Marcus Aurelius Quotes

“The things you think about determine the quality of your mind.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

“When people injure you, ask yourself what good or harm they thought would come of it. If you understand that, you'll feel sympathy rather than outrage or anger. Your sense of good and evil may be the same as theirs, or near it, in which case you have to excuse them. Or your sense of good and evil may differ from theirs. In which case they're misguided and deserve your compassion. Is that so hard?”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

“How unlucky I am that this should happen to me. But not at all. Perhaps, say how lucky I am that I am not broken by what has happened, and I am not afraid of what is about to happen. For the same blow might have stricken anyone, but not many would have absorbed it without capitulation and complaint.”
― Marcus Aurelius

“You need to avoid certain things in your train of thought: everything random, everything irrelevant. And certainly everything self-important or malicious. You need to get used to winnowing your thoughts, so that if someone says, "What are your thinking about?" you can respond at once (and truthfully) that you are thinking this or thinking that.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

“The willing are led by fate, the reluctant are dragged.”
― Cleanthes of Assos, Hymn to Zeus

“40. The gods either have power or they have not. If they have not, why pray to them? If they have, then instead of praying to be granted or spared such-and-such a thing, why not rather pray to be delivered from dreading it, or lusting for it, or grieving over it? Clearly, if they can help a man at all, they can help him in this way. You will say, perhaps, ‘But all that is something they have put in my own power.’ Then surely it were better to use your power and be a free man, than to hanker like a slave and a beggar for something that is not in your power. Besides, who told you the gods never lend their aid even towards things that do lie in our own power? Begin praying in this way, and you will see. Where another man prays ‘Grant that I may possess this woman,’ let your own prayer be, ‘Grant that I may not lust to possess her.’ Where he prays, ‘Grant me to be rid of such-and-such a one,’ you pray, ‘Take from me my desire to be rid of him.’ Where he begs, ‘Spare me the loss of my precious child,’ beg rather to be delivered from the terror of losing him. In short, give your petitions a turn in this direction, and see what comes.”
― Marcus Aurelius

“All you need are these: certainty of judgment in the present moment; action for the common good in the present moment; and an attitude of gratitude in the present moment for anything that comes your way.”
― Ryan Holiday, The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living

“And why should we feel anger at the world?

As if the world would notice.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations: A New Translation

“The stoics divided philosophy into three branches: logic, physics, and ethics. Logic covered not only the rules of correct argumentation, but also grammar, linguistics, rhetorical theory, epistemology, and all the tools that might be needed to discover the truth of any matter. Physics was concerned with the nature of the world and the laws that govern it, and so included ontology and theology as well as what we would recognize as physics, astronomy, and cosmology. Ethics was concerned with how to achieve happiness, or how to live a fulfilled and flourishing life as a human being. A stoic sage was supposed to be fully expert in all three aspects.”
― Robin Waterfield, Meditations

“I sit with Shakespeare and he winces not. Across the color-line I move arm in arm with Balzac and Dumas, where smiling men and welcoming women glide in gilded halls. From out the caves of the evening that swing between the strong-limbed earth and the tracery of the stars, I summon Aristotle and Aurelius... and they come all graciously with no scorn nor condescension. So, wed with Truth, I dwell above the Veil.”
― W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk

“It is quite possible to be a good man without anyone realizing it.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations: A New Translation

“Whatever happens, happens such as you are either formed by nature able to bear it, or not able to bear it. If such as you are by nature form’d able to bear, bear it and fret not: But if such as you are not naturally able to bear, don’t fret; for when it has consum’d you, itself will perish. Remember, however, you are by nature form’d able to bear whatever it is in the power of your own opinion to make supportable or tolerable, according as you conceive it advantageous, or your duty, to do so.”
― Marcus Aurelius

“Don't be overheard complaining ... not even to yourself.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

“In a world where ‘likes’ and ‘followers’ define worth, we have become a society of self-promotion and self-indulgence, where the true value of human connection and genuine experience is lost to the endless pursuit of more.”
― Jop Helm

“Dwell on thoughts that are in harmony with nature and her laws, and act accordingly. Don’t let yourself be pulled off course by the insults or injuries of others. Let them go their way and you go yours, continuing on the path of reason. This is not selfish or antisocial on your part—far from it. Your individual reason is not opposed to the common good, but in harmony with it.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations : Marcus Aurelius

“It makes you want to take a lesson from Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor, who had a guy who would stand next to him in this chariot so that when the crowds were cheering for him, the guy next to him would say, "Remember, you're only a man. You're only a man.”
― Al Pacino, Sonny Boy

“Our existence is a philosophical conundrum in the era of social media - do we truly exist if we aren’t validated by likes and followers?”
― Jop Helm

“When they push your buttons and then blame you for pushing back, that's not just disrespect, it's pure manipulation.”
― Jop Helm, COVERT CONTROL: Unveiling the Dark Art of Social Manipulation

“You are not here to be accepted; you are here to become. And in the fires of becoming, you will either forge yourself or be reduced to ash.”
― David Maze, If Nietzsche Wrote Meditations: Think Fight Club Vibes for The Self-Improvement Fanatic.

“Morality is the lullaby of the herd, sung to keep their dreams small. Wake up, and you will find the world is yours to shape.”
― David Maze

“...whatever happens has always happened, and always will, and is happening at this very moment, everywhere. Just like this.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations: A New Translation

“A lion does not seek the approval of sheep, nor does the storm beg the earth for permission to rage. Why, then, do you?”
― David Maze, If Nietzsche Wrote Meditations: Think Fight Club Vibes for The Self-Improvement Fanatic.

“The gods we worship are only mirrors of our fears and desires. If you would be free, stop kneeling and start creating.”
― David Maze, If Nietzsche Wrote Meditations: Think Fight Club Vibes for The Self-Improvement Fanatic.

“Love is not the denial of power, but its highest expression. The strong love differently than the weak.”
― David Maze, If Nietzsche Wrote Meditations: Think Fight Club Vibes for The Self-Improvement Fanatic.

“The man who seeks comfort will find chains; the one who embraces struggle will find wings.”
― David Maze, If Nietzsche Wrote Meditations: Think Fight Club Vibes for The Self-Improvement Fanatic.

“Truth is a sword, and only those willing to bleed for it should dare to wield it.”
― David Maze, If Nietzsche Wrote Meditations: Think Fight Club Vibes for The Self-Improvement Fanatic.

“Do not envy those who walk the easy path, for their steps leave no mark upon the world.”
― David Maze, If Nietzsche Wrote Meditations: Think Fight Club Vibes for The Self-Improvement Fanatic.

“He who waits for permission to live will find himself buried with the others who did the same.”
― David Maze, If Nietzsche Wrote Meditations: Think Fight Club Vibes for The Self-Improvement Fanatic.

“When he wrote Meditations, Marcus Aurelius was the most powerful man in the world. He had, quite literally, a whole empire at his disposal. Cities, armies, palaces. All were his. He spent over a decade, from the year 161 to 180, as Roman emperor during the 'Golden Age'. And yet he resisted seeking any contentment in his status and power, in favour of simplicity, consultation and a cosmic perspective. He believed watching the stars was important and talks about Pythagoras - the early Greek philosopher and founder of Pythagoreanism - as his influence here.
The Pythagoreans saw gazing up at the sky not just as a pleasant thing to do, but an insight into a divine order. Because stars are all separate, but all together in an order. For the Stoics, looking at them was looking at unveiled glimpses of divinity - and also fragments of Nature.
It is not just the sky or the stars, then, that are important, but what we think when we look at them. Our connection to the shifting world around and above us.
'The universe is change', wrote Marcus Aurelius. 'Our life is what our thoughts make it.'
Even a man in charge of an empire could look at the stars and feel happily small in the grand universal order of things.
The sky doesn't start above us. There is no starting point for sky. We live in the sky.”
― Matt Haig, The Comfort Book

“One of his sayings rather struck me as worth putting on a poster in the Underground or somewhere. “Think of yourself as dead. Now, return and live your life.”
― Joseph O'Connor, My Father's House