Michael A. Michail

Spirituality * Culture * Self-Expression

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Inner Awareness

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On January 17, 2022

In Enlightenment

We live in a world of information. Facts, figures, opinions, viewpoints come at us from all angles – some information is accurate and some, well, not so accurate. It’s hard to tell the truth from untruth. Information abounds from multiple sources that one person or another, one organization or another, avows is correct while others, equally vehemently, avow is fake.

The media, politicians, scientists, educators, friends, employers, celebrities – they all want you to accept, believe and affirm the things they consider to be “real truth.”

How can you tell what to believe?

External information sources are always going to be questionable. And when these sources declare themselves authorities and forbid you to question them, you know you have problems.

But there is one source that really is reliable: it is your own Inner Voice – the part of you that is connected to Universal Intelligence.

How can you tell if the inner voice speaking to you is really connected to Universal Intelligence or is just echoing back the information you’ve picked up from external sources? The answer is to learn to make distinctions between the two, and this requires some practice with meditation and personal, mystical contact with the Divinity within you.

Here is an exercise to get you started on your path to experiencing Inner Awareness.

MEDITATION EXERCISE

We all have different levels and degrees of mobility, yet, I hope that each of you has at least one position you can assume that is comfortable while at the same time allowing you to remain alert. Traditionally, a straight back pose while sitting on the floor is encouraged, but this is not an absolute – do what you can with the abilities you have. Meditation and connection to the Divine transcends all physical barriers. When you have found your special position, close your eyes and allow yourself to rest.

Just do that, at first, and when you have gotten used to being in the pose start becoming aware of your surroundings. Let your awareness extend in all directions. Use sound or touch to experience everything around you. Allow yourself to become aware of all the sounds or sensations in your environment.

Consciousness, like an uncovered candle flame, projects in all directions. It casts its energy on everything without discrimination. Consciousness, perceives everything with equal interest. It is only later that judgements are made about what is perceived. Remain, now, in the non-judgmental state – the state of merely being aware on the information that comes to you.

Notice a car in the street, a clock ticking somewhere, a radio or TV playing next door. Or, notice the texture of your clothes, the feeling of what you are sitting on, a slight breeze, the difference in temperatures on different sides of your body. Allow yourself to perceive everything, all experiences at once. Take in all the information without judgment. That’s all. Just allow yourself to be aware of the world around you.

Do this for, perhaps, 5 or 15 minutes a day. Do the exercise at home or while you are out. Do it just a few minutes at a time. Experience unfiltered, actual, information coming to you without the confusion of other people’s interpretation. Become aware of yourself in your own space without discriminating one item from another.  

Soon you will begin to understand that all the “news” and “communication” that pushes itself upon you is only as valuable as the interpretations you chose to give them.

Until next time – Love and Blessings and all good wishes for Peace Profound.

Where’s Beethoven?

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On January 10, 2022

In Social Commentary

Look back 500 years, 400 years, 100 years, even 50 years and you will see examples of world class, creative geniuses everywhere. Leonardo, Michelangelo, Shakespeare, Martin Luther, Newton, Copernicus, Galileo, Bach, Mozart, Benjamin Franklin, Madame Currie, Dostoyevsky, Nicola Tesla, Beethoven … The list goes on and on. Geniuses in every field of human endeavor, whose works changed the world, whose names will live forever.

But what will people 100 years from now or even 50 years from now see when they look back at our time? Where is our Beethoven?

We are pretty much at the peak of civilization – certainly as far as technology goes. The average idiot walks down the street carrying a device that connects to all the information in the world. We have the ability to communicate, instantly, with people everywhere, anytime. Someone in Tennessee has no problem talking to someone in Timbuktu. And not just talk – they can see each other on screen, send each other documents, conference with dozens of other people around the world at the same time – they can even hop a plane and meet in person in just a few hours. Imagine if Shakespeare could have done that.

There is also more wealth in the world, today, then at any other time in history. And, in terms of percentage of the population, there are fewer people in poverty than ever before.

It’s a golden age for many – or at least it should be – but there is something missing.

We haven’t had a real technological breakthrough since the Moon landing more than 50 years ago. “Art” has literally degenerated to someone throwing excrement at a canvas and framing it. Music, film and television is created by committees and focus groups. Authors are more concerned with the number of pronouns and acronyms they can use than in the story. And “educators” appear to base their curricula on insect or reptilian logic.

The flame of the World Soul is being extinguished.

In the past, creative people struggled to find information, patrons and audiences – how much could Van Gogh, Mozart, Tesla and others have benefited from the Internet? Current technology has solved many problems that hindered creators of the past. We also have excessive amounts of leisure and levels of comfort only the very rich could afford not too long ago.

And yet…

Where is our Beethoven? Our Shakespeare? Our Newton? Our Rembrandt? Our Einstein? Hell, where’s our Elvis?

It seems the fulfilment of needs such as information and leisure does not contribute to greatness. What powers genius is a connection to Spirit – and that is something technology can’t seem to give us.

Instead of a new Axial Ages or a new Renaissance the 21st century is a new Dark Age full of propaganda, conflict, pestilence and the Death of the human Spirit.  

Ups and Downs

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On December 5, 2021

In Social Commentary, Spirituality

Your favorite mystic was a bit lazy last week and didn’t prepare a good post. Actually, not so much lazy as despondent. The political situation in the world has a way of bringing me down – although, it really needn’t do so.

It is true that the current occupant of the White House is a corrupt moron and likely to get the West into a shooting war, or worse – an economic war that turns Western nations into vassal states of certain Eastern powers. And the various, current, Prime Ministers of Canada, the U.K., New Zealand and, especially, Australia likewise appear to be corrupt morons and enemies of the people. The 27 unelected Commissars of the European Union, along with just about every elected (selected) President, Prime Minister and Chancellor of the European nations are no better and, in most cases, worse. As are the rest of the leaders of Asia, the Middle East, Africa, South America and all affiliated or non-affiliated islands and such. What can be said of the U.N., NATO, and the other dictatorial organizations that deem themselves in control of the world?

It’s not enough that they all seem to despise their own, individual, nations – they also seem to act with a collective agenda to crush the spirit of Humanity, in general, and, specifically, to destroy Western civilization.

This is not something we should find surprising; the Devil has been in control of all the kingdoms of the world for thousands of years. What’s different is that it seems like in the past 50 years or so, the efforts to subjugate humanity have been ramped up considerably.

Yet, we should not despair – least of all, your favorite mystic. We know all this, and we also know that the Earth itself belongs to God and all the human and, perhaps, non-human inhabitants on the planet that want a REAL life are welcome to enter the Kingdom of God – a Kingdom that is not of this world and, thus, is beyond the control of the Devil.

The political leaders are doing what they have to do to achieve their wicked goals – this should not concern us. Let them do what they must in the time available to them. Certainly we, on the path, must continue to exist IN the world – living and walking on the planet. However, spiritually, we should remain apart and not be OF the world.

Let them do their thing while we continue to do ours.

Let us seek first and with vigor the Kingdom of God and let all the rest work itself out.

Spiritual Authority

By

On November 14, 2021

In Spirituality

You could spend all your days reading books about the spiritual life – you could dream about it, fantasize about it, study the philosophy of the world and judge everything around you – but that won’t really get you any closer to being Spiritual – to experiencing personal growth and Enlightenment. You can’t get there by reading and studying you have to practice, but to practice you must first know what you should be practicing – you need some authoritative guidance to help you find the right path to take.

Unfortunately, the greater part of modern literature on this subject has been strongly influenced by the times – and face it, modern attitudes are hostile to real spiritual attainment. Many books and so-called teachers often pump out systems based on fear of confronting actual life and a real ignorance of what people need today and what they are capable of achieving. The modern view is warped by rules, prejudices and concepts of collectivism and fake social justice that allow only a few people the ability to hang on to spiritual power and thus maintain a rigid, decadent social system. The modern world does not want you to experience true spiritual growth which would free you from its grasp: it wants you to be dependent on an elitist, Luciferian state ideology.

What people need today is the same thing they needed a thousand, two thousand, five thousand years ago or more – a path to divine union. That doesn’t mean an absolute rejection of materialism, it means being able to embrace life IN the world without becoming part OF the world – living as close to Spirit as your physical limitations allow.

Originally, spirituality and meditation were a core part of all positive religions. This is because religion, in general, is something local while spirituality is universal. The religion of your people, culture and traditions gave you access to Spirit in a direct and wholesome environment. Separating spirituality from religion turns it into an orphan of the storm, subject to whatever debris the wind and rain throw at it. Practicing spirituality requires an established framework to make it functional.

I’m not suggesting that you must adhere to whatever religion you were born into or whatever religion is dominant in your locality – I am saying that a religious structure that has been around for thousands of years and is still thriving and growing probably has something positive to offer you and shouldn’t be rejected just for the sake of being “modern.” It might be true that many faith groups have been corrupted by modern social viewpoints so that they are almost unrecognizable from their foundations, but it is possible to look back at the origins of the religion and use the early principles for your own spiritual benefit.

Spirituality, separated from cultural tradition and authoritative sources, will likely end up attached to some modernistic, State held belief system loaded with collectivist nonsense about abandoning the past in favor of some mythical great reset. Positive spirituality is eternal and never changing. But negative spirituality also exists as a manipulative, malevolent force that seeks to corrupt and enslave the masses who reject the truth. Be on your guard.

Meditation

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On October 31, 2021

In Spirituality

A whole person, someone at one with himself – as opposed to someone who is inwardly divided – meditates everyday, without effort and without the need for any stylistic preparation. However, most people are not at one with themselves and most people would greatly benefit from achieving this state. And, interestingly enough, the most widely used way of becoming a whole person is to practice meditation.

Most people who want to learn about meditation seem to think that they have to read a lot of books or take classes. Books and classes are wonderful tools for getting second hand knowledge, but this has little to do with the act of meditating itself. Meditation is a natural process, part of the mechanism of being a human, we can all do it intuitively – at least we should be able to if we weren’t programed to resist it by our current materialistic culture.

Assume a comfortable position and then let yourself concentrate and connect with your inner self, letting the outer, messed up world fade away. A few moments of this a day, in time, will make a big impact on your life. Get into the habit of doing this. Once you start to understand and appreciate what is happening for you, some review of known, established meditation techniques will be helpful.

Look around.  Find one technique you think you will like and work with that for a time. You can change your mind and try something else, later. Some simple, early-stage techniques will involve adopting a good posture and effective breathing methods. A minute of reflection will tell you what these could be. Once you’ve had some regular practice, books and classes will then serve to REFINE and ENHANCE your own natural experiences. After using different techniques and finding something that feels good for you, the knowledge, experience and sensations that come to you automatically will inspire you to continue the practice.

Start now. Start from where you are. Start with whatever fear, pain or doubt you have. Start with your uncertainty – but start. Start and don’t stop. Start right from where you are now and with whatever insight and knowledge you have and go from there.

Later, you can do other things, refine your technique, explore more sophisticated or complex methods to see what they are about. First, however, you will want to get some direct experiences that can only come from practice.

Many people believe that to be a regular meditator or a spiritual person means that you must immediately stop living the way you do now: stop eating, drinking, playing and having a normal life.

Nope.

You can meditate and still keep living your regular life.

However, if done sincerely, meditation will expand your consciousness – it will expand your understanding of life and fill you with more clarity. Once your mind becomes calm and you get an overview of your own life patterns, you might begin to act differently. You might have the desire to live differently. But this will be a natural, unforced experience – something you will choose to happen. What that will look like is anybody’s guess. It will simply be something that is right for you alone, something that you, yourself, will choose.

Your choices in life will begin to be based on a calm, self-reliance and inner contentment. Your personal choices will NOT be based on indifference or some form of imposed, frightened attitude regarding what is allowed and what is forbidden. Instead, you will choose with an alert, involved attitude toward whatever you face in your own life.

Meditation won’t change or remake you – it will simply bring out your own true, natural, inner self. It will help you be the person you really are.

Stay Awake

By

On October 24, 2021

In Enlightenment

I saw this post on social media, recently. It’s a bit upsetting. Have people really given up on waking up the world?

I know things look bad. Frightening things are happening all around the world. It’s so much easier to ignore them. So much easier to stay asleep and avoid the fears. Many people have chosen to take this route. And, it seems, many people on the path to wakefulness are choosing to let the others sleep. This is not the way to go. As long as we are able to do it, let’s strive to carry with us to Enlightenment as many other people as we can.

OK. Many people who have seen the reality of Wakefulness have decided to go back to sleep and live in a zombie-like dream state. Fine, that’s their choice and maybe we don’t have the right to force them to take part in our journey.

But there still are, oh so many, people stuck in the zombie-sleep state who have not had the chance to make the choice. They don’t even know that there is a choice to be made. Part of our Path, I think, is to show them the option even if they refuse it.

At the same time, there are others who have seen reality and simply don’t know how to deal with it. Perhaps they believe themselves to be alone, surrounded as they are with zombies. They make the false choice to fake the zombie-state just to get along – just to avoid confronting the truth. They need us to show them that they are not alone. Worse, some of these people who have seen the Light and turned from it, deliberately work to keep other people asleep – to keep them from experiencing Wakefulness. Perhaps that is the purpose of the post above, to supress the chance for Enlightenment in others. Very nasty.

We could make the effort to wake up the first group, the ones who have never seen the Light, no matter how impossible that task might be. Part of walking the Path includes helping others when we can. The sleepers deserve the chance to make the choice. If they choose, as many do, to go back to sleep – well, that is their choice.

The others, the ones who woke up already but are afraid to commit – the ones faking the zombie-state and living in quite despair – need to know they are not alone. They could benefit from the knowledge that Wakefulness is not something to be feared or pushed away.  Somehow, we could signal to them that all is not lost- not yet – there is still hope – there is still a chance for salvation.

Now, to be very clear, when I say Wake Up, I don’t mean “woke.” Woke is stupid and possibly worse than the outright zombie-state. By Wakefulness I mean Illumination, Enlightenment, Cosmic Consciousness and being imbued with Divine Spirit. People who are “woke” are living a false dream.

This is the time to Wake Up anyway we can – wake ourselves up, if necessary, or accept the call to wakefulness made by others. Wake up and shout out to everyone the good news that there is another way of living, a way of truly living, a greater reality that is available, freely, to anyone who wants it.

Meditation; contemplation; prayer; study and research; physical training and discipline; commitment to family, friends, culture and traditional spirituality; fearless conversation with others; and even, sometimes, blindly leaping into the Light with Faith that Enlightenment exists – all these and many more ways are available to help you Wake Up.

Make the choice – the first choice – that you actually WANT to wake up. Choose to reject the zombie-like, sleep state – I know that being asleep is an easy and safe way of life, but it is not REAL life. The real life is free and light and airy and fun and exciting and wonderous. The real life is struggle and motion and discovery. The real life embodies the PURSUIT of happiness – a kind of happiness that only exists with full wakefulness and Enlightenment.

Don’t give up – Wake Up and become an alarm clock to wake up others.

We Must Live Somewhere; They Can Live Anywhere

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On September 19, 2021

In Culture

There’s a saying: Some people can live anywhere, but others have to live somewhere.

This is one of the many divisions facing society, today. Some of us have a homeland, a culture, a tradition, a spiritual connection to a community. We must live somewhere. We can’t just pick up and leave a place anytime we want to – it’s a challenge. And when we arrive at a new place, we make a commitment to stay there. We are bound to the land, the people, the institutions.

This is not the case for others. For some people, wealthy Globalists in particular, physical location is temporary. They can live anywhere. They have abandoned their roots. They have no connection to place; no sense of national identity. For them, flying off to Paris for lunch and then spending a month in Hong Kong on a whim is a common event. There’s nothing keeping them in the land of their birth. Cultural heritage is irrelevant and citizenship is just a formality – totally unimportant.

This was not always the case. While the old rich, people with generational wealth, the hidden controllers of society could always live anywhere, they seldom did so as it would attract too much attention. They did however run their business interests internationally. But the other rich, the stereotypical rich people of the past who made their fortunes in their own lifetimes – cattle barons, oil tycoons, real estate moguls – they owed their wealth to the land. You couldn’t move 100,000 head of cattle across the ocean on a whim or uproot an oil well. Even retail stores such as Macy’s, Eaton’s, Woolworths, etc. had fixed locations. And, similarly, creative organizations like film makers were tied to the land. If you wanted to make a big, successful movie in the past, you had to live and work in Hollywood and your market was primarily America and the English-speaking world.

This has all changed, however, since the 1960’s. The methods of International Finance have trickled down to almost all aspects of business including moviemaking and retail enterprises.

For example, Jeff Bezos of Amazon, currently the richest person in the world, someone who creates nothing, but just moves merchandise around, can set up his retail operations anywhere. Along with Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, Jack Dorsey of Twitter, and many more, he has no spiritual connection to the land of his birth – no connection to the people of America. There might be some nostalgic value to remaining in America, but that’s it. These people can afford to NOT be patriotic or concerned with the people out of which they sprang because they can live, work and thrive anywhere.

Thus, they glibly spew out the Globalist propaganda about the benefits of a One World Government, a Borderless Society, a Multicultural Collective and the rest. They seek to fool the gullible into believing they are on the side of freedom when really, they are working to establish a society built on a subservient underclass made up of people who MUST live somewhere dominated by an elitist, ruling class of people that can live anywhere.

Notice their choice of a world capital: it is NOT New York, London, Paris, or even Beijing – cities that actually produced things that contributed to the advance of civilization – it is places like Geneva and Brussels whose only “contribution” to the world is a generations long history of promoting and protecting International Finance and Banking.

The people that can live anywhere are not our friends, no matter what they say. To them, we people of the land are unimportant, expendable and replaceable. We are merely chattel, serfs or vassals. They might want to review some history, however, because the elitist, upper-class twits that seek to dominate the world are the ones actually replaced every couple of hundred years; while we people of the land endure forever.

Through the Mountain

By

On August 15, 2021

In Spiritual, Storyteller

Your favorite mystic gets asked a lot of silly questions, one of which is “Are you Enlightened?”

How do you answer a question like that?

If I say Yes – you might think I’m bragging (and who would brag about a thing like that?)

If I say No – you might think I’m lying (and who would lie about a thing like that?)

The problem is that to understand the answer to that question you have to know just what Enlightenment is. And if you know what Enlightenment is, you really don’t have to ask the question.

People “think” they know what Enlightenment is, or what they want it to be, but thinking about it makes you miss the point. Enlightenment is a state of BEING not an idea. It is a natural state that anyone can experience and it is also an extreme state that can’t easily be defined.

You could compare it to something like Happiness. When you are happy, you know it without being told. And people who have experienced happiness can usually tell when other people are happy without being told. But happiness covers a wide range of experience – from a little happy to ecstatic (and I use that word deliberately because sometimes Enlightenment is equated with ecstasy). And sometimes if you are in a particular state of happiness for a very long time, you can forget that there was ever any other way of being and so you no longer know that you are happy – you’re just you.

A better question might be “how do you BECOME Enlightened?” And that poses problems of its own because a very real and legitimate answer to that question is “how are you AVOIDING being Enlightened?)

I think I will need to write a much longer treatise on this subject some day, soon.

Enlightenment is a natural state and humans seem to experience barriers to enjoying that state. Where did those barriers come from and how can you get around them are even trickier questions that require a lot of verbiage to respond to adequately.

So, to finish off this post, here’s a little story about getting through the barriers that might stir up some level of Enlightenment within you as you read it.

Imagine you are living in a dark and gloomy world. Easy to do, since that’s how many people see life. Now, as you wander about you begin to notice a large mountain in your path. Did it just appear? Was it always there? While you’re thinking about it, you move closer and see that there is a hole or cave in the side of the mountain. You move towards it. As you get closer, you notice people running out of the cave as if they are terrified or maybe in a state of shock. They ignore you or babble something incoherently as you question them, but you get the impression that something weird is in that cave.

Now as you get closer, you notice that while some people are running out of the cave, other people are creeping in to it. You decide to follow them in and find yourself traveling through a tunnel. Someone tells you there is something amazing at the end of the tunnel but they can’t explain what it is.

You go in deeper.

People pass you going out and coming in. And when you reach a point in the tunnel, you start to see people just standing or sitting around. One of them tells you they have just decided to rest for awhile. They don’t want to go back to the old world, but they just can’t bring themselves, yet, to continue to the end.

But you decide you are going all the way.

You decide you really want to see this wonderful thing at the end of the tunnel, whatever it might be.

You move along. People continue to pass you running out or running in, deeper. You also continue to see people just stopping on the way. But you no longer try to talk to anyone. You will find out for yourself what is going on.

There are scary sounds, rock slides, pits that open up before you that must be leaped over, walls that must be climbed, shadows of things you can’t understand – but you keep going deeper towards the truth.

You go deeper and then you notice a light. Maybe it was always there. Who knows? You move towards it. It is the way out of the mountain tunnel. Cautiously you step through to the other side.

Your eyes are opened. Everything is beautiful. Bright skies, clean air, pretty birds and flowers and people around you that seem so happy.

You wander around, almost ecstatic with a new found vigor. You suddenly think of the mountain you passed through and look for it. It is gone, it is no where to be seen. Perhaps it was never really there at all.

Please Subscribe

By

On July 25, 2021

In Info

A few weeks ago, I mentioned that the “blog subscription” widget on my site suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. It hasn’t come back and I still don’t know where it went. I have, however, found a replacement for it. The new widget/plugin seems to work OK, but there are some concerns. First, none of my old subscribers were migrated to the new program so, if you had subscribed before, you will have to re-subscribe with the new system. Second, the notifications are going straight to the spam folders – even the notifications to me. I can’t seem to correct that on my end – I’m not great at even simple tech. If you have tried to subscribe, please check your spam folder – also, try to make your own adjustments to allow my notifications to get directly to your in-box. At this time, and for the foreseeable future, the only notices you’ll get from me are announcements of new posts. At some point, I might make other announcements – but nothing too ponderous to read. Third, I have no idea how long this widget will keep working.

If you prefer not to subscribe, perhaps you’ll consider bookmarking my page and checking in now and then. Since the start of the year, I have been consistently posting every week and I hope to continue that practice.

What comes to mind, for me, regarding this situation, is a comment frequently made by spiritual teachers. They often use phrases such as “when one door closes, another door opens” or “losing something makes room to find something better” or “everything that happens to you, happens for a good reason.”

I won’t say these are false teachings; they are, however, naïve and misleading.

Certainly, good things happen to good people: but so, also, do bad things. And good things even happen to bad people.

Really, for the most part, things just happen. God notices every sparrow that falls, but God doesn’t stop every sparrow from falling. Things are going to happen to us in the world – how we react to things happening is the important part for each of us, individually.

Sometimes when a door closes, we find ourselves locked in a room with no way out. There’s nothing wrong with hoping for something good to happen and actively looking for ways to make good things happen. There’s nothing wrong with having faith that whatever happens, we will be able to make the best of it. The problem revolves around the EXPECTATION that somehow a new door will magically appear without any effort on our part. We must each take action to create our own good.

Another popular saying comes to mind: “God helps those who help themselves.” We must open ourselves up to possibility and be ready to seize opportunities as they appear – or appear to appear. And if another door opens, step through it quickly before it shuts again. The real doors we should be seeking are the ones the open up within us.

So, will losing my old widget lead to something better? I don’t know. I’m just going to keep trudging along with these posts and hope people enjoy reading them. Sometime in the future I might invest in some service that handles widgets and upgrades and all that for me.

Maybe.

For now, I’ll continue doing what I do.

I might not be anyone’s open door, but maybe I can be a small crack in the wall that lets a few people peep out at the mystic world.

Marcus Aurelius

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On July 18, 2021

In Culture

Who is Marcus Aurelius?

Aurelius was born in 121 A.D. and became Emperor of Rome in 161 A.D. Considered the last of the “five good emperors,” Aurelius led Rome in the final days of the Pax Romana, the great Roman peace established by Augustine in 27 B.C. He died in the year 180.

Despite being the most powerful man of his time and being fabulously wealthy, Aurelius patterned himself as a Stoic philosopher and is sometimes referred to as the “Philosopher King.” He led a simple, contemplative life and is the author of an important philosophical and spiritual book called “the Meditations.”

Stoicism is not just a philosophy or intellectual pursuit; Stoics consider it a way of life. To the Stoic, the highest good is to lead a life of virtue. The route to virtue is the practice of prudence, justice, temperance and courage.

Stoicism was founded by the Greek philosopher Zeno in the 3rd century B.C. The name itself refers simply to the “stoa poikile,” the painted porch where Zeno and his followers met to discuss their ideas.

One of the most important of the ancient Stoic philosophers was Epictetus. He lived from 50 to 135 A.D. He was born a slave, but acquired his freedom and by the end of his life he was respected as one of the wisest men of his age and, perhaps, the only truly free man because he lived his philosophy with a vigor.

Epictetus taught that external events are beyond our control – thus, we should accept whatever happens to us or around us calmly and dispassionately. At the same time, individuals are responsible for their own internal experiences and their own actions. The internal life should be examined and controlled through rigorous self-discipline.

Epictetus greatly influenced the thought and life style of Marcus Aurelius and he is quoted often in “the Meditations.”

Aurelius lived in troubled times. His reign was marked by wars and uprisings and political difficulties. Aurelius, however, began his philosophical training as a young man; thus, he was prepared for the struggle when he became emperor. Aurelius did all that was expected of him as leader of his people and worked diligently for what he considered the good of the empire while also maintaining his own inner discipline. He endeavored to master his thoughts, feelings and passions despite the turmoil going on around him.

In a simple form, his philosophy might be seen as a precursor to the often-quoted Serenity Prayer of modern-day theologian Reinhold Niebuhr – “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

Aurelius was by no means a Christian. More likely he was a Pantheist seeing God as encompassing all existence rather than as a separate being or personal savior. But he shared the same spiritual understanding.

The life of Marcus Aurelius shows that even someone with vast privilege and authority can aspire to a nobler, pious and mystical existence.

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