How To Think Like A Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy Of Marcus Aurelius Quotes
"To learn how to die, according to the Stoics, is to unlearn how to be a slave."
"Neither philosophy nor empire takes away natural feeling."
"Death is like some prankster in a scary mask."
"Where are they now? Nowhere… or at least nowhere of which we can speak."
"As long as we can grasp the truth firmly enough that certain misfortunes are inevitable, we no longer feel the need to worry about them."
"Realizing this makes it easier to let go: we can no more hold on to life than grasp the waters of a rushing stream."
"Why do you weep for me instead of thinking about the plague… and about death as the common lot of us all?"
"If you now grant me leave to go then I will bid you farewell and pass on ahead of you."
"Nobody is so fortunate as not to have one or two individuals standing by his deathbed who will welcome his demise."
"The master ought not come to the pupil, but the pupil to the master."
"You are just an impression and not at all the things you claim to represent."
"It is not things that upset us but our judgments about them."
"The short way is the way of Nature, which leads to the soundest words and actions."
"If you have leisure to praise me, I am speaking to no purpose."
"We usually think of rhetoric as something used to manipulate other people. We tend to forget we’re doing it to ourselves as well, not only when we speak but also when we use language to think."
"The way we talk and think about events involves making value judgments, which shape our feelings."
"There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so."
"Wisdom therefore consists in grasping external things objectively, as indifferent in this regard."
"Sticking to the facts can, by itself, often reduce your anxiety."
"In cognitive therapy, we learn to take greater ownership of or responsibility for the catastrophic value judgments that distress us."
"What would a role model like Socrates, Diogenes, or Zeno do?"
"The more clearly formulated your coping plan is and the more confident you are about putting it into practice, the less anxious you will tend to feel."
"It's not things that upset us but our judgments about things."
"We need to make an effort to awaken our self-awareness, in other words."
"Small changes can often have big consequences anyway."
"The Stoics believed that entertainment, sex, food, and even alcohol have their place in life—they’re neither good nor bad in themselves. However, when pursued excessively, they can become unhealthy."
"When doing what feels pleasurable becomes more important than doing what’s actually good for us or our loved ones, that’s a recipe for disaster."
"Reflecting on the moral of this story, Marcus calls to mind 'the alarm and trepidation' with which the town mouse perpetually lives because of his greed."
"Stoic joy is profound. It comes from achieving your fundamental goal in life and experiencing genuine fulfillment, which make ordinary pleasures seem trivial by comparison."
"The wise man’s sense of delight comes from one thing alone: acting consistently in accord with virtue."
"Marcus was probably a much happier man than his hedonistic brother Lucius was."
"Modern English isn’t well equipped to capture some of the distinctions made in ancient Greek philosophy, especially when it comes to describing emotions and sensations."
"The Stoics weren’t killjoys. Marcus was convinced he could obtain as much healthy enjoyment from the simple things that befell him in life as pleasure-seekers like his brother did from ravenously indulging their unhealthy desires."
"The virtues of courage and moderation improve our character and our lives in general when they are exercised wisely, whereas most of the things we crave just give us fleeting pleasure."
"The point isn’t to obliterate all desire but rather to moderate unhealthy or excessive desires, which place too much importance on certain types of pleasure."
"He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how." - Nietzsche
"If we eliminate from ancient writings a few allusions that gave them local colour, we shall find the ideas of Socrates, Epictetus, Seneca, and Marcus Aurelius absolutely modern and applicable to our times."
"Beware of aggravating your troubles yourself and of making your position worse by your complaints. Grief is light when opinion does not exaggerate it; and if one encourages one’s self by saying, ‘This is nothing,’ or, at least, ‘This is slight; let us try to endure it, for it will end,’ one makes one’s grief slight by reason of believing it such."
"One is only unfortunate in proportion as one believes one’s self so."
"Do not let us build a second story to our sorrow by being sorry for our sorrow."
"To forgive a man who has done wrong, to be still a friend to one who has trodden friendship underfoot, to continue being faithful to one who has broken faith. What I say may perhaps seem incredible to you, but you must not doubt it."
"For surely all goodness has not yet entirely perished from among men, but there is still in us a remnant of the ancient virtue."
"Think about the consequences of responding with anger and compare them to those of responding rationally, calmly, and perhaps with empathy and kindness."
"The actions of others are external to us and cannot touch our character, but our own anger transforms us into a different sort of person."
"Does another do me wrong? That’s his business, not mine."
"The best form of revenge is not to sink to their level by allowing yourself to become angry with them."
"What virtue has Nature given man as a response to the wrongdoing in question?"
"Humans are essentially social creatures; Nature didn’t intend us to fight but to help each other."
"To expect bad people not to do bad things is madness because that is wishing for the impossible."
"Your eyes feel so heavy now—it’s time to let them close."
"Leaves that the wind scatters to the ground, Such are the generations of men."
"The wise man sees life and death as two sides of the same coin."
"To be angry is not manly but rather a mild and gentle disposition is more manly because it is more human."
"Everything that happens is as usual and familiar as the rose in spring and the fruit in summer."
"Life is warfare and a sojourn in a foreign land. Our reputation after life is nothing but oblivion."
"Philosophy consists in this: for a man to preserve that inner genius or divine spark within him from violence and injuries, and above all from harmful pains or pleasures."