Marcus Aurelius and such

SmilingJack

SmilingJack

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So the thread on NC books themes with folks not ever reading "LHA" by Tom Wolfe I admitted I had never read it until recently. So not only did I read that but also have slogged thru Marcus Aurelius 2000 year old meditations.
Funny thing is that his ish is sorta like the wheel...hard to improve without changing the way roads are made(Durham Museum of Life and Science exhibit)! Hell this crowd knows no doubt philosophy from 5,000 years. My thinking has always been the golden rule but who knows?

Bottom line I'm tired of the low brow arguments so maybe a thead about serious ideas? Yeah unlikely I know!51c8dfb7ee558e9c3634f9813a5ba75a (1).jpg
 
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The writings of Aurelius and his precursor Epictetus have gotten me thru many a dark time...
 
This is a good idea and I will try to respond later. Unfortunately, I'm not sure Roman philosophy is in many posters' wheelhouses. I'm always up (well usually) for a good philosophy discussion, but I've never read Aurelius and my reading of Epictatus was very, very long ago.
 
I've been thinking about Stoicism lately as a personal philosophy. I've developed a tendency to divide the issues in my life into the controllable and uncontrollable and focus on the former and accept the latter. I ran across a description of the philosophy and identified with it. Need to do some research.
Any recommendations on which translation of "Meditations " to start with?
 
BubbaOtis said:
I've been thinking about Stoicism lately as a personal philosophy. I've developed a tendency to divide the issues in my life into the controllable and uncontrollable and focus on the former and accept the latter. I ran across a description of the philosophy and identified with it. Need to do some research.
Any recommendations on which translation of "Meditations " to start with?
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If I have any philosophical leanings, Stoicism would come the closest thing to a match.
 
SmilingJack said:
So the thread on NC books themes with folks not ever reading "LHA" by Tom Wolfe I admitted I had never read it until recently. So not only did I read that but also have slogged thru Marcus Aurelius 2000 year old meditations.
Funny thing is that his ish is sorta like the wheel...hard to improve without changing the way roads are made(Durham Museum of Life and Science exhibit)! Hell this crowd knows no doubt philosophy from 5,000 years. My thinking has always been the golden rule but who knows?

Bottom line I'm tired of the low brow arguments so maybe a thead about serious ideas? Yeah unlikely I know!51c8dfb7ee558e9c3634f9813a5ba75a (1).jpg
Click to expand...
Dean Smith was this type of leader
 
BubbaOtis said:
I've been thinking about Stoicism lately as a personal philosophy. I've developed a tendency to divide the issues in my life into the controllable and uncontrollable and focus on the former and accept the latter.
Click to expand...
This is the essence of stoicism. It's not about grin and bear it or suffering in silence, it's about realizing there's no need to bear or suffer from shit you can't control in the first place. The tricky part is figuring out what that stuff is, and the answer is, most of it...
 
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There is some evidence that Aurelius was a consumer of opium, which, if true, would be apropos, at least in terms of generating stoic philosophy...
 
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