Tuesday, 8 November 2022

You're not so perfect either, consider your failings too

Whenever you take offense at someone's wrongdoing, immediately turn to your own similar failings, such as seeing money as good, or pleasure, or a little fame -- whatever form it takes. By thinking of this, you'll quickly forget your anger, considering also what compels them -- for what else could they do? Or, if you are able, remove their compulsion.

-- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 10.30

Remember Socrates's tolerant belief that "no one does wrong on purpose". The clearest proof of that hypothesis? All the times we did wrong without malice or intention. Remember them? The time you were rude because you hadn't slept in two days. The time you acted on bad information. The time you got carried away, forgot, didn't understand. The list goes on and on.

This is why it is so important not to write people off or brand them as enemies. Be as forgiving of them as you are of yourself. Cut them the same slack you would for yourself so that you can continue to work with them and make use of their talents.

* Source: The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman 

Thursday, 27 October 2022

Just do it, even when you feel lazy and you don't want to

 Anything that must yet be done, virtue can do with courage and promptness. For anyone would call it a sign of foolishness for one to undertake a task with a lazy and begrudging spirit, or to push the body in one direction and the mind in another, to be torn apart by wildly divergent impulses.

-- Seneca, Moral Letters, 31.b-32

Quality is b=much better than quantity...one home run is much better than two doubles. -- Steve Jobs 

* Source: The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman 

Tuesday, 25 October 2022

Want less, want nothing = have everything

 No person has the power to have everything they want, but it is in their power not to want what they don't have, and to cheerfully put to good use what they do have.

-- Seneca, Moral Letters, 123.3

John D. Rockefeller, who was as rich as they come, believed that "a man's wealth must be determined by the relation of his desires and expenditures to his income. If he feels rich on $10 and has everything he desires, he really is rich."....Today, you could try to increase your wealth, or you could take a shortcut and just want less.

* Source: The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman 

Wednesday, 19 October 2022

Don't sweat the small stuff

 It is essential for you to remember that the attention you give to any action should be in due proportion to its worth, for then you won't tire and give up, if you aren't busying yourself with lesser things beyond what should be allowed.

-- Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 4.32b

"...don't spend your time (the most valuable and least renewable of all your resources) on the things that don't matter. What about the things that don't matter but you're absolutely obligated to do? Well, spend as little time and worry on them as possible....If you give things more time and energy than they deserve...then sadly, you've made the important things - your family, your health, your true commitments - less so as a result of what you've stolen from them."

* Source: The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman     

Monday, 17 October 2022

Don't be miserable in advance

 It's ruinous for the soul to be anxious about the future and miserable in advance of misery, engulfed by anxiety that the things it desires might remain its own until the very end. For such a soul will never be at rest -- by longing for things to come it will lose the ability to enjoy present things.

-- Seneca, Moral Letters, 98.5b-6a

"The pragmatist, the person of action, is too busy to waste time on such silliness....let the news come when it does. Be too busy working to care."

* Source: The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday and Stephen Hanselman