#Roman Stoic

[tmarshconnors]

"You could die right now. Let this fact guide the rest of your life."

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 AD and a Stoic philosopher. 

[arabdoll]

“What progress, you ask, have I made? I have begun to be a friend to myself.”

Seneca

[simpleman193]

[sictransitgloriamvndi]

“Accept death in a cheerful spirit, as nothing but the dissolution of the elements from which each living thing is composed. If it doesn't hurt the individual elements to change continually into one another, why are people afraid of all of them changing and separating? It's a natural thing. And nothing natural is evil.” - Marcus Aurelius

[ancientcharm]

"Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones." -Marcus Aurelius

A Stoic Heart: The Found Letters of a Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius, the Author of Meditations, to His Son, Lucius Commodus, on the Art of Mastering Life's , Grace and Stoicism. Vol. I by Andrii Datsenko

[illustratus]

The Death of Seneca by Manuel Domínguez Sánchez

[lumi-waxes-poetic]

“The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today. You are arranging what lies in Fortune's control, and abandoning what lies in yours. What are you looking at? To what goal are you straining? The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.”

—Lucius Annaeus Seneca

[yorgunherakles]

bir insanı, temsil ettiği şeyler nedeniyle değerli bulmanın anlamsızlığı...

epiktetos - söylevler

[cowboynia]

The Death of Seneca, Manuel Domínguez Sánchez, 1871.

This large painting depicts the suicide of the Stoic philosopher Seneca, after his condemnation by Nero. His friends grieve over his body. The figure in red was universally praised for Sánchez's use of foreshortening and the depiction of emotion without facial expression. It's featured in the Museo Nacional del Prado. It's one of my dream paintings to see in person.

[voltttmeter]

roman after that stupid fight he got into (as in sort of a follow-up to this)

[museeeuuuum]

Thought I'd treat yall and release this video a few days early! Today, a guest and I dive into the recent TikTok trend where men apparently think about ancient Rome at least once a day! Can an entire academic study be boiled down to a gender binary? What does Russel Crowe and Stoicism have to do with it?

[stoicheadaurelius]

"The Pythagoreans tell us to look at the stars at daybreak. To remind ourselves how they complete the tasks assigned them—always the same tasks, the same way. And their order, purity, nakedness. Stars wear no concealment." (c) Marcus Aurelius, "Meditations".

[moonkissedmeli]

". . . one, that things do not take hold upon the mind, but stand without unmoved, and that disturbances come only from the judgement within; second, that all that your eyes behold will change in a moment and be no more; and of how many things you have already witnessed the changes, think continually of that. The Universe is change, life is opinion." -Marcus Aurelius, 4.3

[mayskaiss]

[andreai04]

You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.

If it doesn’t harm your character, how can it harm your life?

People try to get away from it all—to the country, to the beach, to the mountains. You always wish that you could too. Which is idiotic: you can get away from it anytime you like.

By going within.

Nowhere you can go is more peaceful—more free of interruptions—than your own soul.

The tranquility that comes when you stop caring what they say. Or think, or do. Only what you do.

Is an emerald suddenly flawed if no one admires it?

Ask yourself at every moment, “Is this necessary?”

Consider the abyss of time past, the infinite future. Three days of life or three generations: what's the difference?

The impediment to action advances action.

What stands in the way becomes the way.

How many unkind people have you been kind to?

Wait for it patiently—annihilation or metamorphosis.

Fight to be the person philosophy tried to make you.

You accept the limits placed on your body. Accept those placed on your time.

You've wandered all over and finally realized that you never found what you were after: how to live.

You want praise from people who kick themselves every fifteen minutes, the approval of people who despise themselves. (Is it a sign of self-respect to regret nearly everything you do?)

[a8ra]

Issue #58

The Stay Stoic Newsletter

Let's be a little hard on ourselves.

Demand the Best from Yourself

​

It’s easy to “let ourselves off the hook.”

We often give ourselves “the benefit of the doubt.”

​When we make a mistake, we “cut ourselves some slack.”

​Maybe we need to take a different approach. Perhaps instead of going easy on ourselves, we should demand the best from ourselves and hold ourselves to a higher standard? The Stoic philosopher Epictetus certainly believed so:

​“How long are you going to wait before you demand the best for yourself? If you are careless and lazy now and keep putting things off and always deferring the day after which you will attend to yourself, you will live and die as someone quite ordinary.”

​When we give ourselves a pass, we’re not doing ourselves any favors. We’re excusing ourselves to be, as Epictetus so bluntly puts it, “quite ordinary.” And who wants to be ordinary? Surely YOU don’t, do you?

​We must hold ourselves to a higher standard. It’s the only way to live a life of consequence. Living according to a higher set of standards allows us to be extraordinary. Different from the rest. More beneficial to the world and those we inhabit it with. When we are gone, we will be remembered. When we die, we will be missed.

​I’m certainly not advocating that you beat yourself up on a regular basis. That’s just depressing. We all screw up from time to time. We all fall short now and then. We're all human. Sometimes we need to offer ourselves the same grace we would offer others when they make mistakes.

​However, I am suggesting that you might need to beat yourself up a little more often than you currently do. You may need to drop the kids gloves and put on the boxing gloves from time to time. You may need to look at yourself in the mirror and ask yourself a very tough, but important question:

​“Am I giving this my best?”

​Well, are you?

​Stop making excuses for yourself. Stop being careless and lazy with the precious time you have left. Stop putting things off. 

​Stop being ordinary.

​Isn’t it time you demand the best from yourself?

​Thanks for reading this week's edition of The Stay Stoic Newsletter!

​Take care and see you next week.

​Stay Stoic!

​Mike

​