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every time i read Marcus Aurelius's Meditations it's like two paragraphs of incredibly dense grammar followed by one paragraph of something that completely clears my brain of all anxiety followed by some Roman Bullshit
that shit completely clears the desktop of my brain, man
this is the most roman way to say 'there's so precious little time and you shouldn't waste it' by taking 9 paragraphs to tell you half a sentence. 10/10
If it helps, there's a translation of it by Gregory Hays I rather like that cuts down on some of the Victorian-ness of it. (doesn't get rid of the dense grammar, anxiety-clearing point, and then Roman Bullshit; but I think that's original to it)
That same section:
Remember how long you’ve been putting this off, how many extensions the gods gave you, and you didn’t use them. At some point you have to recognize what world it is that you belong to; what power rules it and from what source you spring; that there is a limit to the time assigned you, and if you don’t use it to free yourself it will be gone and will never return.
Book 5, section 1 is the one that always really throws me though.
At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: “I have to go to work—as a human being. What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for—the things I was brought into the world to do? Or is this what I was created for? To huddle under the blankets and stay warm?”
—But it’s nicer here.…
So you were born to feel “nice”? Instead of doing things and experiencing them? Don’t you see the plants, the birds, the ants and spiders and bees going about their individual tasks, putting the world in order, as best they can? And you’re not willing to do your job as a human being? Why aren’t you running to do what your nature demands?
