Marcus Aurelius Quotes

If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.

Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking.

If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.

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.

You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.

Death smiles at us all, all a man can do is smile back.

Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.

Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new strategy.

When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive - to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.

It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.

Most of what we say and do is not essential.

If you can eliminate it, you'll have more time, and more tranquillity. Ask yourself at every moment, 'Is this necessary?'

The best revenge is not to be like your enemy.

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.

Waste no more time arguing about what a good person should be. Be one.

The things you think about determine the quality of your mind. Your soul takes on the color of your thoughts.

You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this and you will find strength.

Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together, but do so with all your heart.

Never esteem anything as of advantage to you that will make you break your word or lose your self-respect.

You always own the option of having no opinion.

There is never any need to get worked up or to trouble your soul about things you can't control. These things are not asking to be judged by you. Leave them alone.

Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.

Our life is what our thoughts make it.

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.

What we do in life ripples in eternity.

Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself the following question: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticize?

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.

He who lives in harmony with himself lives in harmony with the universe.

The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.

Remember that very little is needed to make a happy life.

Be tolerant with others and strict with yourself.

If someone can prove me wrong and show me my mistake in any thought or action, I shall gladly change. I seek the truth, which never harmed anyone: the harm is to persist in one's own self-deception and ignorance.

One of the recurring themes in Marcus' handbook is leadership's responsibility to work intelligently with what it is given and not waste time fantasizing about a world of flawless people and perfect choices.

Our anger and annoyance are more detrimental to us than the things themselves which anger or annoy us.

Your life is what your thoughts make it.

I'm going to be meeting with people today who talk too much - people who are selfish, egotistical, ungrateful. But I won't be surprised or disturbed, for I can't imagine a world without such people.

The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.

Do not indulge in dreams of having what you have not, but reckon up the chief of the blessings you do possess, and then thankfully remember how you would crave for them if they were not yours.

How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.

Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.

Everything that happens happens as it should, and if you observe carefully, you will find this to be so.

A man's life is what his thoughts make of it.

The first rule is to keep an untroubled spirit.

The second is to look things in the face and know them for what they are.

The most complete revenge is not to imitate the aggressor.

No matter what anyone says or does, my task is to be emerald, my color undiminished.

When you need encouragement, think of the qualities the people around you have: this one's energy, that one's modesty, another's generosity, and so on. Nothing is as encouraging as when virtues are visibly embodied in the people around us, when we're practically showered with them. It's good to keep this in mind.

The wise man sees in the misfortune of others what he should avoid.

The only wealth which you will keep forever is the wealth you have given away.

Because your own strength is unequal to the task, do not assume that it is beyond the powers of man; but if anything is within the powers and province of man, believe that it is within your own compass also.

Every man's life lies within the present; for the past is spent and done with, and the future is uncertain.

How much time he saves who does not look to see what his neighbor says or does or thinks.

Do not act as if you were going to live ten thousand years.

Death hangs over you. While you live, while it is in your power, be good.

Do not waste what remains of your life in speculating about your neighbors, unless with a view to some mutual benefit. To wonder what so-and-so is doing and why, or what he is saying, or thinking, or scheming -- in a word, anything that distracts you from fidelity to the ruler within you -- means a loss of opportunity for some other task.

Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future, too.

To understand the true quality of people, you must look into their minds, and examine their pursuits and aversions.