As an aphoristic philosophical work, the Meditations contain reflections on the soul and death, reason and nature, the god of the universe and the god of the heart, the public interest and social interaction. Mark Aurelius provokes the reader to think through philosophical and direct words, teaching us a calm and enlightened life.
Meditations
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="42" > attitude toward death</h1>
Marco Aurelius believed that in the face of death, we do not need to develop fear. In his view, death is only the normal way of natural operation, the decomposition and demise of natural things; the body is only the composition of bones, blood and a network of tissue, and breathing is only the inhalation and exhalation of air. Therefore, there is no need to care about the body, and there is no need to fear death.
If death were to come tomorrow, what would you do? What about the day after tomorrow? Aurelius believed that if you cared about the difference between the two days, then your spirit must be very empty. He advocated not seeing death many years later as a big deal.
Truly rational people are neither obsessed nor evasive in the face of death, just as they are not concerned with how long their souls remain in the body. If they were to die tomorrow, they would leave with the same joy as they would if they were dying many years later.
Marco Ole
In many places in the Meditations, Ole conveys the idea that man is only a part of the universe, and that the departed man exists in a different form in the universe and will continue to be part of the universe in different ways.
In Lao Tzu's view, the loss of life is just a common thing, just like we eat and breathe. "Prosperity must decline" reveals the law of the demise of natural things, so it is necessary to maintain a normal mind in the face of death.
Similarly, Zhuangzi, another representative of Taoism, had a more similar attitude toward death than Olelius. After the death of his wife, Zhuangzi did not show any grief, but sang and sang, which made Zhuangzi's friends very incomprehensible, and Zhuangzi explained it like this: The deceased wife also ushered in her new life, and I did not have to grieve for her, but felt happy for her.
contemplation
Death is another kind of rebirth, a sublimation of life returning to its original nature and returning to nature. If Aurelius could meet Zhuangzi, they would surely feel the resonance in this regard.
Therefore, death does not represent the disappearance of a person, in other words, it is a new birth of a person, and death is the return of life. Rational people don't obsess and escape death, they focus only on the present moment.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="52" > live in the moment</h1>
As mentioned earlier, the rational man whom Aurelius admired always focused on the present. This kind of thinking is not a source of water, a rootless tree, and it is precisely because of their open-minded optimism in the face of death that they will pay more attention to the present and pay attention to everything in front of them.
Why focus so much on the present? Aurelius gives a very appropriate example. Whether it is a person who dies young or a person who is dying, all they have lost is their present life.
It is not difficult to understand that the 26-year-old lost his 26-year-old good years, and the 89-year-old lost his 89-year-old life, although they lost their lives at different ages, but for them, they lost the only thing they had - the present.
We can't go back to the past, we can't change the future, the only thing we can grasp is the present. Correspondingly, we cannot lose the old time, nor can we lose the future, and the only thing we can lose is the present. Whether you are 27 years old or 89 years old, all you can see is your current life.
Marco Ole sculpture
Among them, Aurelius also mentioned some insights about wanting to "flow for hundreds of years". Compared with the vastness of the universe, life is short for decades, there is no need to care about the name after you, after you die, the life of the people who can really remember your descendants is so short, it will not be long before these people who still have memories of you will also pass away.
Until the end, you will find out how illusory these honors of the hereafter are, they are only the talk of the people who live in the world, and they are of no benefit to the deceased you.
So how do you live in the moment? First of all, focus on yourself and don't waste your short life on worrying about others. Aurelius considered it a waste of time to focus on other people's ideas and daily routines, which were trivial moves.
Second, investing these efforts to focus on others into the public interest, and participating in public construction is the consciousness of everyone as a political creature. Finally, it is to pay attention to your own inner God, which is what is truly right for you, able to observe all your impressions, supervise all your interests, resist the temptations of the senses...
People who are reading
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="61" > God in your heart</h1>
Since you have decided to live in the present moment, you must pay attention to the God in your heart. Unlike the god in the universe, the inner god is the natural nature of a person, a rational existence.
People who don't pay attention to their inner world must be unfortunate people. What is my nature? What is the nature of the world as a whole? What is the connection between the two? Aurelius raised these questions that every rational person must ponder.
As a rational person, to value the God in your heart is to act according to His instructions. "God" here is not a religious concept, but more like an ethical concept, which is consistent with the nature of a series of virtues such as "restraint, integrity, patience, bravery..." The God in your heart will tell you what is truly right for you, what is really in line with good.
Such other things as power, pleasure, or praise, Aurelius argues that although these things may bring us pleasure in a short period of time and seem to have the upper hand, the benefits and pleasures it provides are directed at the animal, not at a rational man.
book
If a person ignores his inner God, his whole life is constantly concerned with all kinds of trivialities, all the time is spent in constant wear and tear, he cannot save himself from the state of pain, in the face of evil things and harm to his interests, he cannot resist, so that his heart remains simple.
Always pay attention to your inner voice, retreat into your own world, and keep your heart in a simple state. Inner thoughts are the only things that can cause us to feel pain and irritability, so keeping our actions consistent with our inner nature protects us from suffering.
In general, the God in our hearts guides us to be open-minded and optimistic about death, to recognize the importance of the present, and to combine the two to make us a rational person.
sculpture
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="69" > contentment</h1>
Reading through the Meditations, Aurelius, in addition to the above three aspects, has another point of view that makes me feel a lot. Aurelius was very much in favor of a class of people who were open to the contingencies of life and anything they gained. This reminds me of a previous description in a book: he lived in a temple palace, he lived in a thatched hut, he ate the taste of mountains and treasures, he ate white porridge steamed buns...
Whether they are faced with monstrous wealth or destitution, he not only accepts it calmly, but even in his eyes, the difference between the two is minimal. Contentment is their life credo.
But for most people, this is very difficult to reach. This is why most people cannot live a calm and contemplative life. When destitute, most people struggle to accept the status quo and resent it. They waste most of their lives on the trivialities of focusing on other people's lives.
And when they soar, most people are blinded by a moment of pleasure and focus all their attention on the pleasures of material gain, and the short-lived pleasures make them unable to find the north and forget what is really in line with their nature.
Thinking people
As the ruler of the Roman Empire, Marco Aurelius lived his life in the philosophies of life conveyed in the Meditations. No matter when this immortal classic is read, it will have different feelings, often read it and always new, combined with some thoughts in life, it can often resonate with him ideologically.
From calm in the face of death, to grasping the proverbs of the moment, to paying attention to the God in your heart. Mark Aurelius always wanted everyone to be a rational person, to use wisdom in righteous deeds, to reject conceit, hypocrisy, and anything evil that might hurt our souls, and to regard every action as the last act in life.
We often say that "although we know a lot of truths, we still can't live this life well", so is there no need to clarify these truths? Aurelius also gave the answer: just like after the eye pain, we have to find plasters and water.
We understand these truths in order to make reasonable answers to the various problems we encounter in life, like ointment applied to the wound, if the wound is not healed in time, we do not need to apply any more medicine?
Life often faces all kinds of setbacks and blows, which are like God's prescriptions for our lives, although it is difficult to endure the torture of these strange prescriptions in a short period of time, but its ultimate purpose is to consider our health, and these prescriptions prescribed by God are for the sake of the health of our lives.
Knowing these, we can be more calm and calm in the face of various challenges, and act in line with our own nature, so as to feel unprecedented peace in the process of these behaviors, and put ourselves in a state of harmony and order, at this time, no external harm can sting your soul.