Tag: Premeditatio Malorum

Living for Today

When life is easy, we tend to forget that tomorrow is not guaranteed to anyone.

We may live for another 50 years or for another 50 seconds.

Bad stuff happens. Car accident, heart attack, random act of violence. No one knows.

That doesn’t mean we should live recklessly. It just means we should savor the present moment.

No regrets is a coward’s motto. We all have regrets. It’s what we do with them that matters.

We have to stop worrying about past mistakes. We would all like to be perfect and not have done dumb shit in our life. That’s an impossibility.

Mistakes will be made. Some of them will be HUGE, life altering. Then what?

“You just do it. You force yourself to get up. You force yourself to put one foot in front of the other, and God damn it, you refuse to let it get to you. You fight. You cry. You curse. Then you go about the business of living.” – Elizabeth Taylor

You may post your best self on social media. But what about the days you can barely get out of bed?

Guess what? No matter how good your life is, we all have bad days.

We should prepare ourselves for what may happen. Premeditatio Malorum. But not worry about what outcome may actually happen.

“We suffer more in imagination than in reality. “ – Seneca

We spend too much time worrying about a future that we are horrible at predicting.

Live in the present moment Because that is all we have.

“At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself: “I have to go to work — as a human being. What do I have to complain of, if I’m going to do what I was born for — the things I was brought into the world to do? Or is this what I was created for? To huddle under the blankets and stay warm?” – Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

It does not have to be a great day. It just has to be a day. Just get up and live it.

You don’t have to take the 30,000 foot view. My mom on once said to me during a difficult time get through the next 10 minutes, then the next 10 minutes.

Remember it is a privilege to be above the soil. There are more people than you can imagine who are breathing their last breath at this very moment.

Do not waste a moment that you still have breath.

If you have life be thankful. No matter your situation.

“Nature brings what is good for everyone and everything, and at the precise moment.” – Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

Life provides you with what you need if you are willing to accept it. It may look like an obstacle or bad luck, but that may disguise the opportunity.

Premeditatio Malorum

Premeditatio Malorum means the premeditation of the evils and troubles that might lie ahead.

Now that may seem contrary to Seneca’s idea that “we suffer more in imagination than in reality.”

Premeditatio Malorum is about being prepared, not worrying.

“Today it is you who threaten me with these terrors; but I have always threatened myself with them, and have prepared myself as a man to meet man’s destiny. If an evil has been pondered beforehand, the blow is gentle when it comes.” – Seneca

I have no issue sitting down and thinking about what might happen and preparing. It’s the letting it go, knowing I have a plan in place, that’s the part I struggle with.

I perseverate on what on the worst case scenario, and I become anxious about it.

That is the running narrative in my head.

I need to learn to focus on the plan and not the troubles themselves.

That is how you balance Seneca’s two ideas.

Think about what bad could happen and plan for it. Don’t make the evils and troubles worse than they might be in your imagination.

Know that you can handle anything that is thrown at you. Because you are ready.

“You can read Seneca a hundred times and think you’re now prepared for calamity, but that’s just knowledge disguised as understanding.” – Lawrence Yeo, More to That blog

It doesn’t matter what you know if you can’t put it into action when you need to.

Think of what might happen, prepare for it, don’t imagine that it will be worse than it could be, and let it go.