Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.54 (Hicks and Hicks) Be happy with my lot. Treat people well. Don't allow unexamined thoughts to guide my actions. That's just three things .  For that last part, the key is time. Taking a breath. Resting a moment after the stimulus. Giving myself a chance to calm, to examine, to decide, to act rather than re act. It's easy for the elephant to lead me where I do not want to go. Taking a pause to just be for a few seconds, to stop doing and start thinking, I can constrain my mind better, more completely, more subtly, more effectively.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.52 (Hicks and Hicks) And here again we see which traits Stoics value. Honor and kindness over technique and accomplishment. Be the right person.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.48 (Hicks and Hicks) Spontaneous order. Mixed with higher order patterns visible only at a remove. Cooperation happens when given an avenue for fair treatment and reputation matters.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.38 (Hicks and Hicks) How wonderfully sarcastic. And apropos. I'm always worried about things. Paying for this thing or that. Fixing or buying this or the other. But they don't care at all.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.34 (Hicks and Hicks) Nothing lasts. Not even glory. We remember Marcus for now. How many people more famous than he in their day, are now utterly forgotten, not mentioned in any record or living memory? Don't worry about it. It's fine.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.31 (Hicks and Hicks) Don't be a dick. Dont break local physics.  Got it. Works for me.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.29 (Hicks and Hicks) A lot to unpack here. May take a day or two.  That things I want, the one I think about, is dragging me along like the strings of a marrionette. I don't things, and don't do them, for the wrong reasons Outcomes I'd reject were I thinking straight. Where is my elephant taking me? Can I interrupt its pattern and wait long enough to be less invested in the answer? More able to think clearly?

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.28 (Hicks and Hicks) Sometimes people don't realize how awesome I am. How much I didn't eat that day. (Nevermind today. Hush!) How I didn't cuss that one guy out in traffic and I let the other two cars in during that merge? A+ human being right there. I was a good sport during a game? It's expected. Nobody notices or cares. And yeah, a little recognition — a nice job or quick 'hey I noticed' nod — would be nice. But that's not where the important approval happens.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.27 (Hicks and Hicks) Be happy with what I have. Don't covet even that which is my own. If it is time for something to move on to its next owner, who am I to thwart fate? Definitely an ideal for aspiration.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.25 (Hicks and Hicks) It's. All. Temporary. Means both it's not important  and we think we have time . And change is important . . . lest we stagnate. New cannot come from nothing. It comes from the pieces parts of the old.

Today's Meditation: What we should focus on is where we are lusting and dreaming and fighting for so-called “externals.” We should think about where we have made our happiness conditional on this or that achievement, on this or that identity which lies outside our control. We should remind ourselves that we have plenty right now, that we can feel good—feel enough—right now.  The Daily Stoic 2603?? Geez. Five days behind. And now the inertia is from having so many to do. Bleh. But I can do one. This one. Focus on this one and done. Do the rest when I get home, surely? My happiness doesn't depend on having done these blog entries . . .  but my remembering self is always happy about when my doing self gets around to it. So call this one done and do the next. Hop to it.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.23 (Hicks and Hicks) It's not serious. It's only temporary. It's beautiful and futile and holy and null. It's everything everywhere all at different times. But only limited times. So get over it.

Today's Meditation: It must be bewildering to be a kid. The world is a confusing and illogical place…and so little of it is explained to them at first. And their brains are still developing, to boot. .... They’ve literally never done this before. This is their first time on the planet. They are trying to get up to speed. And again, everything is insane! Society is a mess. Rules are contradictory. Language is ridiculous. Stuff is always changing. Of course things are hard. They’re hard for adults, too! So give them some grace. Be patient. Explain and explain again. Answer their questions. Then be patient again. They need it. We all do.  ~ The Daily Dad 260304 My world is not the same as their word. I know things they don't. I'm expecting them to be as knowledgeable and competent as I am. And that's not fair. I need to make allowance. I need to understand. I need to adjust and adapt and explain better and demonstrate and be patient. They are not small adults. They're ...

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.16 (Hicks and Hicks) Their minds are better than mine. My mind dredged up trouble at the drop of a hat. Middle of the night? Yes. Trying to go to sleep? Sure! Right before something emotional? Why not? Maybe not tonight. Think virtuous thoughts, O student! Think virtuous thoughts.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.64 (Hicks and Hicks) Just because I am stressed or in pain or overly busy or frustrated or hurried or ill doesn't mean I get to treat others poorly. Recognize it. Interrupt it. Correct it.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.22 (Hicks and Hicks) Behold the power of the Stoic promise: forgiveness and affection; perspective; dreedom from harm. There are worse fates. More work to do expanding my sphere of interest and becoming truly a citizen of the world. More work to do understanding error as ignorance and forgiveness as natural and unbidden. More work to do rejecting harm from the start.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.21 (Hicks and Hicks) Present author excluded. Thank goodness. Myself? Yeah, probably within 15-20 years. Maybe more if I improve my health. But that's ok. It's fine. I'm not meant to be remembered forever. So what? Oh no! I'm like everybody else in history! I can live with that.

Today's Meditation: Meditations , 7.17 (Hicks and Hicks) I am not angry with you, but just go away.  Impulses, stray thoughts, intrusive thoughts, all are natural, if unwanted. I can acknowledge that there's no issues that they showed up — I'm not somehow culpable, not to be blamed, for them — but that I do not need to indulge them. I can tell them to go and return to my task at hand.

Today's Mediation: Meditations , 7.14 (Hicks and Hicks) If I choose not to be harmed, I am not harmed. But but but what about physical injury!? Haven't you ever seen one of those inspirational stories about someone who lost a limb or is paralyzed and hasn't let that define their life? What more do you need to prove that if you truly choose not to be harmed, then you are not harmed .

Today's Mediation: Meditations , 7.3 (Hicks and Hicks) A mild manner and without condescension. This hits too close to home for me. I am guilty of this sin. Help me to do better, O Emperor!  Seriously though, I do need to be better at treating others with all the respect they deserve as members of the common polity. And measuring worth by what is person cares about, what they value? Luckily, Stoicssm is an active philosophy, so what a person cares about will be easily observed in what they do and say. I hope my actions speak well of me.

Today's Mediation: It’s ugly out there…but we don’t have to be ugly. We can be beautiful. We can be kind. We can be honest. We can be decent. We can be good. We have to be.  ~ The Daily Stoic 260225  Help solve the problem, if only by not adding to it; more, if possible. Stop the comments stop the assumptions stop the bias the inequality the inputs. Stop the outputs.

Today's Mediation: Meditations , 2.13 (Hicks and Hicks) Meditations , 2.13 (Waterfield) Meditations , 2.13 (Long) Meditations , 2.13 (Hammond) Fear not what others think. Keep straight my own house and follow Nature. Accept fate and pity those who are ignorant of virtue.

Today's Mediation: "...what harm does that stupid insult do? It’s nothing, Jimmy, it’s empty. Just ignorant words from an ignorant child who is gone from your life the moment it was said.” ...  It happened. It’s done. It doesn’t change your responsibilities. ...  We can keep running the numbers, replaying the mistakes, and assigning fault, but the total never changes. That type of math keeps us stuck in the past. The past is gone, and no amount of calculation will bring it back or make it fair. What we do have is agency right now. We can choose to let go, to move on, and to move forward. Agency doesn’t exist in the past—it only exists now . ~ The Daily Stoic 260222 How do I deal with mistakes? I try to shake them off and move on, but it doesn't always work . . . mainly in the middle of the night. ----- Right now, my son is having a crisis of confidence because he is not as good at his chosen sport (Ultimate) as he wants to be. Worse, he feels this because we play pick up w...

Today's Mediation: You Are Here by Thich Nhat Hanh, Happiness and Peace are Possible Meditation is as meditation does. As Forrest Gump as that sounds, it seems to be the nut here. Meditation without self-castigation is allowed. I don't have to flagellate mysf for not having stopped all thought processes or for motic8ng the car horn on the highway outside. Accept. Roll with it. Keep going. Far less frustrating than expecting too much.

Today's Mediation: Meditations , 7.1 (Hicks and Hicks) Nothing is new under the sun, all that happens has happened before. The world is full of evil people and atrocities; I cannot demand that it not be. I can accept that it is and do my best within such a world.