Head-dibs

Download the game free of charge through July 4. I'm not a gamer, but I am a huge fan of the artist behind the soundtrack.

"What assistance can we find in the fight against habit? Try the opposite!" (Epictetus, Discourses, 1.27.4)

" Epictetus the slave. Marcus Aurelius the emperor. Seneca the power broker and playwright. These three radically different men led radically different lives. But they seemed to have one habit in common: Journaling. In one form or another, each of them did it. It would be Epictetus who would admonish his students that philosophy was something they should “write down day by day,” that this writing was how they “should exercise themselves.” Seneca’s favorite time to journal was in the evenings. When darkness had fallen and his wife had gone asleep, he explained to a friend, “I examine my entire day and go back over what I’ve done and said, hiding nothing from myself, passing nothing by.” Then he would go to bed, finding that “the sleep which follows this self-examination” was particularly sweet. And Marcus, he was the most prodigious of journalers, and we are lucky enough that his writings survive to us, appropriately titled, Τὰ εἰς ἑαυτόν, Ta eis heauton, or “to himself.”...

"This is why we say that nothing happens to the wise person contrary to their expectations." (Seneca, Tranquility of Mind , 13.3) 1. Manage your expectations 2. Consider for the best and worst-case scenarios. 3. Be prepared for either and excel in virtue as you receive it.

"It's 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 the one seeking them. Suspend judgment about them. And at once they will lie still and you will be freed from fleeing and pursuing." (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 11.11)

"It is not good to be entirely without the experience of cold and heat, but one ought in some degree to feel the cold in winter and likewise the heat in summer and to seek shade as little as possible." (Musonius Rufus, Lecture 19) "We should take wandering outdoor walks, so that the mind might be nourished and refreshed by the open air and deep breathing." (Seneca, Tranquility of Mind , 17.8)

“Observation and perception are two different things. The observing eye is stronger. The perceiving eye is weaker.” (Miyamoto Musashi, 1584-1645)

"To the youngster talking nonsense, Zeno said, 'The reason why we have two ears and only one mouth is so we might listen more and talk less.'" (Diogenes Laertus, Lives, 7.1) "The best treasure is a sparing tongue." (Hesiod)

“It’s a wonder I haven’t abandoned all my ideals, they seem so absurd and impractical. Yet I cling to them because I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart...I see the world being slowly transformed into a wilderness, I hear the approaching thunder that, one day, will destroy us too, I feel the suffering of millions. And yet, when I look up at the sky, I somehow feel that everything will change for the better, that this cruelty too shall end, that peace and tranquility will return once more. In the meantime, I must hold on to my ideals.” (Anne Frank) “Just that you do the right thing. The rest doesn't matter. Cold or warm. Tired or well-rested. Despised or honored. Dying...or busy with other assignments.” (Marcus Aurelius)

Listen to reason and have a nice weekend!

Vivaldi, with great hair A little Baroque-n-roll from the 1700's for your listening pleasure:

 . . . stop digging." "How much more harmful are the consequences of anger and grief than the circumstances that aroused them in us." (Marcus Aurelius, 11.18.8)

"If you find something very difficult to achieve yourself, don't imagine it impossible--for anything possible and proper for another person can be achieved as easily by you." (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 6.19) There are two kinds of people: the first says "Why them and why not me?" and the second says, "If that can do it, why can't I?" 

"It's normal to feel pain in your hands and feet if you're using your feet as feet and hands as hands. And for a human being to feel stress is normal--if he's living a normal human life. And if it's normal, how can it be bad?" (Marcus Aurelius, 6.32)

"Constantly reflect on how swiftly all that exists and is coming to be is swept past us and disappears from sight. For substance is like a river in perpetual flow, and its activities are ever changing, and its causes infinite in their variations, and hardly anything at all stands still; and ever at our side is the immeasurable span of the past and the yawning gulf of the future, into which all things vanish away. Then how is he not a fool who in the midst of all this is puffed up with pride, or tormented, or bewails his lot as though his troubles will endure for any great while? (Meditations, 5.23) Think of substance in its entirety, of which you have the smallest of shares; and of time in its entirety, of which a brief and momentary span has been assigned to you; and of the works of destiny, and how very small is your part in them. (Meditations, 5.24) For all things are swift to fade and become mere matter for tales, and swiftly too complete oblivion covers their every ...

"We cry to God Almighty, 'how can we escape this agony?' Fool, don’t you have hands? Or could it be God forgot to give you a pair? Sit and pray your nose doesn’t run! Or, rather just wipe your nose and stop seeking a scapegoat." (Epictetus, Discourses, 2.16.13) In other words, stop complaining and take responsibility. 

“We speak of the sun’s light as 'pouring down on us,' as 'pouring over us' in all directions. Yet it’s never poured out. Because it doesn’t really pour; it extends. Its beams (ἀκτῖνες) get their name from their extension (ἐκτείνεσθαι). To see the nature of a sunbeam, look at light as it falls through a narrow opening into a dark room. It extends in a straight line, striking any solid object that stands in its way and blocks the space beyond it. There it remains—not vanishing, or falling away. That’s what the outpouring—the diffusion—of thought should be like: not emptied out, but extended. And not striking at obstacles with fury and violence, or falling away before them, but holding its ground and illuminating what receives it. What doesn’t transmit light creates its own darkness.”  (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 8.57)

The "triumvirate" of books for summer reading has arrived! Doctoral studies start in the Fall with the focus of my work in the book on the far left, Hays translation of Marcus Aurelius, "Meditations." The middle book is part of critical analysis and the book on the right is for contextual analysis. Precedent research starts officially in August and my bibliography is already filling up!  

“You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it. From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, ‘Look at that, you son of a bitch.” (Edgar Mitchell, Lunar Module Pilot of Apollo 14) “How beautifully Plato put it. Whenever you want to talk about people, it’s best to take a birds-eye view and see everything all at once—of gatherings, armies, farms, weddings and divorces, births and deaths, noisy courtrooms or silent spaces, every foreign people, holidays, memorials, markets—all blended together and arranged in a pairing of opposites.” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 7.48)