Head-dibs

The end of a month is exciting for it represents a time of transition, the chance to review days gone by and make changes for personal growth in the days that lay ahead. The rubric for February looks something like a daily check-list and is presented in no particular order. This will become daily practice for the month until it is mastered . . . if nothing prevents me: ASK: "What would _____ do?"  "Cherish some man of high character, and keep him ever before your eyes, living as if he were watching you, and ordering all your actions as if he beheld them." (Epicurius) PREPARE: "What could go wrong?"  Think ahead, plan for contingencies. Don't let yourself be ambushed, taken by surprise. TRAIN: Practice voluntary discomfort.  Skip a meal, take a cold shower, "forget" your coat. Get out of your comfort zone. RESOLVE: "If nothing prevents me .  . ." The new "to do" list. AMOR FATI Accept what is outsid...

 " . . . we must follow the old adage and avoid three things with special care: hatred, jealousy, and scorn. And wisdom alone can show you how this may be done. It is hard to observe a mean; we must be chary of letting the fear of jealousy lead us into becoming objects of scorn, lest, when we choose not to stamp others down, we let them think that they can stamp us down. The power to inspire fear has caused many men to be in fear. Let us withdraw ourselves in every way; for it is as harmful to be scorned as to be admired. One must therefore take refuge in philosophy; this pursuit, not only in the eyes of good men, but also in the eyes of those who are even moderately bad, is a sort of protecting emblem. For speechmaking at the bar, or any other pursuit that claims the people’s attention, wins enemies for a man; but philosophy is peaceful and minds her own business. Men cannot scorn her; she is honoured by every profession, even the vilest among them. Evil can never grow so stro...

"There are more things, Lucilius, likely to frighten us than there are to crush us ; we suffer more often in imagination than in reality. . . What I advise you to do is, not to be unhappy before the crisis comes . . .  some things torment us more than they ought ; some torment us before they ought ; and some torment us when they ought not to torment us at all. We are in the habit of exaggerating, or imagining, or anticipating, sorrow. . . . You may retort with the question: "How am I to know whether my sufferings are real or imaginary?" Here is the rule for such matters: We are tormented either by things present, or by things to come, or by both. As to things present, the decision is easy. . . As to what may happen to it in the future, we shall see later on. To-day there is nothing wrong with it. For it is more often the case that we are troubled by our apprehensions, and that we are mocked by that mocker, rumour, which is wont to settle wars, but much more often se...

Skinny old man, he was. Always out working in the yard in a light cotton shirt, his child-sized jeans secured in place by suspenders and those heavy boots. Puttering in the yard, there was never a time he did not wave to a neighbor walking or driving by. Sometimes we arrived at my grandparents house in the late afternoon and he was the first to greet me, giving a wave across the yard. If we arrived during the night, he was easily heard the very next day pushing a mower, or seen raking leaves, tending flower beds. When he saw me, he shared that wave he must have been saving just for me. I remember once going outside just to wave at Mr. Douglas. One day we drove up and Mr. Douglas was not in the yard. He was not there the next day, either. The picture was all wrong. He was always there, but not today. The yard was still. "He's passed on," my grandmother said. I didn't know what that meant and the adults exchanged glances and prepared themselves for a cautionary expla...

"Let us cherish and love old age ; for it is full of pleasure if one knows how to use it. . . . . . . let us go to our sleep with joy and gladness ; let us say: I have lived; the course which Fortune set for me is finished. And if God is pleased to add another day, we should welcome it with glad hearts." (Seneca, Moral Letter 12: On Old Age)

“'Cherish some man of high character, and keep him ever before your eyes, living as if he were watching you, and ordering all your actions as if he beheld them.'” Such, my dear Lucilius, is the counsel of Epicurus; he has quite properly given us a guardian and an attendant. We can get rid of most sins, if we have a witness who stands near us when we are likely to go wrong. The soul should have someone whom it can respect, – one by whose authority it may make even its inner shrine more hallowed. Happy is the man who can make others better, not merely when he is in their company, but even when he is in their thoughts! And happy also is he who can so revere a man as to calm and regulate himself by calling him to mind! One who can so revere another, will soon be himself worthy of reverence. Choose therefore a Cato; or, if Cato seems too severe a model, choose some Laelius, a gentler spirit. Choose a master whose life, conversation, and soul-expressing face have satisfied y...

"In everyone's life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit." (Albert Schweitzer)

Hi. My name is James. I'm addicted to Porcupine Tree. The best musicians from everywhere, gathered into one band. A genuine "suicide squad." This piece is the best of Rock all in one place. And if I played drums, I'd quit because of everything that follows 0:08, like 3:25 and 3:57. Pretty much the whole song. Yes, I'm well aware the band is no more, but Steve Wilson is!

"Some things are in our control and others not. Things in our control are opinion, pursuit, desire, aversion, and, in a word, whatever are our own actions. Things not in our control are body, property, reputation, command, and, in one word, whatever are not our own actions. The things in our control are by nature free, unrestrained, unhindered; but those not in our control are weak, slavish, restrained, belonging to others. Remember, then, that if you suppose that things which are slavish by nature are also free, and that what belongs to others is your own, then you will be hindered." (Epictetus, Enchiridion 1)

"All you need are these: certainty of judgment in the present moment; action for the common good in the present moment; and an attitude of gratitude in the present moment for anything that comes your way." (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations)

“Of all the people only those are at leisure who make time for philosophy, only they truly live. Not satisfied to merely keep good watch over their own days, they annex every age to their own. All the harvest of the past is added to their store. Only an ingrate would fail to see that these great architects of venerable thoughts were born for us and have designed a way of life for us.” (Seneca, "The Shortness of Life")

“For the New Year . . . everyone takes the liberty of expressing his wish and his favorite thought: well, I also mean to tell what I have wished for myself today, and what thought first crossed my mind this year,—a thought which ought to be the basis, the pledge and the sweetening of all my future life! I want more and more to perceive the necessary characters in things as the beautiful:—I shall thus be one of those who beautify things. Amor fati: let that henceforth be my love! I do not want to wage war with the ugly. I do not want to accuse, I do not want even to accuse the accusers. Looking aside, let that be my sole negation! And all in all, to sum up: I wish to be at any time hereafter only a yea-sayer!” (Friedrich Nietzsche 1844-1900) "Amor Fati" is to love your fate, to say "yes" to life. This does not mean to be a "yes man" to everything that comes along and never say "no" to anything. The idea is that one takes what comes as format...