer and a blogger. I studied Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy at Polytechnic University of the Philippines.

I currently live in Iloilo City, just south of the Philippines. I'm married and a father of two lovely girls.

My background in Epicurean philosophy is a product of my complex intellectual development from being a hard-line Marxist communist, to being a Socratic skeptic, then to becoming a Sartrean post-modern existentialist. I did not get into Epicureanism out of nothing. (Well, nothing comes out of nothing. ) It was my existentialist distaste of absolutism that led me to dig more on the question of free will.

As a result, I re-evaluated all my ideological inclinations and questioned my own mode of thoughts. Along the way when I re-examined Marx's doctoral dissertation on Epicurus, I suddenly became curious about Epicurean philosophy.

While studying Epicurus, I came across Stoicism and entertained the Stoic philosophy in my thoughts for a while. Then I found myself in a dialectic process between Epicureanism and Stoicism.

But in the end, Epicurenism won my mind and my heart as I found Stoicism lacking in terms of authenticity (I do not say they are hypocrites ).

I became a self-declared Epicurean just a month ago.

So far, the Epicurean texts I have read are the Letter to Menoeceus, The Principal Doctrines, The Vatican Sayings, and the Book 1 of On Ends by Cicero. I am still in the process of reading Lucretius' On the Nature of Things.

I am thankful you provided me a list of works to read. I have not yet read some of them so the above list is truly of great help.

I found the group Epicurean philosophy because it appeared on the sidebar of my FB news feed as suggested group. Perhaps, the algorithm has recognized me as Epicurean based on my posts. Through this, we met, and I became a member here. It's my pleasure to be here.

I m looking forward to becoming Epicurean friends with you guys. Thanks a lot.