(독서)Daily Stoic-7월 12일 SOME SIMPLE RULES

"But what does Socrates say? 'Just as one person delights in improving his farm, and another his horse, so I delight in attending to my own improvement day by day.""-EPICTETUS, DISCOURSES, 3.5.14 (“하지만 소크라테스는 뭐라고 말합니까? ‘다른 사람이 농장을 개선하는 데 기뻐하고, 또 다른 사람이 말을 개선하는 데 기뻐하는 것처럼, 나는 날마다 내자신을 개선하는 데 기뻐합니다.’” -에픽테토스, 담화록, 3.5.14)   The rage these days is to start your own company-to be an entrepreneur. There is no question, building a business from scratch can be an immensely rewarding pursuit. It's why people put their whole lives into doing it, working countless hours and taking countless risks. But shouldn't we be just as invested in building ourselves as we would be to any company?   Like a start-up, we begin as just an idea: we're incubated, put out into the world where we develop slowly, and then, over time, we accumulate partners, employees, customers, investors, and wealth. Is it really so strange to treat your own life as seriously as you might treat an idea for a business? ...

"Love the humble art you have learned, and take rest in it. Pass through the remainder of your days as one who whole-heartedly entrusts all possessions to the gods, making yourself neither a tyrant nor a slave to any person."-MARCUS AURELIUS, MEDITATIONS, 4.31 ("네가 배운 겸손한 예술을 사랑하고, 그 안에서 휴식을 취하라. 모든 소유물을 신들에게 온전히 맡기고, 누구에게도 폭군이나 노예가 되지 않는 사람으로서 너의 남은 날들을 지나가라." - 마르쿠스 아우렐리우스, 명상록, 4.31)   Stop by a comedy club any weekend night in New York or Los Angeles and you're likely to find some of the world's biggest and most commercially successful comedians in there, workshopping their craft for just a handful of people. Though they make a fortune in movies or on the road, there they are, practicing the most basic form of their art.   If you ask any of them: "Why are you doing this? Why do you still perform?" The answer is usually: "Because I'm good at it. Because I love it. Because I want to get better. Because I thrive on connecting with an audience. Because I just can't not do it."   It's not work ...

"For I believe a good king is from the outset and by necessity a philosopher, and the philosopher is from the outset a kingly person." -MUSONIUS RUFUS, LECTURES, 8.33.32-34 (“나는 좋은 왕이 애초부터 필연적으로 철학자이며, 철학자가 애초부터 왕과 같은 인물이라고 믿는다.” -무소니우스 루푸스, 강의, 8.33.32-34)   The Israeli general Herzl Halevi believes that philosophy is essential in his role as a leader and warrior. "People used to tell me that business administration is for the practical life and philosophy is for the spirit," he said. "Through the years I found it is exactly the opposite- I used philosophy much more practically." War and leadership offer an unending series of ethical decisions that require priorities, balance, and clarity. That's what philosophy helps with.   Plato knew this when he imagined a utopia ruled by a philosopher king. "Either philosophers should become kings," he said in The Republic, "or those now called kings should truly and sufficiently undertake philosophy." Marcus Aurelius was quite literally that philosopher king.   What does that have to do with you? ...

"Enough of this miserable, whining life. Stop monkeying around! Why are you troubled? What's new here? What's so confounding? The one responsible? Take a good look. Or just the matter itself? Then look at that. There's nothing else to look at. And as far as the gods go, by now you could try being more straightforward and kind. It's the same, whether you've examined these things for a hundred years, or only three."-MARCUS AURELIUS, MEDITATIONS, 9.37 ("이 비참하고 징징거리는 삶은 이제 그만둡시다. 더 이상 장난치지 맙시다! 왜 그렇게 고민하십니까? 무슨 새로운 일입니까? 무엇이 그렇게 혼란스럽습니까? 책임이 있는 사람을 잘 살펴봅시다. 아니면 그 문제 자체를 봅시다. 다른 것을 볼 필요가 없습니다. 신들에 관해서라면, 이제 더 솔직하고 친절하게 대해봅시다. 100년 동안 이문제들을 살펴보든, 단 3년 동안 살펴보든 똑같습니다." - 마르쿠스 아우렐리우스, "명상록", 9.37) Character," Joan Didion would write in one of her best essays, "the willingness to accept responsibility for one's own life- is the source from which self-respect springs."   Marcus is urging us not to waste time complaining about what we haven't got or how things have worked out. We have to quit monkeying around and be the owners of our own lives. Character can be developed, ...

"This is what you should teach me, how to be like Odysseus-how to love my country, wife and father, and how, even after suffering shipwreck, I might keep sailing on course to those honorable ends."-SENECA, MORAL LETTERS, 88.7b (“이것이 내가 가르쳐야 할 것이다. 어떻게 하면 오디세우스처럼 될 수 있는지, 어떻게 하면 내 조국, 아내, 아버지를 사랑할 수 있는지, 그리고 심지어 조난을 당한 후에도, 어떻게 하면 그 명예로운 목적을 향해 항해를 계속할 수 있는지.”-세네카, 도덕 편지, 88.7b)   Many schoolteachers teach The Odyssey all wrong. They teach the dates, they debate whether Homer was really the author or not, whether he was blind, they explain the oral tradition, they tell students what a Cyclops is or how the Trojan Horse worked.   Seneca's advice to someone studying the classics is to forget all that. The dates, the names, the places-they hardly matter. What matters is the moral. If you got everything else wrong from The Odyssey, but you left understanding the importance of perseverance, the dangers of hubris, the risks of temptation and distraction? Then you really learned something.   We're not trying to...