Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.1 (Hicks and Hicks) I remind myself often how good I have it in so, so many ways, lest I make the grievous error of forgetting my blessings and pursuing a mirage of temptation and seduction. Even if I weren't committed to my family and friends for their own sake because I love thrmI know what my loving home life means to my life. I'll be dammed if I'm going to throw that away for some material gain or some impulsive thrill.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.30 (Hicks and Hicks) I resemble that remark. What so many can do with so little when I fail despite riches of all kinds.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.29 (Hicks and Hicks) Be a part of the community. Full stop.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.26 (Waterfield) You must profit from the present moment with right reason and justice. Such a tidy summary of the practical side of Stoicism: how to do my best, here now, with what I have. Will I be more effective if I follow that impulse? Will I think better and get closer to my goals if I let passions sway my actions? I can't help but experience those distractions, but I certainly can watch for them, try to interrupt them, and mimize their impact.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.25 (Hicks and Hicks) If it's too hard to be a good man, the just pretend to be one for one day. Just one day. It's fine . Don't worry about it. No problem. One day. You can do that, right ? Ok. So, hey, that wasn't so bad, right?  A whole day, acting like I and happy with my fate, performing acts of justice, and being kind. And it barely hurt at all. I mean, I really wanted that second cookie at lunch, but I know what my body is like and I know the bad consequences of eating sugar. So I accepted that reality and left it there with hardly any looking back in longing as I left the break room..... Great! Good to hear. Say, whaddaya think about.....

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.23 (Waterfield) Certainly would be convenient to believe in Fate and be done with it, but as the Stoics teach, best to deal with the world as it is than as I wish it were. So I don't believe in Fate or a Providential Universe. Now what? Well, the simplest thing, the easiest and least ancious way to deal with it, is to accept it as a useful psychological tool to help accept unpleasant / devastating worlds without imploding. Even if I don't know the reason, maybe there is one. It can also help keep me focused on the basics: since Providence isn't out there doing something infernal, liminal, or angelic to my world, then it's either random or deterministic and not up to me in either case. IF anything is up to me, it would be only be my internal world, my opinions, and my actions. So long as I limit myself to these, and to aiming for the right goal, I should be (as) ok (as I can be). Alternately, I could toss this somet...

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.21 (Hicks and Hicks) Follow Nature. Reason will lead. Focus. On reality, right here, right now.  Remember my goal. Aim for virtue. Now layer in the Elephant and the Rider. Emotion will lead. Impulse will lead. Passion will lead. Reason will backfill. So how to fix this? The Stoics know sudden desires and whims can be overwhelming. And they know how easy it is to fall into the trap of self-justification after the fact. So they built into their philosophy methods to interrupt bad thought patterns and logical fallacies. Take a longer view - will history care, will anyone remember? Take the broader view - does this mean anything to the rest of the community, much less the cosmopolity? Take a clearer view - am I adding assumptions to the facts? Am I letting my pride / anger / jealousy / envy / emotions run the show? Simply asking the questions will sometimes be enough break the mental bonds which restrict me. Actually answering them with...

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations , 4.20 (Hicks and Hicks) Cf Meditation 3.6: if you can find something better than wisdom, justice, courage, and truth...pursue it at once! The best things are best, but, if they're not, switch to the best. But that won't happen, because the best things are the best.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.19 (Hicks and Hicks) I can be good or spend my time wkorying what so-and-so thinks of me. I don't have time for both. Pivk the direct path to virtue, reason, and Nature.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations , 4.18 (Hicks and Hicks) Worry about myself, not others. It is enough — more than enough, too much! — to work on following reason and Nature in my internal world.  Worrying about someone else's actions is useless — more than useless, detrimental! — and wastes my energy, focus, and care. Not only are their lives beyond my control, they're not my business in the first place. I can be concerned for a friend, or worried about a child, and do it in a way which doesn't presume that they are mine to rule and then be frustrated when they fail to become my willing servants. It's the assumption of right which is wrong. I have not only no ability to direct them to my wishes, but I deserve no such thing even were it possible. They are independent moral agents and not objects to manipulate.  Kant was right: treat people as ends in themselves, not as means.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.17 (Hicks and Hicks) Get good. Or rather, be good. 'The problem is you think you have time.' Ain't that the truth? Mañana, right? We'll, I'm restarting XYZ tomorrow. Actual tomorrow, 260108. It's been a year, maybe two. We'll see if it helps, if it hurts. We'll see. In 7.7, Marcus also says, I can't always do it with only what I have to hand. So I'll do something. XYZ in the morning. Let's make some headway.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh (ed. by Melvin McLeod), The Four Mantras Dear one, I know that you are suffering, that is why I am here for you. So immediate. So powerful. So necessary.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.11 (Hicks and Hicks) Do what reason and Nature command for the common good. Accept correction when I'm wrong, being swayed solely by argument, not emotion, instinct, or impulse. It's just two things, right? Studying Haidt's The Righteous Mind,  and reading about the Elephant and the Rider, however, makes me doubt the efficacy of the instruction. I can want to be persuaded only by logic and facts, but my human mind doesn't usually work that way. The Elephant makes the move and the Rider yells, 'That way!', pointing wherever the Elephant is already heading. But there is room for improvement. I can become closer to this ideal by keeping it at the forefront of my mind. If I can catch them in act, explicitly identifying potential errors, labeling them, I may more often choose the better path. Now to work on corraling my fickle focus into helping me actually do  that.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations, 4.11 (Waterfield) Meditations, 4.11 (Hammond) Hammond's translation is so much better at getting the point across. I can see why Waterfield turned it out that way, but it's a definite reach cf Hammond's plain prose. When I have been wronged, I need to guard against mentally accepting the narrative the other side is using: their hidden assumptions, omissions, and shading. Judge the situation as it is. Without their baggage, but without my own as well. Look at things honestly and plainly, doing my best to see through illusions, internal and external, which block my ability to reason with all the facts. I can't follow Nature if someone blinds me nor if I blind myself.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations , 4.10 (Hicks and Hicks) Another section on Providence.... I can either just reject this or allow it as play-acting to further my pursuit of virtue and oikeiosis . I choose to adopt it as an attitude, a actor's costume for verisimilitude, a conceit that can help me be pursue virtue more easily, even if not reality in fact.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations , 4.9 (Hicks and Hicks) The main part of Stoicism I reject: a providential universe is a step too far. The universe is a machine. It exists. It operates. It flows. It interacts from point to point in space and time, but it doesn't mean it. It's not pointed at anything. There's no need to bring intentionality or telos into it. I choose Stoicism because it makes the most sense. It helps the most. It's effective . It treats people like people, promotes personal and social growth and progress, and a focuses on beliefs useful in both the short- and long-term. Rights are a convenient fiction we use to control impulses in ourselves and others. Providence, likewise, is a story we tell to make us feel less afraid in the face of an uncaring, immutable void. Fine. But recognize the crutch and use it purposefully. Don't mistake a tool for reality.

Today's Meditation(s): Medea, in Ovid's Metamorphosis, Book VII

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations , 4.8 (Hicks and Hicks) What a timely reminder of first principles. If it doesn't touch my inner self, if there's no connection to virtue and morality, then it is incidental, accidental; perhaps worth accounting for in my life, but not at the cost of my virtue. Stay true to my reason and follow Nature. Thus will I know what (general) moral path to take to achieve my (by best chance at) desired results while ensuring I remain true to (my pursuit of) virtue. If it takes me off my path, that is the only true harm. Whether I achieve that path, is another matter. It is enough that I know how to do the best I can with what I have, where I am. My struggle is generally one of performance, not perception:  I see the right path, but do not choose it.

Today's Meditation(s): Money is tighter. Work is changing for the worse. Kids are growing, changing, making me adapt. Body is aging, failing, failing faster. Friends and family have health issues, too. Cars need repair. House needs repair. Clothes need buying. Food needs buying. Bill need paying. And that's just my immediate world..... I don't know who said it: "A man who has only my troubles must count himself lucky indeed." I could bitch and moan about it. I could get drunk and make it worse. I could take it out on those I love. Or I could be thankful I have more than so many. I could plan ahead in case things get worse. I could recognize that what I have now is what I used to wish for. I could look inside myself and find the source of my unrest that makes these things seem important and worth losing sleep. I could get busy in my own salvation.

Today's Meditation(s): Meditations , 4.7 (Hicks and Hicks) (Waterfield) Waterfield's version is closer to how I've usually seen and heard this Meditation quoted — sometimes shortened even to just the first and final phrases — but the Hicks' translation adds that bit at the end that just makes me giddy. "Overcome your hurt feelings or injured pride." Adding the specific sources of feelings of harm makes the passage much more meaningful. Now it sounds like Marcus reminding himself of a time he let his pride or anger or slight or embarrassment made him to act viciously. Or, at least, lead him to poor decisions by acceding his impulses, disregarding his reason, and not following Nature. Gee. Why would I see that, get it intuitively, and have it resonate so well with me? Aside: so what's in the original? I'll need to look it up.