Tag: Stoicism

Memento Mori Makes a Great Birthday Gift

I celebrated my birthday this week. While I blew out the candles and toasted to my good health, I had in mind these two words: memento mori. In English, the Latin phrase means, “Remember death.”

Now, before you think I’m the world’s biggest party pooper, hear me out. The point of memento mori is not to be maudlin or morbid. On the contrary, it is meant to provide inspiration to embrace every day as a gift not to be wasted or taken for granted.

The inevitability of death has been recognized throughout the history of the world. It is a central theme in religion, art, architecture, music and literature. The phrase memento mori can be traced back to the ancient civilizations of Greece and Rome. Socrates said the proper practice of philosophy “is about nothing else but dying and being dead.”

I always knew I wouldn’t live forever, but as I rounded the sun for the sixty-first time, it really started to sink in. Like Henry David Thoreau wrote in Walden, “I do not want to come to the end of life and discover I had not lived.”

Contemplating my mortality urges me to take Thoreau’s advice to simplify, simplify, simplify! The best place to start is with our physical possessions. Evangelist Billy Graham said, “I never saw a U-Haul behind a hearse.” What a good reminder that, in the end, we won’t be taking anything with us.

However, I’ve found stuff isn’t the most difficult thing to simplify, nor is it the only thing that fritters life away. Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius wrote in Meditations, “You could leave life right now. Let that determine what you do and say and think.” I shudder at the thought of how much time I’ve wasted doing things that had no real purpose, saying things that had no real meaning, and thinking about things I couldn’t control.

Memento mori reminds us our days are indeed numbered and helps us get crystal clear about our priorities. We can start with our possessions, but from there we must examine our behavior, pursuits, relationships, finances and attitude to see if they reflect what is truly important to us.

This constant awareness that life is short leads to living more intentionally. Intentional living means building your life around your core beliefs and values. Instead of acting on impulse, cruising on auto-pilot, following the herd or trying to impress, our daily life becomes more purposeful and authentic.

The best gift we can give ourselves is permission to spend the rest of our lives living each day as if it’s our last. This doesn’t mean shouting, “YOLO!” while doing something stupid or irresponsible. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Seneca said, “Let us prepare our minds as if we’d come to the very end of life. Let’s postpone nothing. Let us balance life’s books each day.”

I’m excited to start the rest of my life with memento mori tatooed on my consciousness. To remember I must die inspires me to remember I must live. After all, as Thoreau reminded us, “Living is so dear.”

Birthday Wishes and Wisdom

Cue the balloons and confetti because tomorrow is my birthday. Actually, for me, birthdays are less about celebrating than they are about reflecting and improving. (I know, I’m a real party animal.) In my lifetime, I’ve spent way too much time worrying about things I can’t do anything about. So here’s my birthday wish: the wisdom to focus on what is in my control.

These familiar words are from The Serenity Prayer, “God, grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change, the courage to change what I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” Reinhold Niebuhr is credited for writing it in 1943, but the idea goes back much further.

Epictetus, a former slave turned Stoic philosopher, wrote during the second century, “Make the best use of what is in your power, and take the rest as it happens. Our opinions are up to us, and our impulses, desires, aversions – in short, whatever is our own doing.”

An 8th century Indian Buddhist scholar wrote, “If there’s a remedy when trouble strikes, what reason is there for dejection? And if there is no help for it, what use is there in being glum?”

A 1695 Mother Goose nursery rhyme expresses the sentiment more lightly, “For every ailment under the sun there is a remedy or there is none. If there be one, try to find it; if there be none, never mind it.”

In 1801, Friedrich Schiller wrote, “Blessed is he who has learned to bear what he cannot change, and to give up with dignity what he cannot save.”

Just this week, Ryan Holiday wrote on a similar theme in his email Meditations on Strategy and Life. He suggests one of the most important questions we can ask ourselves, “Is this in my control?” He writes, “Making this distinction will make you happier, make you stronger and make you more successful if only because it concentrates your resources in the places where they matter.”

It seems humanity has long-acknowledged the simple wisdom of heeding what is in our control and letting go of the rest. Tomorrow, when the smoke clears from 61 birthday candles, I’m claiming that wisdom as mine.

The Elegance of Queen Elizabeth II

As I reflect on Queen Elizabeth’s death this week, I recall a story my mother loved to tell about a time when I was about ten. Apparently I was displaying less than desirable table manners at dinner one evening. My mom asked, “Is that how you are going to eat when you dine with the queen?” To which I replied with all the audacity and seriousness only a ten-year-old girl can possess, “What makes you think I won’t be the queen?”

While I do admire the spunk of that little girl, she clearly had much to learn about ascension to the throne as well as dining etiquette. It’s hard to imagine fifty years later I would have become a bit of a royal watcher and big fan of Queen Elizabeth.

There’s little I can add to the conversation about the queen’s life and how beloved she was by those close to her as well as those who watched her from afar. To say she was elegant is an understatement. While she did not coin the phrase Keep Calm and Carry On, it does seem to embody Queen Elizabeth’s fortitude, composure, and self-discipline.

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The now famous British phrase was one of three posters the Ministry of Information created in 1939 in the event of war. On September 3, 1939, in response to Adolf Hitler’s invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany. Only a small number of original posters survived as most of them were recycled in 1940 to help the British government face a desperate paper shortage.

In 2000, a copy of the poster was discovered in a bookshop in Northumberland, England and reproductions began to sell a year later. The poster and its message has since become ubiquitous with many imitations and parodies.

As a student of Stoic philosophy, I find the British stiff-upper-lip attitude admirable. Not everyone appreciates the sentiment of the poster as I do, but it has helped me get through many life challenges with a bit of the queen’s strong spirit.

Were my mother still living, I know she would be glued to the television this week and mourning along with the rest of the world. She would retell stories about growing up and living during Queen Elizabeth’s reign. I also know she would still be laughing about when I was ten and actually thought I had a shot at wearing the Crown. §

“When life seems hard, the courageous do not lie down and accept defeat;
instead, they are all the more determined to struggle for a better future.”
~ Queen Elizabeth II

The Elegance of Sympatheia

A television news anchor broke down in tears while interviewing a Ukrainian father whose wife and two children were killed while trying to escape their city under siege. I know I’m not the only viewer who wept with them. In that moment, we were experiencing what the ancient Greeks called sympatheia, an elegant concept that all things are mutually woven together and have an affinity for each other.

Sympatheia reminds us we are part of something much bigger than ourselves. You’ve probably seen a photo called The Blue Marble. It is an image of Earth taken fifty years ago by the Apollo 17 crew on their way to the Moon. It was shot 18,000 miles from our planet and is one of the most reproduced images in history. About the photo, astronomer Carl Sagan said, “There is perhaps no better a demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world.” 

This summer the James Webb Space Telescope, a 10 billion dollar satellite located a million miles away, is sending us celestial images I can barely fathom. According to NASA, the very faintest blips of light in the photos are of galaxies as they existed more than 13 billion years ago. The images confirm for me that we are part of an incomprehensibly elegant universe. 

Maybe you’ve had a similar feeling standing on the ocean shore, on the rim of the Grand Canyon, or under a million stars in the vast night sky. This oceanic feeling happens when we allow ourselves to have a zoomed-out perspective. It’s then we experience a feeling of awe and realization that we are very small, but part of something incomprehensibly big.  

Stoic philosophy is rooted in the concept of sympatheia. Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius wrote, “Meditate often on the interconnectedness and mutual interdependence of all things in the universe.” The Stoics understood we are essentially all the same. We all suffer and cry, love and laugh, live and die. Sympatheia allows us to understand that our actions affect one another. 

Ryan Holiday, author and host of the podcast The Daily Stoic said, “We are all unified and share the same substance. We breathe the same air. We share the same hopes and dreams. We are all descended from the same. And this is true no matter what race you are, no matter where you come from, or what you believe.” 

My guess is sympatheia doesn’t come naturally to our selfish egos. Of course, we look out for number one. We probably care about family and those immediately around us. We might even feel a duty to those who look like us, live like us, and think like us. Sympatheia takes some work. 

If we contemplate the photos coming to us from the James Webb Telescope and hold that zoomed-out perspective, our connection and responsibility grow. We can see we are part of an interconnected world, where everything and everyone is united in a delicate relationship. It is this connection to each other that can push us to be and do what’s good, not just for a part, but for the whole.

Aurelius wrote, “The universe made rational creatures for the sake of each other, with an eye toward mutual benefit and never for harm.” In the big picture, our differences are insignificant. What unites us is our sameness. Our universe, our planet, and our humanity depend on the elegance of sympatheia. §

“That which is not good for the bee-hive, cannot be good for the bees.”
~Marcus Aurelius

The Elegance of Sympatheia

A news anchor broke down in tears while interviewing a Ukrainian father whose wife and two children were killed while trying to escape their city under siege. I know I’m not the only viewer who wept with them. In that moment, we were experiencing what the ancient Greeks called sympatheia, an elegant concept that all things are mutually woven together and have an affinity for each other.

Sympatheia reminds us we’re part of something much bigger than ourselves. You’ve probably seen a photo called The Blue Marble. It is an image of Earth taken fifty years ago by the Apollo 17 crew on their way to the Moon. It was shot 18,000 miles from our planet and is one of the most reproduced images in history. Astronomer Carl Sagan said, “There is perhaps no better a demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world.” 

Maybe you’ve had a similar feeling standing on the ocean shore, on the rim of the Grand Canyon, or under a million stars in the vast night sky. This oceanic feeling happens when we allow ourselves to have a zoomed-out perspective. It’s then we experience a feeling of awe and realization that we are very small, but part of something incomprehensibly big.  

Stoic philosophy is rooted in the concept of sympatheia. Roman emperor Marcus Arelius wrote, “Meditate often on the interconnectedness and mutual interdependence of all things in the universe.” The Stoics understood we are essentially all the same. We all suffer and cry, love and laugh, live and die. Sympatheia allows us to understand that our actions affect one another. 

Ryan Holiday, author and host of the podcast The Daily Stoic said, “We are all unified and share the same substance. We breathe the same air. We share the same hopes and dreams. We are all descended from the same. And this is true no matter what race you are, no matter where you come from, or what you believe.” 

My guess is sympatheia doesn’t come naturally to our selfish egos. Of course, we look out for number one. We probably care about family and those immediately around us. We might even feel a duty to those who look like us, live like us, and think like us. Sympatheia takes some work. 

If we think about that photo of Earth and hold that zoomed-out perspective, our connection and our responsibility grow. We can see we are part of an interconnected world, where everything and everyone is united in a delicate relationship. It is this connection to each other that can push us to be and do what’s good, not just for a part, but for the whole.

Aurelius wrote, “The universe made rational creatures for the sake of each other, with an eye toward mutual benefit and never for harm.” In the big picture, our differences are insignificant. What unites us is our sameness. Our planet. Our humanity. What if our world leaders understood and practiced the concept of sympatheia? A better question might be, what if we all did?  §

“What’s good for the hive is good for the bees.” – Marcus Aurelius

The Joy of Overcoming Obstacles

After a stormy night, the trail I walk each morning was scattered with sticks and debris. As I hiked along the wooded path, I picked up a dozen large limbs and heaved them to the side in a gesture of goodwill towards the next traveler.

The warming sun sent smoky shafts of light through the cool forest mist. The soaking rain intensified the heady smell of pine straw carpeting the trail. My eyes remained on my feet to avoid slipping on the muddy slopes.

I came to a stop when I looked up to see a huge oak tree had fallen across my path. The trunk, three feet in diameter, hung precariously over the trail and stretched about forty feet each direction into the thick woods.

Ducking under the tree seemed unwise. Crawling over it wouldn’t be easy. I briefly considered turning around. Then stepping forward, I heard myself say, “The obstacle is the way.”

It was the title of a book I’d just read. Author Ryan Holiday draws on the ancient philosophy of Stoicism to encourage readers to face life’s challenges with resilience. Holiday writes, “Whatever we face, we have a choice: Will we be blocked by obstacles, or will we advance through and over them?”

Deciding a fallen tree wouldn’t stop my daily hike,  I stretched one leg on top of the trunk, grabbed hold of the thick bark to pull myself up and over and dropped ungracefully to the the other side. My arms and legs were dirty and scraped, but I felt surprisingly good.

When I reached the blocked path the next day, I crawled on the tree trunk and stood up to take in a higher view of the woods before jumping to the other side. This morning, I walked up and down the full length of the trunk like a balance beam. The fallen tree had become the best part of my morning.

Holiday believes overcoming obstacles in life requires the discipline of three critical steps:

1. Perception – How we view what happens around us can be a source of strength or weakness.

2. Action – We can always choose to act with deliberation, boldness and persistence.

3. Will – We have an internal power we shouldn’t allow the outside world to undermine.

Take notice of obstacles in your life. They may come in the form of disappointment, difficulty, rejection, injury, injustice, illness or heartbreak. When an obstacle appears – large or small – notice how you react to it. Do you accept it? Do you face it with grace and resilience? The good news is if we don’t handle it well, we will certainly get another chance to try again, because obstacles are a part of life.

More than 2,000 years ago, Marcus Aurelius wrote, “Our actions may be impeded, but there can be no impeding our intentions or dispositions. Because we can accommodate and adapt. The mind adapts and converts to its own purposes the obstacle to our acting. The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.”

I know the folks who maintain the hiking trail will eventually remove the fallen tree, but until then, it remains a fun daily reminder that the obstacle is the way. §