You Think You Have Time. You Don’t.

you are mortal remembering that you could go at any moment. And one of the ways I do that is when I travel, I try to stop in various cemeteries and just spend a little time walking around, looking at the headstones, thinking about the people buried there, thinking about the people that have come before us.

And that's what I want to talk about in today's episode, some stoic lessons that I've gathered from cemeteries all over the world where in thinking about death, I changed my life. And I think might be able to change it.

beautiful cemeteries in the world. But you know what good it does the people who are buried here? Nothing. There was a guy buried in this cemetery. Two hundred and fifty thousand people came to his funeral. That's insane. I've never even heard of this person. Two hundred and fifty thousand people. But you know what good

What good it did him? No good at all. Marcus Aurelius tries to remind us that people who long for posthumous fame, what they forget is that they won't be around to enjoy it. He says, and even if you were, people are still annoying and obnoxious. It's not that special. Marcus Aurelius is remembered by history, not because he strove to be remembered, but because of how he lived his life, what he tried to do with the time that he had, what he wasn't

Thinking about is legacy. Legacy is for everyone but you. This beautiful cemetery, this is for the people who love those people. It doesn't do them any good. But what of the time they wasted, what of the wrong things they valued? You want to think about how you're spending your time.

Now? Are you living now? Are you appreciating it now? Death is the one certainty. It's the one thing that will happen to every person that's ever been born. It's the prophecy that never fails, they say. And yet, how many people

In this cemetery, we were surprised by it. How many people were caught off guard? How many people thought, oh, I thought I had more time? How many of these people wasted enormous amounts of their time, as we all do? Seneca says we protect our property, we protect our money. money and yet we're so frivolous with our time. The one thing we should be the strictest misers about, he says, we just freely hand out to people. We let it be wasted because we think we have so much of it and we don't.

Eventually, we all come to the end. And not just eventually, could be sooner than you think. Obviously, the thing we all dread most is something happening to our kids. No parent ever wants to bury a child. And unfortunately, it's true, one day our children will die, we ourselves will die.

But the Stoics remind us that that simply seeing death as this tragedy, this thing that's out there that could happen to you at some point in the future, says you actually have to think of death as something that's happening now. He says the time that passes belongs to death.

So however old your kids are, those are years that they'll never get back, that you'll never get back. So we have to spend our time wisely. We have to be with our kids when we're with our kids. When Marcus Aurelius tells himself, as you tuck your children in at night, say to yourself,

Trying to do is make sure that he doesn't rush through this thing. Only get to do so many times. In the midst of life, we are in death. As we kill time, as time passes, it is killing us and it is gone forever. And so is that five-year-old and six-year-old and seven-year-old. seven year old, an eight-year-old, an eighteen year old. They'll never get that again. So be there for it while it's here.

Yeah, uh these people lived in a different culture, they had different beliefs, different perceptions, maybe they thought different things about the afterlife. All the same they had to face this unchanging, unavoidable thing. And that's true for Marcus Aurelius, that's true for Seneca, that's true for Epictetus.

They had to come to terms with the fact that however powerful they were, they couldn't escape death. Whatever their beliefs about the afterlife were, this life was gonna end at some point. And so, in this way, death is a great equalizer. It's a common thing we all have in common, just as we all we all have grief and loss in common. It's it's a thing that yes takes us apart, it strips us

From our loved ones. It takes people we love away from us and ultimately takes us away from people we love. It also brings us together with everyone and everything that ever lived. So when the Stoics talk about how everything has two handles, that's the other way that you could think about death, not as something.

Horrible and sad and awful and violent, but as something communitarian, something that unites us, something we all have in common, something transcendent and sacred, then in that regard. And actually, this cemetery that that I'm in right now is a plantation cemetery of workers from everywhere from Spain and Puerto Rico, Korea, China, Japan, all over the world people came here. Different cultures, different beliefs.

different socioeconomic backgrounds but all had one thing in common obviously trying to provide for their family trying to make a better life many of their descendants still live here in Hawaii so death brings us together but also life brings us together. In this cemetery that I'm in here in Maui. Like like you see all these poles.

I guess also it's just this idea that none of this last we get chewed up and turned into worm food, sure. But even our tombstones, like this cemetery is right next to a a freeway, next to a business. I remember I once visited a a cemetery in

in Brazil and another one in Milan and they were taking these family tombs and just selling them to new families because they they had to make room. They were running out of grave space. And it's just a reminder that again the most powerful among us, the most important among us, eventually We just end up taking up space, we get in people's way and life goes on. And that's something that I think spending time in cemeteries reminds us.

Right, that it would be in better repair than this. And yet this is the inevitable process. In Meditations, Marcus Real says like Alexander the Great and his mule driver, the say they both die, they're both buried in the same ground, and the same thing happens to both. Both meaning they're both ultimately consumed by worms.

and become nothing and their accomplishments are equalized. But yeah, the point is it's like not just like your coffin and your tombstone and your fence. But then, you know, as we find with Indian burial grounds or all sorts, like eventually this This too, no one even knows this is a cemetery.

Found one from the eighteen thirties, I found one from the eighteen fifties, found a bunch of people born during the Civil War, uh a bunch of Union veterans of the Civil War, some Confederate veterans too. Um, but I like to walk through the cemetery. It's always peaceful in a cemetery, it's always quiet. And I just think about the lives that these people had. I think about

how quickly they were forgotten. I also think about what they managed to do in their brief lives. But I think really what a cemetery is for me is a reminder of how short an ephemeral life is. There's one little tombstone I saw someone was born in the eighteenth Sixties and they drowned swimming in the San Pedro River. They went for a swim like I did yesterday, and it was the last

Swim that they ever made. And so I think Memento Mori, why I do I carry the Memento Mori coin in my pocket. The reason I do that is to remind myself not to take things for granted, not to be rushed, not to to get upset about things that don't matter. This moment now is a gift, even if you're in a cramped RV, even if you're stuck in traffic, even if it's taking longer than you thought, to just relax, calm down. Life is wonderful, life is beautiful.

Even in a cemetery, it's peaceful and you can find something you can just soak in and appreciate, feel that sort of somber bit of reflection, and then go on about your life. And there's a reason that the Stoics talk about death over and over again. Казідін філософко ексей.

Because fiber is not just about digestion, it's the key driver of gut health, which directly impacts a bunch of things nutrient absorption, energy stability, recovery, focus, mood, and overall performance. Momentous Fiber Plus is a complete three-in-one formula with soluble fiber, insoluble fiber, and prebiotic resistant start.

Like everything Momentous makes, Fiber Plus is built with a science first formulation, clean and minimal ingredients and no artificial additives or artificial flavors. And right now Momentous is offering our listeners up to thirty-five percent off your first order with promo code DAISTOIC. Head over to Livemomentous.com and use promo code DAILYSTOIC for up to 35% off your first order. That's Livemomentous.com, promo code DAILYSTOIC.

But I go, this is a person with hopes and dreams. Maybe they had power, maybe they had fame, maybe they wrote books, maybe they were beautiful, maybe they had an illustrious last name. And where are they now? They're dead, they're buried in this marble box and nobody knows and nobody cares.

And in meditations, Marcus Aurelius reminds himself, he says, Who remembers the name of the emperor who came before him? Who remembers any of these people? They're gone and forgotten. And this is supposed to humble us and sober us up. It's supposed to

That we don't take life for granted, but that we also don't prioritize and obsess over the wrong things. I'm reminded of this very powerful quote from Seneca. He says that at the end of your life, you better have something to show for all your years other than a number, right? What do you actually have to?

Show for it. Not what did you accomplish, like how much did you make, how powerful did you get, but did you actually live those years? I met a man in Austin, his name was Richard Overton. He was 112 years old when he died. That number would be meaningless if he didn't live a full and good life in. in that time. So to me the idea of momentum worry is not just hey you could die right now nothing matters. It's that you because you could die, how do you actually show how do you have

Proof of life for the years that you've been alive. Proof of life. To me, that's what Memento Moria is about, and it's why we can't forget it. Pandemics have have always been with us. And there are people buried in here from the Spanish flu, there are people that are buried in here from yellow fever, from typhus.

From malaria, all sorts of terrible diseases from wars, from tragedies, from violence. Death was ever present in history and in the ancient world. Marcus Aurelius lost, I think, six children before they reached adulthood. Death was ever present. In our antiseptic safe world today with the advances in modern medicine where where we push death away, where people die in special homes, where we don't have to think about it, let alone see it, it's really easy to to deny death, to deny the reality.

of this thing that will happen to all of us. And so for the Stoics, the idea of memento mori was a constant reminder, an active practice that life is short, that we could go at any moment, that we're not in control, that we never will be in control, and that even if the averages are in your favor, that doesn't

matter for you the individual which is why you can't take life for granted which is why you can't be entitled which is why you can't waste time which why you can't take other people or relationships for granted you could leave life right now marks really says let that determine what you do and say anything.

Since it left the Kesslis family, which by the way is what happens to all our possessions. The things you love, the things you care about, eventually someone is going to possess them. That is to say, if they don't throw them away. There's a story about Epictetus. He had this lamp that was

stolen and you'd think he'd be upset. Instead he goes, look, you can only lose what you have. And he goes back and he replaces it the next day with something cheaper. But the funny part is that after he died, one of his students bought it for a lot of money. He wanted it possess something that Epictetus had possessed. Of course, totally missing the point.

of the lesson. Now again the lesson isn't you should never have anything and you shouldn't care about anything and should give away all your possessions like a monk. No, it's just a reminder that that as the Stoics say we only own this stuff in trust. We have it temporarily.

the house, not just the place we currently stand or operate, but everything in our life is only ours for as long as we are lucky to have it. I heard someone say, and I think about this with the where I live on this ranch out not far from here,

The bank is just letting me make payments on it. Like you don't even own it. You have it temporarily. And if you can think about it that way, you're not only gonna be more insured against the ups and downs in life, you're gonna know the proper perspective on things. It helps me relax. with my children. I don't have to take everything so seriously. I don't have to stress about everything. I don't

own it. We remind ourselves that we don't really own this stuff, that it's only ours temporarily. So the day when we have to give it up, whether it's while we're living or at the end of our life, we're okay with that. We're okay giving it back. I actually had a a a friend of mine who died not that long ago. And he he wrote about this saying, I'm ready to give the gift back.

That's what he was saying about his life itself, ready to return the gift. And that's a very stoic idea. All of it, it's only temporary, we only get it for a little bit. There's a famous line in a Aeschylus play, Agamemnon. Cassandra is the prophet. That can see the future, but she's cursed that no one will ever listen. And she says, uh, when she comes home, knowing that.

Agamemnon is gonna be murdered by his wife. She says, I can smell the open grave. Meaning she can smell that death is on this person. They they're marked for it, but they don't know it. I'm just sitting here in this cemetery and they just reinterred or work on this grave someone who's been dead for 65 years. We all have that mark of death on us. Like we we think about this idea like what would I do if I found out I I had cancer, if I got a terminal diagnosis.

What if someone could predict my death? But you do have a terminal diagnosis. Someone can predict your death. All of us are mortal. The doctor knew with absolute certainty when we were born that we were going to die. It's just that because we feel healthy, it's just because the average lifespan is incredibly long these days, in a way that the ancients couldn't have even

imagined the average person living to because the infant mortality then was so high. And we think we're gonna live forever, we think we're the exception, and we're not. It's gonna happen for all of us. We have to live accordingly. We have to make the right decisions. As a result, we have to cut out the things that are wasting our time. Steve Jobs talked about this in his famous commencement address. He was talking about how life is short, it's uncertain for all of us.

as it tragically was for him. He said it's too short to spend it living somebody else's life, following somebody else's track. That's one of my favorite questions from Mark Sweeless in Meditations. He says, you're afraid of death because you won't be able to do this?

anymore and by this I take it to mean all the indignities and stupid things that we spend our time doing. Like you want to live forever so you can go to the DMV more, so you can scroll on your phone more, so you can hold grudges more. So you can covet more things, that's not a life worth extending. Okay, so I'm not saying that life is meaningless and you should just die. I'm saying the opposite. I'm saying

You should try to live a life that is worth being long. That's the tragedy, Seneca says. How many people at their end of their life all they have to show for it is a large number. That's not what we're after. That's not meaningful. That's not what philosophy is.

Fighting to try to make us. So this decision to cut out the inessential, to do what actually matters, to live the life we are meant to live, to to be brave and to be authentic, to be real, to chase and value the right things, that's what Memento Mori reminds us.