art of living

Recall how long you’ve been putting off these things, how often you have received an opportunity from the gods and yet did nothing. You must finally accept that you are part of the universe, one with a grand administrator, the spring to your small stream. You have a limited, fixed time here, and if you fail to clear the clouds from your mind, it wi

Do external things distract you? Give yourself time to learn something new and constructive. Stop being whirled about. But you must also avoid being swept the other way, and become a trifler grown weary by a purposeless life, with thoughts and activities flying in all directions.

11. Don’t fall prey to following the opinions of your enemy, search out the truth yourself.

praise? Or spoiled by disrespect? Is an emerald made ugly by lack of attention? How about gold, ivory, purple, a lyre, a knife, a flower, a shrub?

Do what is necessary according to your natural, social logic. For this brings not only the tranquility that comes from doing well, but also that which comes from doing less. Most of what we do is unnecessary...take away the unnecessary parts, and you have more time for leisure and less anxiety.

“I am rising to the work of a human being. I’m done complaining about doing what I was born to do. Or have I been born to sleep in pajamas, trying to keep warm?”

But there are limits, just as there are to eating and drinking. But you push these boundaries, too, don’t you. Yet you don’t push the boundaries of your work...odd.

Do you get angry with people with sweaty armpits and bad breath? What good does it do you? Mouths smell. Armpits stink. —But if he were reasonable, he’d fix it. Well you have a brain, you’re rational...tell him! Stir his rational mind with your own. Show him his error. If he listens, it will cure

What then is worth being valued? The audience clapping? No. Nor the clapping of tongues in the form of praise.