Marcus Aurelius on seeing your worries from a height. From Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, about 175 AD.
In 176, Marcus Aurelius came home to Rome after nearly eight years away. Crowds filled the city, and he rode in a triumph.
In one speech he said he had been gone many years. Cassius Dio says the crowd shouted back the number, eight, and showed it on their hands, hoping for eight gold coins each. He smiled and paid.
In 176, Marcus Aurelius came home to cheering crowds in Rome after nearly eight years away. His notebook told him to look down on such crowds from above: voyages, births, deaths, and praise that soon turns to blame. He pictured the age of Vespasian, full of weddings, plots and feasts, and all of it gone.
Seen from high enough, a worry shrinks back to its true size. Practical advice: when one problem fills your night, picture your street, then your city, then the world.
Well established · checked against 5 sourcesPicture tonight’s worry from high above your city, then name its true size.
“One embarrassing moment at work keeps feeling huge. How do I see it at its real size?”
Look Down From Above and the other 11 ideas of Meditations, a minute at a time.
Download on theApp StoreEvery idea is drawn from the public-domain text, and its names, dates and quotes are checked against the sources listed with it. The paintings are made for Counsel; they show the scene, not a historical record.
