On Marcus Aurelius "Meditations", and what a Roman Emperor knew about staying human There is a particular kind of book that was never meant to be a book at all. It was meant to be a night — one night, and then another, and then hundreds of them, each one a small defeat against the dark. A man comes in from the cold, or from the war, or from the exhausting theatre of being obeyed by everyone and understood by no one, and he sits down and writes not for us but against himself — against the parts of himself that are tired, that want to be cruel, that have started, quietly, to wonder if any of it matters. Marcus Aurelius ruled sixty million people. He commanded the most feared army the world had yet produced. And on the frontier, in a tent, between one battle and the next, he wrote himself notes. Not decrees. Not philosophy for export. Notes. The kind you leave for yourself on the counter so that tomorrow-you, groggy and diminished, remembers what today-you already figured out....
Last summer was, for me, a Summer Horribilis. First, I lost my mum—a grief that cracked the world open in a way I still don’t fully have words for. And just when I thought the universe would give me a moment to breathe, I found myself surrounded by people who treated me with a level of rudeness and coldness I didn’t expect. Grief makes you vulnerable.
Rudeness makes you defensive.
The combination can make you feel like you’re drowning. I needed a way to stay steady.
I needed a way to protect my peace without becoming bitter.
I needed a way to outsmart the people who tried to provoke me. So I knocked on the doors of my old friends:
Marcus Aurelius. Seneca. Epictetus. And they answered. Their words became a shield, a compass, and a quiet reminder that strength doesn’t always roar. Sometimes it simply refuses to be dragged into someone else’s chaos. Here are the three Stoic tricks that helped me—and I hope they help you too.
1. Don’t react—observe
Rude people want one thing: your reaction.
They feed on it. They grow from it. They use it to justify their behavior.
Marcus Aurelius said, “You have power over your mind—not outside events.”
When you observe instead of react, you take back control.
You become the calm one in the room.
And calmness is disarming.
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