Marcus Aurelius werd in 121 in Rome geboren. Hij was een van de eerste stoïcijnen en schreef het boek Meditations.
Het is een verzameling wijsheden die hij tijdens zijn leven optekende. Dit was de afgelopen tijd mijn trein- en perronboekje, omdat het er zich erg goed voor leent om af en toe een brokje tot je te nemen.

De stoïcijnen meenden dat ware vervulling wordt bereikt door een deugdzaam leven te leiden. Of dat lukt hangt alleen af van wat we zelf kunnen beïnvloeden. Aan al het andere zouden we ons niet teveel gelegen moeten laten liggen.

De tijd waarin Marcus Aurelius leefde verschilt nogal van de onze. Zo was slavernij voor hem heel normaal. Dit fragment geeft een luguber inkijkje in zijn leefwereld:
“Have you ever seen a severed hand or foot, or a decapitated head, just lying somewhere far away from the body it belonged to? That’s what we do to ourselves—or try to—when we rebel against what happens to us, when we segregate ourselves.”

Hier wat citaten die me aanspraken:

“You can see the difference between the branch that’s been there since the beginning, remaining on the tree and growing with it, and the one that’s been cut off and grafted back.”

“People try to get away from it all—to the country, to the beach, to the mountains. You always wish that you could too. Which is idiotic: you can get away from it anytime you like. By going within.”

“Do less, better.”

“What stands in the way becomes the way.”

“Let it happen, if it wants, to whatever it can happen to.”

“—But there are external obstacles. . . .
Not to behaving with justice, self-control, and good sense.
—Well, but perhaps to some more concrete action.
But if you accept the obstacle and work with what you’re given, an alternative will present itself—another piece of what you’re trying to assemble. Action by action.”

“Just as nature takes every obstacle, every impediment, and works around it—turns it to its purposes, incorporates it into itself—so, too, a rational being can turn each setback into raw material and use it to achieve its goal.”

“There are brambles in the path? Then go around them. That’s all you need to know.”

“A man standing by a spring of clear, sweet water and cursing it. While the fresh water keeps on bubbling up. He can shovel mud into it, or dung, and the stream will carry it away, wash itself clean, remain unstained.”

“Live as if you were alone—out in the wilderness.”

“Stop whatever you’re doing for a moment and ask yourself: Am I afraid of death because I won’t be able to do THIS anymore?”

“Why such turmoil? To live your brief life rightly, isn’t that enough?”

“Learn to ask of all actions, “Why are they doing that? Starting with your own.”

“How much more damage anger and grief do than the things that cause them.”

“Kindness is invincible, provided it’s sincere—not ironic or an act.”

“It never ceases to amaze me: we all love ourselves more than other people, but care more about their opinion than our own. If a god appeared to us—or a wise human being, even—and prohibited us from concealing our thoughts or imagining anything without immediately shouting it out, we wouldn’t make it through a single day. That’s how much we value other people’s opinions—instead of our own.”