An Ancient Guide to Quitting Wisely
Saturday Review | Notes, Takeaways, and Reflections (9 - 15 Oct)
Welcome to Perennial Meditations (Saturday Review) — A weekly recap and reflection of ancient lessons for modern life. Below you’ll find links, notable quotes, transcript summaries, and a Saturday Meditation.
1. On Practicing What You Preach (Listen here)
In our Sundays with Seneca series, we explored a letter known today as On Practicing What You Preach, Seneca wrote,
I am glad if you are in good health and if you think yourself worthy of becoming your master at last. The credit will be mine if I can drag you from the floods you are being buffeted without hope of emerging. This, however, my dear Lucilius, I ask and beg of you, on your part, that you let wisdom sink into your soul and test your progress, not by mere speech or writings, but by stoutness of heart and decrease of desire. Prove your words by your deeds. […]
2. How to Think Like an Existentialist (Read here)
In our Monday Meditation (The PATH), we searched for ancient lessons on How to Think Like an Existentialist (Courage, Freedom, and Being).
Courage — “We must be ourselves; we must decide where to go,” observed the theologian and existential philosopher Paul Tillich (1886–1965). […]
Freedom — For Kierkegaard, freedom is ultimately defined as — possibility. […]
Being — Creating ourselves is an art form — the act of intentionally choosing who we become. […]
3. The Enlightenment Project (Listen here)
In this episode, I share a short clip from my conversation with Jonathan Robinson, the author of The Enlightenment Project. The full conversation will release next week on In Search of Wisdom.
4. Growing Moral: A Confucian Guide to Life (Listen here)
In this episode of In Search of Wisdom, my guest was Stephen Angle, the author of Growing Moral: A Confucian Guide to Life. Stephen is a philosophy writer and researcher specializing in Chinese Philosophy, Confucianism, Neo-Confucianism, and comparative philosophy. His research focuses on philosophy’s role in human rights, politics, and ethics.
5. The Connection Crisis (Read here)
It seems that, universally, we all know the feeling of loneliness. How would you describe loneliness? Across the more than one hundred interviews conducted on In Search of Wisdom, several guests raised concerns about the epidemic of loneliness.
Wisdom traditions point to the truth of interconnectedness. Why do so many of us experience loneliness? Is there a connection crisis? […]
6. On Being Misunderstood (Listen here)
Does anyone actually understand you? It seems that, universally, we all have parts of us that are unknown to others (and often even to ourselves). […]
We are misunderstood because there is no one exactly like us. The American essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote,
“Speak what you think now in hard words, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradicts everything you said today. — ‘Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.’ — Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, …, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh.”
7. An Ancient Guide to Quitting Wisely
What do Zeno, Heraclitus, and the Buddha all have in common? They all quit; or, to put it another way — decided to chart a new course.
Zeno, the founder of Stoicism, was a merchant before embarking on his search for wisdom. According to legend, Siddhartha Gautama (better known as the Buddha) was a prince who renounced his position and wealth to seek enlightenment. Similarly, Heraclitus was heir to the throne in Ephesus, one of the world’s richest and most powerful cities; he gave up the kingdom and chose to seek the word of wisdom instead.
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