Meditations –– Marcus Aurelius

Author: Marcus Aurelius

Date Started: [[April 20th, 2021]]

Date Finished: [[May 31st, 2021]]

Type: hand-written

I expected this book to be far more life-changing and eye-opening than it actually was. Most of the people who reviewed the book, or recommended it, come from traditionally Western backgrounds. But for me, a lot of these things - thinking about mortality, about our relationship to the people around us - were concepts and values I was already aware of (and practicing to a certain extent)

That being said, it was a challenging, fantastic read.

Main concepts:

• Mortality and change
• on giving and not expecting anything in return,
• "Nature", "harmony" and the human's purpose to live in accordance with it,
• [[logos]] encapsulating/understanding what the logos really is - more than just logic and rationality. Something more abstract and certainly much larger.
• the behavior of others is outside our control

I took detailed notes in a physical notebook (two, actually), that I hope to revisit every now and then. But here's a highly condensed version of those hand-written notes:

On mortality

• It keeps coming up in the book, over and over again in different words but essentially with the same meaning. But I guess this is what he wanted to do - not just accept it but remind himself time after time of these facts. Perhaps it's not enough knowing it once but meditating on it that makes the difference.
• #religion How can you appeal to people's morality without bringing up their faith? Is replacing the word God with nature enough? Spirituality + religion? Giving the same power to something external (maybe internal) only using different words/names.
  • People just need something to hold on to - to pour their "faith" into - whether that's this book, the Bible, the Quran, etc. And maybe that's what I'm doing too?
• #comment It takes a certain kind of humility to accept that you (or anyone else) don't know what's on the other side. I think he's telling us to value the mind and the spirit more –– because that's the one that will potentially last longer/transcend the physical? But is this true?
• [[Ryan Holiday]] really wasn't kidding when he says "Memento mori" is the motto of the stoics. It comes up everywhere. Everything is about remembering the impermanence of life and honoring what's important because of the short life we have. Quotes, again, and explanations stemming from those quotes.
• In any case, why is the fear of death such an important topic? Is the monotheistic world that inculcates the fear of hell the reason people are afraid to die? Or have people just not thought about it enough?
  • Perhaps its some deep internal psychology that everyone has to come to terms with - a product of #evolution

Book 1

• Accept the costs of important things as money-well spent.
• Appolonius and his patience in teaching: To have seen someone who clearly viewed his expertise and ability as a teacher as the humblest of virtues. [[notes on teaching]]
• Severus: To be eager to share, not to be a pessimist and never to doubt your friends' affection for you.
• "That whenever I felt like helping someone who was short of money, or otherwise in need, I never had to be told that I had no resources to do it with."

Book 2

• 1. #comment [[Ryan Holiday]] talks about about each read of the book offers something. His first read, he realized the paragraph is about being prepared for the day, and accepting and facing mean-spirited or difficult people. But later reads of the same book revealed that the para is about working together, helping each other and not obstructing. There's lots more to be unpacked with each read.
• 2. #comment neglect the physical? or give more importance to the mind? Is despising the flesh the right answer, or valuing the connection between the three (mind, body and soul) and finding a balance?
• The world is maintained by change –– in the elements and in the things they compose. That should be enough for you; treat it as an axiom.
• 4. #comment Should we live our lives in this urgency? That time is running out? But he's right at the same time - to make use of ourselves is somewhat our purpose.
  • What world is it that we belong to?
• "Like a Roman –– like a man" – #comment we can't hold people to their world-views when the world they viewed was limited. That being said, we can recognize that times have changed, and accept that maybe this wasn't the best way to put across his point.
• "People who labour all their lives but have no purpose to direct every thought and impulse toward are wasting time –– even when hard at work.
  • #comment This duality is one of lots of struggle. It's not easy to find that balance, nor is it easy to find that purpose. [[set goals, not systems]]
• 13. #comment Not just "investigations" but judgements of other characters and bucketing people to being a certain kind. Looking for the faults in the souls of others is ultimately a fault in our own souls.
• A brief instant is all that is lost. For you can't lose either the past or the future; how could you lose what you don't have?
• 15. [[Maya and the concept of perception]]
  • All the quotes in the book are reminders that even Aurelius mixed and matched learnings from different sources. Nothing is original. Curation.
• 17. The connection to #Buddhism - Thich Nhat Hanh and the water/wave analogy to death.
  • What is dealt comes from the same place we do.

Book 3

• 4. #comment Worrying about other people doesn't mean caring for other people - it means being bothered by their judgements, their behaviours, etc. These things are much easier said than done. How can one be empathetic while still maintaining some detachment? Or be helpful for the common good without getting sucked in?
• "Your ability to control your thoughts - treat it with respect. It's all that protects your mind from false perceptions - false to your nature, and that of all rational beings." [[Maya and the concept of perception]]
• Nothing produces greatness of mind like the habit of examining methodically and honestly everything we enounter in this life, and of determining its place in the order of things, its intended use, its value to the whole universe, and its worth to man in his role as citizen.

Book 4

• Choose not to be harmed and you won't feel harmed. Don't feel harmed, and you haven't been.
• "It was for the best so nature had no choice but to do it"
  • Chaos? Randomness? Maybe that counts as nature, too, but you can't attribute that to being "for the best".
• "While you're alive and able, be good."
• #comment Content should not be confused with passivity or lack of ambitions. Make plans, strive for things bigger than you, but be flexible in the odd chance it doesn't happen.
• "To be like a rock that the waves keep crashing over. It stands unmoved and the raging of the sea falls still around it."

Book 5

• "The things you think about determine the quality of your mind"
• "Keep in mind how fast things pass by and are gone - those that are now, and those to come. Existence flows past us like a river: the "what" is in constant flux, the "why" has a thousand variations. Nothing is stable, not even what's right here. The infinity of past and future grasps us - a chasm whose depths we cannot see. So it would take an idiot to feel self importance or any distress, or any indignation either. As if the things that irritate us lasted."
• What does not hurt the community cannot hurt the individual. Every time you think you've been wronged, apply this rule: If the community isn't hurt by it, then neither am I. But what if the community is hurt? Then don't be angry with the person who caused the injury. Just help him to see his mistake.
• If it is good to say or do something, then it is even better to be criticized for having said or done it.

Book 6

• 39. #comment Things are no longer ordered (by nature), with human intervention they are progressing toward man-made disorder. How does this fit in with evolutionary theory? The force = genes and their mutations?
• The happiness of those who want to be popular depends on others. The happiness of those who seek pleasure fluctuates with moods outside their control. But the happiness of the wise grows out of their own free acts.
• Learn to concentrate on what those around you are saying. Enter as deeply as possible into the mind of each speaker.

Book 7

• To feel affection for people even when they make mistakes is uniquely human. You can do it, if you simply recognize that they are human too, and that they act out of ignorance, against their will, and that you'll be dead. And above all, that they haven't really hurt you, haven't diminished your ability to choose.
• On pain: pain is always endurable, the intelligence maintains serenity by cutting itself off from the body, the mind remains undiminished.
• When you have done something well and someone else has benefited from it, why do you crave yet a third reward - to be thanked or to be repaid?

Book 8

• Remember that to change your mind and to accept correction are free facts too. The action is yours, based on your decision, and your own mind.
• 57. "That's what the outpouring - the diffusion - of thought should be like: not emptied out but extended."
  • Beautiful. Extending can be applied to the body, as well. Not just moving but extending. Diffusion of both thought and movement through extension - illuminating the space it takes up.

Book 9

• 2. #comment Nature is actually indifferent to a lot of things - infact if those things have evolved instead of been created, it makes even more sense that they survive.
• When somebody's behavior offends you, find fault instead with yourself for failing to anticipate his offensive behavior. Your ability to reason should have told you that he would misbehave.

Book 10

• Stop all this theorizing about what a good man should be. Be it!
• How many traits do you have that would make a lot of people glad to be rid of you?

Book 11

• #comment We should really distinguish between indifference and non-reaction. It is not about not caring for it at all, but about not reacting to the circumstance. [[detachment vs non-reaction]]
• #comment How can you talk about everything being connected and still separate the mind, the soul and the body so easily?
• It is the pursuit of these things, and your attempts to avoid them; that leave you in such turmoil. And yet they aren't seeking you out, you are seeking them out. Suspend judgment about them, and at once they will lie still and you will be freed from fleeing and pursuing.
• How false and beneath contempt is the man who says, "Let me be perfectly frank with you." What is he up to? There is no need to dress up the truth. It will be evident in your words, written on your face, ringing in your voice, flashing from your eyes.

Book 12

• 3. #comment Of what you've said and done, and not just the others. Free yourself of past actions and focus on making present actions something you won't regret later.
• Be a boxer, not a gladiator, in the way you act on your principles. The gladiator takes up his sword, only to put it down again. But the boxer is never without his fist and has only to clench it.
• Intelligence is uniquely drawn toward what is akin to it and joins with it separately, in shared awareness.
• So make your exit with grace –– the same grace shown to you.