I’ve learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances.

The saying expresses a stoic, inward-looking view of well-being: what most determines happiness or misery is not external fortune but one’s habitual “disposition”—temperament, attitudes, and the way one interprets events. It implies that circumstances matter less than the mind’s response to them, and that cultivating resilience, gratitude, and self-command can mitigate suffering even amid hardship. As a moral observation, it also shifts responsibility inward: rather than waiting for life to improve, one can work on character and outlook. The phrasing (“learned from experience”) frames it as hard-won practical wisdom rather than abstract philosophy.