What is this, fundamentally? What is its nature and substance, its reason for being? What is it doing in the world? How long is it here for?
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Fundamentally →
Well enough alone →
Some take nothing into account, and others want to take account for everything. They are always talking importance, always taking things too seriously, turning them into debate and mystery. Few bothersome things are important enough to bother with. It is folly to take to heart what you should turn your back on. Not the least of life’s rules is to leave well enough alone.
~ Baltasar Gracián
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The art of living →
Philosophy does not promise to secure anything external for man, otherwise it would be admitting something that lies beyond its proper subject-matter. For as the material of the carpenter is wood, and that of statuary bronze, so the subject-matter of the art of living is each person’s own life.
~ Epictetus
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Personal drama →
The greatest crime is the overlooking of who you really are in favor of the story of who you think you are. This preoccupation with your personal drama is the cloud that masks the sun.
~ Wu Hsin
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Complaining →
Don’t be overheard complaining about life at court. Not even to yourself.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Already knowing →
The most difficult subjects can be explained to the most slow-witted man if he has not formed any idea of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without a shadow of doubt, what is laid before him.
~ Leo Tolstoy
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Perfection of character →
Perfection of character: To live your last day, every day, without frenzy, or sloth, or pretense.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Better left alone →
Many see the trees but not the forest, or bark up the wrong tree, speaking endlessly, reasoning uselessly, without going to the pith of the matter. They go round and round, tiring themselves and us, and never get to what is important. This happens to people with confused minds who do not know how to clear away the brambles. They waste time and patience on what it would be better to leave alone, and later there is no time for what they left.
~ Baltasar Gracián
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Right or wrong →
Then the only proper response for me to make is this: You are much mistaken, my friend, if you think that any man worth his salt cares about the risk of death and doesn’t concentrate on this alone: whether what he’s doing is right or wrong, and his behavior a good man’s or a bad one’s.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Contentment →
The man of contentment seeks nothing that he doesn’t have and understands that whatever he has isn’t his to own
~ Wu Hsin
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