The weekend is almost over and I have so little time to do anything, but I do have the time to share with you some ancient wisdom from the Roman stoic, Seneca.
The following video is a transcript from the book ‘The Epistles of Lucius Annaeus Seneca V1‘ that contains various letters from Seneca advising his friend Lucilius on the stoic way of living.
The letter in question, ‘On Saving Time’ is relevant to my recent posts, “How to Manage your Time doing the Important things you Love”, and the practical wisdom offered by Seneca reinforces my view that time is the most precious thing we have in our relatively short lifetimes.
Written in Greek by the only Roman emperor who was also a philosopher, without any intention of publication, the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius (AD 121-180) offer a wide range of fascinating spiritual reflections and exercises developed as the leader struggled to understand himself and make sense of the universe. Spanning from doubt and despair to conviction and exaltation, they cover such diverse topics as the question of virtue, human rationality, the nature of the gods and Aurelius’s own emotions.
But while the Meditations were composed to provide personal consolation, in developing his beliefs Marcus also created one of the greatest of all works of philosophy: a series of wise and practical aphorisms that have been consulted and admired by statesmen, thinkers and ordinary readers for almost two thousand years. Read more…
This is a continuation of the “How to Manage your Time doing the Important Things you Love” and the last in the series. The first post in the series can be found here.
What does it mean to live consciously?
Living consciously does not only mean one having awareness of oneself and their surroundings, but it can also include being aware of the shortness of time and how one should make good use of it when they still can.
All this talk about the shortness of life provokes memories of a wise Roman Emperor who wrote down a particular meditation, or call it a piece of positive psychology, that perfectly described my thoughts on being conscious of the apparent dwindling thing called time…
“Live each day as if it were your last”
~ Marcus Aurelius, ‘Meditations’
The emperor’s words should prompt you towards managing your time for you to do the important things that will eventually benefit you and others in your life.
Bob Marley was not the only Reggae Artist to be Wise
Legendary Reggae star John Holt once sang, the hugely successful hit “Time Is The Master”, and he was of course right…well, as far as the title he was.
Finding time to blog is getting harder by the day…baby J is growing by the day…and will soon be wanting me to take him to the park for football practice every evening…and that’s after coming home from work.
Time is the master indeed, and what governs our daily activities whether we like it or not…
“We can never turn back the pages of time, though we may wish to relive a happy moment, or say good-bye just one last time, we never can, because the sands of time continue to fall, and we can’t turn the hourglass over.”
This is a continuation of the “Take Courage to Perform Wise Actions Against Fear” and the last in the series. The first post in the series can be found here.
Learn Life Changing Wisdom in 42 minutes
Despite my previous long-winded posts of advising you how to beat fear, sometimes a quote of wisdom could do the same job in much quicker the time and can be just as inspirational.
So let me introduce you to Brian Johnson, a philosopher and self-help guru who produces audio books on subjects such as philosophy, psychology, spirituality and personal development.
Brian has also narrated some of the the most empowering quotes on both ‘Courage’ and ‘Action’ in audio form. So now I wish to share these with you, and will hopefully provide you with the motivation and wisdom for you to attain the self-knowledge needed to cultivate your own personal growth.
Quotes on Courage and Action are both in Mp3 format:
This is a continuation of the “Take Courage to Perform Wise Actions Against Fear” series. The first post in the series can be found here.
Continuing on with my advice…
Some Homework to do for the rest of your life:
How do I apply what I have learned about myself towards dealing with certain fears or impediments of the mind?
The best way to go about dealing with inner issues is to deal with them one at a time with a clear mind. Once you get into the habit of self-observation as I advised you to do during the routine of attaining self-knowledge, you should learn to question every thought and emotion that affects your mind, so to determine if it is contradictory to your personal development in life.
This self-interrogation is similar to the method employed by Socrates to question people about their own opinions and beliefs.
Once false opinions or beliefs are determined they should be discarded immediately if you want to make progress towards “Truth”. The same philosophy can be used when dealing with negative feelings (false emotions such as fear) that can impinge on your state of mind.
A Wisdom blog sharing a beneficial resource of inspirational words of wisdom, philosophy, and enlightening knowledge for the truth seeker. Containing the author's own philosophy of life as well as wisdom-related links to articles, free ebooks, videos and documentaries to educate, liberate and improve one's mind.
