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for now let's get into it and take a look at Marcus Aurelius’ 3 rules of life.
Marcus Aurelius says “Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be
one.” Aurelius was the emperor of Rome during the 2nd century A.D., and is said to be the
last in a line of 5 good emperors known to have ruled Rome. Under his leadership, the
empire was guided by virtue and wisdom. He was a student of Stoicism, a philosophy that
emphasized fate, reason, and self-restraint.
While influenced by many philosophers and philosophical texts, Aurelius’ primary influence
was the teachings of the former slave and Stoic philosopher Epictetus. During his rule,
the emperor constructed a series of autobiographical writings, now known as the Meditations. While
the Meditations was never intended for publication, it remains in print to this day and is perhaps
as popular as ever. The journal shows that the most powerful man on the planet was going
through the same problems that we deal with today and indeed the same problems we will
be grappling with tomorrow. So join us now as we examine the three rules of life that
Marcus thought were of the utmost importance to living a good life and how we can adapt
them to work with our modern day lives. Rule number 1 - Always aim for pure judgment
of events In book 4 of meditations, Marcus Aurelius
tells us “Suppress the value-judgment (which you add), and the ‘I’ve been hurt’ is
also suppressed. Suppress the ‘I’ve been hurt,’ and the harm is suppressed”
This rule is influenced by Epictetus’ discipline of assent which involves making correct judgments
about your impressions, that is the nature of the external world and events that occur
in it. Aurelius tells us that we make judgments about everything. But instead of making a
pure judgment, we make value-judgments by adding a personal twist to our consideration.
Imagine that you are out driving one day and another car drives out of a turning directly
in front, coming dangerously close and almost hitting your car. Your instincts take over
and you swerve hard in order to avoid a collision. What often happens next is that you will start
cursing at the driver, making rude gestures and lose your cool. Now, there are emotions
at play here at different points. First, your emotions alerted you to danger and you reacted
quickly in order to avoid it. This is the correct use of emotions. However what happened
next right after you managed to avoid the accident is that other emotions took over
and made you angry. This is the incorrect use of emotions. What is the use of being
angry at this point? The danger to your life has passed. The only thing that you are doing
is venting your frustration, which not only serves no purpose, but could even be counterproductive
as it makes you more agitated and more prone to an accident.
When something bad happens to us, we say, “So and so happened to me. And that hurt
me” and in this case we would say “I could have died”. The last part that is “and
that hurt me or I could have died” is the value-judgment part. So when you remove that
last part, you don’t let the bad thing make an impact on you. For the Stoics, the biggest
part of living according to Nature was using your head. We need to try to stop adding one’s
own personal twists to our judgments and instead use rational thinking and our ability to reason,
in order to grant or deny assent to impression. So how do we reason and make correct judgments?
We do this by following what ancient stoics did 2000 years ago, which was using their
ability to reason. In the modern world this practice is known as cognitive distancing.
Cognitive distancing, being the main precursor of cognitive-behavioral therapy or CBT, is
basically the ability to become aware of our own beliefs and assumptions and to distance
them from external events. As an example of cognitive practices, consider the simple ABC
model from CBT which is adversity, belief, consequences. Imagine you just got fired from
your job. The adversity here is getting fired. The belief is how we represent and or explain
that event. In this case, we may believe that we are useless or worry about mortgage or
about future uncertainties. The consequences are the behavior or feelings that are caused
by the belief, perhaps we feel sadness or anger. When you make a judgment like that
and give meaning to events, you’re not making a pure judgment.
So remember to look at everything that happens to you for what it is. To apply this discipline
of judgment, we need to inquire whether your beliefs are justified. Suppose that after
being fired from your job, you had the thought that you are worthless and you will never
find your job or lose your house. Is the fact that getting fired really strong evidence
that you are worthless or that you will not find jobs in future? Of Course Not! Of Course
there are other jobs available and in time if you work on yourself, you might well get
something better than what you left. This can be further strengthened by non-cognitive
practices. As an example of non-cognitive practice, consider mindfulness meditation.
In meditation, you exclusively pay attention to your thoughts, and nothing but them as
they come and go, the insight that you are not your thoughts. You can note just how different
the beliefs and associated feelings of “getting fired” is from “getting fired because
you are worthless”. It’s one thing to believe these things, it’s another to build
a strong intuition for it. By using this approach as Marcus Aurelius would refer to it, we are
suspending certain value judgments from external events to avoid negative emotions like worry,
anger and so on. Did your partner cheat on you? Did you lose
money? Do people make fun of you? Did something happen? Then, do something, or move on. The
events themselves can’t hurt you if you don’t let them and hence, aim for pure judgments
of events. Rule number 2 - Only desire what’s inside
your control In the 7th book of his meditations, Marcus
Aurelius says “Love only the event which comes upon us, and which is linked to us by
Destiny” This rule is influenced by Epictetus’ discipline
of desire. Stoics believed that there are four passions that hinder our progress and
contribute to our misery. They divided the four passions into two types. One, for things
not in present possession or anticipated in the future, which are desire, and, two, for
things presently engaging a person, which are pleasure and distress. Here, in this rule,
we will be focusing on the passion of desire. Marcus Aurelius only desired what was inside
his control or what happened to him. In his Meditations, he continuously repeats to himself
that most things in life are outside of his control.
He realized that life is unpredictable. In 2000 years, nothing has changed about that.
We often desire the things we do not control like more money, a better job, a bigger house,
social media following, or maybe that our partner will always love. That we always have
the loyalty of our friends. We sit around waiting, hoping, begging, craving, wishing
for luck to strike, or change to happen while we maintain the exact same social circle and
habits we’ve always had. We always want a better job with better pay
but hold ourselves from learning any new skills that might get us the job we desire. We could
either waste our time and energy into praying and hoping that things would change or we
could concentrate on what is in our control and start taking action. We need to be self-reliant
and take responsibility for ourselves, not leaving it on the Gods or on the whims of
Fortune to determine whether we get what we want.
Marcus Aurelius tells us that if we wish to progress in life then we should limit our
desires to only what’s in our control like taking deliberate action and not to pin our
hope for uncertainties. Desire is: I really want this car and once I get it, I will be
happy, while deliberate action is: If I want this car, then I have to raise the cash, and
to do that I must put extra hours and effort to learn new skills, and working hard to realise
those funds. Whatever you want or wish to accomplish will require your deliberation
and consideration. Not desire.
Even then if you work hard and do everything that you are required to do and still fall
short of cash or for some other reason if you don’t get the car, then instead of feeling
bad, you should accept it gracefully. Stoics believe that the outcomes, whatever it may
be, is not in our control. So instead of getting angry or reacting in an unhealthy manner when
things don’t turn out the way you want, you should love and accept it however it turns
out. Most things in life that happen are not up to you. So only desire what’s inside
your control and accept whatever that is not.
Rule number 3 - Act for the common good
In the book 12 of his meditations, we learn from Marcus Aurelius that “In the first
place: nothing at random, and nothing unrelated to some goal or end. Second, don’t relate
your actions to anything except an end or goal which serves the human community.”
This rule is influenced by Epictetus’ discipline of action. The discipline of action is about
taking the right actions for the right reasons. It is about what you should do. Marcus Aurelius
was a man of action and reminds us that we need to remove impulses from our life and
make our actions purposeful. You probably have several roles that you play in real life.
These might be tied to your family, your job, or your personal pursuits. Stoics believe
that we are here for a reason which is to make things better. So make a list and then
think about what you want to achieve by playing each of these roles and what duties stem from
this. The list of these roles should form your purpose for now and for the future. Having
a purpose is the basis of intrinsic motivation. This type of motivation has been shown to
be the key to your ability to achieve your goals.
Marcus Aurelius wants us to keep a bigger picture in mind which is to serve the common
good. As humans, we live to help one another including people who are selfish, meddling,
liars, treacherous, envious, and unsociable. Nature designed humans as social animals with
innate moral instincts that allow us to live in groups. To act otherwise - to live like
an animal - is against human nature and irrational. Our Society is the glue which holds us together
and since we are a part of the wider world, our actions reflect on our place in it. Hence
our actions should always have an ethical purpose in mind. Let’s take the example
of lying. If you lie, this will reflect on you. People will no longer trust you and that
can have an impact on how they treat you in the future. Even if you are not caught, there
will still be consequences at other people’s expense.
One bad choice can destroy your character, so be careful what you do. Good and evil are
the results of actions taken based on choices specific people made. Each action you take
will reflect on you and your character. So as Marcus Aurelius would say “Don’t talk
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