Plain
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor

Aren't you being foolish then? You get puffed up with pride over these things. You worry yourself sick about them. You complain as if they would bother you forever. Think about the whole universe — you are just a tiny part of it. Think about all of time — you get only a brief moment. Think about everything that happens in the world — how much of it really affects you?

Meditations, Book 5, Section 19 Book 5 · 37 of 52
What Matters Most Freedom & Control
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor Original

Art not thou then a very fool, who for these things, art either puffed up with pride, or distracted with cares, or canst find in thy heart to make such moans as for a thing that would trouble thee for a very long time? Consider the whole universe whereof thou art but a very little part, and the whole age of the world together, whereof but a short and very momentary portion is allotted unto thee, and all the fates and destinies together, of which how much is it that comes to thy part and share!

Meditations, Book 5, Section 19 Book 5 · 37 of 52
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor

Think often about how quickly everything passes away and disappears. All things flow like a river. All actions are always changing. Even the causes behind events shift constantly. Almost nothing stays the same. Then consider the endless time that came before us and the vast time that will come after. Everything will dissolve into nothing.

Meditations, Book 5, Section 19 Book 5 · 36 of 52
Death & Mortality Calm Your Mind
Marcus Aurelius — The Emperor Original

Again, often meditate how swiftly all things that subsist, and all things that are done in the world, are carried away, and as it were conveyed out of sight: for both the substance themselves, we see as a flood, are in a continual flux; and all actions in a perpetual change; and the causes themselves, subject to a thousand alterations, neither is there anything almost, that may ever be said to be now settled and constant. Next unto this, and which follows upon it, consider both the infiniteness of the time already past, and the immense vastness of that which is to come, wherein all things are to be resolved and annihilated.

Meditations, Book 5, Section 19 Book 5 · 36 of 52
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Ancient philosophy, in plain English.

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