When Life Hurts, Care Less About It | The Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius
Once the most powerful man in the known world, Marcus Aurelius attempted to live virtuously, following Stoic principles. Unlike many Roman Emperors, he did not indulge in the many pleasures he had access to, like getting drunk on wine and watching sadistic games in the Colosseum. Marcus Aurelius wanted to fulfill the task Fortune had given him, which was serving humanity. So, he cared deeply about fulfilling his purpose. But to do so, he had to care less about the things that aren’t worthy nor wise to care about. And these things are many.
One of the essential concepts in Stoicism is the schism between things we control and do not control, which Epictetus’ Enchiridion explains so clearly. Most (if not all) things beyond our own actions are not up to us. Does that mean we should renounce the world? Not necessarily. But the Stoics believed that we should be realistic about our limited influence on these things and that we create an unnecessary burden for ourselves if we aren’t. When life hurts, it often means that we care about things we have no control over, and by doing so, we let them control us and play with us like puppeteers. Then, we blame the puppeteers for pulling our strings while, in actuality, we allow them to do so.
But if we stop caring about them, they lose power over us, and we’ll be undisturbed. For Marcus Aurelius, being unperturbed by things outside of his control allowed him to cope with the many responsibilities and challenges he faced as an emperor and to focus on the task he believed he was given by the gods. For Epictetus, it meant freedom. For other people, not being moved by external forces (or a selection of them) could be a way to focus on goals that do matter. And for others, it could simply be a path to a happy, carefree life.
When life hurts, what are the things we should stop occupying ourselves with? And how do we do it? This video is an exploration and free interpretation of Marcus Aurelius’ philosophy on how to care less about things that aren’t worth caring about. By the way, you’ll find more Stoic wisdom in this book - Stoicism for Inner Peace - which contains my collected works on remaining calm and focused in these challenging times. You’ll find a link in the description.
In his Meditations, Marcus Aurelius repeatedly differentiates between present, past, and future. In each category, the ancient Roman Emperor has valuable things to say about how we either care too much about them, or in the wrong ways, or about the wrong things. For clarity and structure, this essay is subdivided into these categories, starting with…
The future. As Seneca once stated: we suffer more in our imagination than in reality, implying that our thoughts are the source of our suffering. When it comes to the future, our imagination often goes wild, inventing countless scenarios of what could happen (but probably never will). Beforehand, we think of ways to handle possible outcomes while shivering because of the idea of ‘not knowing how the future will eventually play out.’
In some instances, what happens is what we anticipate. But in many other instances, Fortune surprises us, overwhelming us with events we couldn’t have anticipated. For example, we could have spent years preparing for a well-earned retirement only to receive, right before the first day of our twilight years, a deadly cancer diagnosis that gives us just a few more months to live. The possibility of such events leads many to continuous worry: the best could happen, but the worst as well!
And what if the Third World War breaks out? What if I lose all my money? Such adverse outcomes are very well possible. But as long as they aren’t happening in the present, we cannot deal with them, as these events simply aren’t happening (at least, not yet): they only exist in our thoughts. The future only bothers us because we think about it, as it does not exist outside the mind. Marcus Aurelius wrote that it’s not the weight of the future pressing upon us but that of the present alone. It’s not the future that hurts us but how we deal with it in the present. The misery of the future happens in the present.
And ironically, it’s not the future unfolding in the present, as when we encounter it, it’s already present. The misery of the future is our worrying about it now. When we care too much about future events, life eventually begins to hurt as we suffer them in our imagination, letting them dictate our present. So, what does Marcus Aurelius say about caring too much about the future?
First, let’s consider the following quote: “Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.” End quote. He pointed out that if he could cope with the present, he could also cope with the future. He told himself not to picture everything dreadful that could happen but instead stick with the situation at hand. When he focused on the present, he realized he could bear it. And if that’s the case, why wouldn’t he be able to handle what’s yet to come?
This attitude resembles the idea of ‘Amor Fati,’ the love of fate, but then fortified with trust that we’ll be able to get through it.
The past. Marcus Aurelius reminded himself of how fast existence passes by and disappears in the infinite beyond our grasp. The past, as the future, is a realm we cannot operate in. What’s gone is gone, and unless we invent the time machine, we can’t change anything about it. Marcus Aurelius stated, and I quote: “Remember that man lives only in the present, in this fleeting instant; all the rest of his life is either past and gone, or not yet revealed. Short, therefore, is man’s life, and narrow is the corner of the earth wherein he dwells.” End quote.
Despite the narrowness of our lives, which only occurs in the present moment, we’re often overly occupied with these areas that lie outside of it and cannot be entered: the future and the past. Marcus Aurelius stated that the past “signifies as much as nothing and is at present indifferent.” It’s not that events that have happened in the past don’t influence the present or that we cannot learn from past events. It’s just that we cannot work with the past, as it’s out of our reach.
And often, our memories of the past are scrambled, and ways to verify what exactly happened are limited. We rely on recollections from personal perspectives and different viewpoints of ourselves or others. So, the past is not only out of reach; our remembrance of it is most likely inaccurate. Yet, we keep caring about past events, often repeating them in our minds, re-experiencing the pain they caused us.
Some believe that by thinking about the past, we may have some control over it. But that’s an illusion. The past is gone. All we try to control are our thoughts about something that’s been flushed away, never to return. “I wish I could have done this differently,” many people say. But they wish for the impossible. Nothing can be gained from such thoughts, as they evoke desires we can never fulfill.
Instead of focusing on the past events in themselves, Marcus Aurelius focused on his reaction toward them. We cannot control past events. Most likely, we also couldn’t prevent them when they occurred in the present. But we can control how we position ourselves toward these events. Initially, we might consider the past unfortunate. We might have had difficult childhoods or experienced the ending of friendships or failed business ventures.
But, according to Marcus Aurelius, the nature of these events isn’t so important; what counts is how we handle them. He stated: “It’s unfortunate that this has happened. No. It’s fortunate that this has happened and I’ve remained unharmed by it—not shattered by the present or frightened of the future. It could have happened to anyone. But not everyone could have remained unharmed by it. Why treat the one as a misfortune rather than the other as fortunate? Can you really call something a misfortune that doesn’t violate human nature?
Or do you think something that’s not against nature’s will can violate it? But you know what its will is. Does what’s happened keep you from acting with justice, generosity, self-control, sanity, prudence, honesty, humility, straightforwardness, and all the other qualities that allow a person’s nature to fulfill itself?” End quote. Interestingly enough, Marcus Aurelius doesn’t discard the value of the past entirely. He believed we could learn from the past by looking at its rhythm: how things come and go, repeating themselves, so we can “extrapolate” the future.
The present. Marcus Aurelius frequently mentions that the present moment is all we have; it’s the narrow field we’ve access to. From the present, we can stare into the endless abyss of the past and the impenetrable darkness of the future. Marcus Aurelius encouraged himself to stick with what was in his control: this moment. But even when we let go of the past and minimize our worries about the future, we may still very well care too much about things not worthy of concern: the things happening as we speak.
We are often dissatisfied with the ways life plays out in the moment. And when things don’t go as we wish, we tend to get angry, sad, or depressed. But according to Marcus Aurelius, being emotionally disturbed by what Fortune throws at us is pointless. How the world around us unfolds itself is not up to us; how we react to it is. Yet, we tend to get disturbed because we don’t like what’s happening or what we want to happen doesn’t happen.
Marcus Aurelius stated that we shouldn’t fight what we’re compelled to. He compared people who struggle with Fortune to pigs, kicking and squealing when sacrificed: it’s no use, as we can’t avoid what the gods have in store. We cannot stop people from wanting to fight wars; we cannot stop natural disasters from happening; we cannot prevent our bodies from aging. In the same way, we cannot force the world to grant our wishes; we’re not guaranteed that the people we’re attracted to are also attracted to us, nor assured that all human beings have the same shots at life. It’s just not possible.
Yet, we spend a lot of time and energy resisting what is and what we cannot change through any means in our arsenal. We’re angry because we don’t have what we want and sad because we’ve occurred what we don’t like, and thus, the present moment becomes a torture chamber in which we suffer at Fortune’s every whim. Or, reversely, we’re so enamored with the present moment that we cling to it. We’re afraid to lose what we have, so again, we let Fortune control us.
But from our total entanglement in all around us, fleeting and ungovernable, we’re often unable to see what’s truly up to us: our choices, actions, and opinions. Marcus Aurelius saw the law of nature as our master; if we run from it or feel grief or anger about it, we’re nothing more than deserters and fugitives. We must accept the ways of nature, embrace them, and focus on dealing with them instead of wasting our energy being disgusted by or clinging to our circumstances.
A way to accept the present he wrote in the 7th book of his meditations, arguing that we should focus on what we have, not what we lack, but with caution. I quote: “Treat what you don’t have as nonexistent. Look at what you have, the things you value most, and think of how much you’d crave them if you didn’t have them. But be careful. Don’t feel such satisfaction that you start to overvalue them—that it would upset you to lose them.” End quote.
Nevertheless, accepting one’s circumstances can be difficult; especially when we face significant hardships and life gives us lemons repeatedly. Can’t we just have a break? But to Marcus Aurelius, adversity is not an excuse to behave like squealing, screaming pigs. He argues it’s an opportunity to “practice virtue,” or in other words, to apply Stoic philosophy to one’s life.
The art of living isn’t about how amazing and fortunate our external circumstances are, as they’re unreliable, weak, fickle, and not our own. It’s about how we face the events we meet; that’s what we should care about, according to the Stoics. As Marcus Aurelius stated: “Because to me the present is a chance for the exercise of rational virtue—civic virtue—in short, the art that men share with gods. Both treat whatever happens as wholly natural; not novel or hard to deal with, but familiar and easily handled.” Thank you for watching.