This is from one of the articles linked in the linked source, using a metaphor around the idea I tried to share above. You can "play the game of life as best you can," (which includes hopefully bettering the lives of others in addition to yourself) but just don't let it define you.
"In this case, Epictetus said everybody should play the game of life-that the best play it with "skill, fonn, speed and grace." But like most games, you play it with a ball. Your team devotes all its energies to getting the ball across the line.
But after the game, what do you do with the ball? Nobody much cares. It's not worth anything. The competition, the game, was the thing. You play the game with care, making sure you are never making the external a part of yourself, but merely lavishing your skill in regard to it.
The ball was just "used" to make the game possible, so just roll it under the porch and forget it, let it wait for the next game. Most important of all, just don't covet it, don't seek it, don't set your heart on it. It is this latter route that makes externals dangerous, makes them the route to slavery"
Interesting point - I've always thought the stoic ideal was that each individual takes charge / responsibility for their own life and tries to live a good life. THEN, if everyone is doing that, as a society, we are better off.
Like it is this "first focus on yourself, and then maybe the world around you might be a bit better for everyone" type mentality.
So, the best version of you could involve sharing and hoping that others follow a similar philosophy - but at the same time you need to not define yourself as having failed if others disregard it?
But I just think that is not completely correct either - a big part of Stoicism, unless I am missing something, is also being a better person holistically.
A world where everyone doesn't care about things generally (like a popular negative generalization of Stoicism) doesn't ever work.
A world where everyone is focused on being the best version of themselves might work better than everyone being focused on making the best world. I think that gets looped into Stoic teaching as well.
Y'know, I don't think I've ever heard someone use that exact sentence, but I think it's an ok distillation for parts of stoicism (depending on your definition of better, that word has a lot of baggage when applied to human beings), especially the parts Seneca focuses on if I'm recalling them correctly.
Ultimately I think the problem is trying to distill it down to a single sentence. Perhaps I was in error in attempting to provide a better example of something that cannot be done adequately, it may have just caused more confusion.
