Marcus Aurelius used his Meditations both as a journal and as a kind of commonplace book where he jotted down quotes and anecdotes he liked. We can’t be sure how the original manuscript was organized and what order he actually put his thoughts in, but it is interesting that a big chunk of Book 11 of Meditations is a […]
On an ordinary afternoon in 1949, the physicist Richard Feynman was going about his business as he felt a pull to have a drink. Not an intense craving by any means, but still it was a disconcerting desire for some alcohol. On the spot, Feynman gave up drinking right then and there. He didn’t want […]
Marcus Aurelius found this piece of advice from an opposing philosophical school important enough to jot it down to himself. It’s worth considering today and practical enough to incorporate into your life immediately: “This advice from Epicurean writings: To think continually of one of the men of old who lived a virtuous life.” For you perhaps that […]
In the township of Tredyffrin, Pennsylvania, not far from the railway station, is a small cemetery filled with the remains of many unnamed Revolutionary War heroes. There are a few other gravestones of various sizes in various states of collapse and decay, the oldest of which dates back to 1777. One is still visible, though […]
Patrick Allan is a writer for one of the biggest productivity sites in the world. It’s an enormous platform which he uses, once per week, to teach his readers about Stoicism. Patrick’s popular Lifehacker.com series “Mid-Week Meditations” offers short insights and wisdom from the Stoics as well as tips for being better, thinking more clearly […]
Perhaps the first important lesson any student of Stoicism learns is the importance of perception—there are objective events, and then there is our perception of them. As Marcus Aurelius famously wrote to himself: “Choose not to be harmed and you won’t feel harmed. Don’t feel harmed and you haven’t been.” It is all in our […]
In Larry Hendrick’s wonderful reinterpretation of Xenophon’s 2,400 year old book about Cyrus the Great, he has Cyrus make this observation: “In my experience, men who respond to good fortune with modesty are harder to find than those who face adversity with courage.” Xenophon was an interesting writer. He was a student of Socrates, a Greek who […]
Marcus Aurelius had an interesting metaphor. He believed that a man, an emperor, a soldier—everyone—was like a rock. Throw the rock up in the air, he said, and “it loses nothing by coming down and gained nothing by going up.” The rock stays the same. We can imagine his own life mirror this analogy. He was […]
The way to spread Stoicism, to teach this philosophy to others, is perfectly captured in this exchange in Steven Pressfield’s wonderful novel, The Tides of War, “How does one lead free men? By being better than they…By being better and thus commanding their emulation.” The same is true for philosophy. The best form of evangelism is always […]