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Stoic Meditation To Calm Your Mind Before You Act · The Stoic Handbook with Jon Brooks

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: You're here because the echoes of ancient stoic wisdom have reached you, whispering of tranquility, clarity, and strength.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: This meditation distills that age old wisdom, inviting you on a journey, a journey where you'll discover stoic principles, leaning on the words of stoic sages, cultivating practical wisdom through grounding visualizations and probing questions to center yourself amidst life's storms.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: So sit down, settle yourself, feel the weight of your body as it meets the earth or the chair beneath you.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Allow your eyes to close.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: Notice the energy of your body, and let's begin accept whatever comes to you woven in the pattern of your destiny, for what could more aptly fit your needs?
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Marcus Aurelius Picture this a vast star filled cosmos, planets and stars, solar systems, clusters of solar systems, galaxies and clusters of galaxies and space infinite space.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: Where does your life fit into this?
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Which of your current challenges can you view as a bend in this cosmic river Men are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of them Epictetus.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: Events don't shape us ultimately.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Our responses, on the other hand, do.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: Recall a recent event that unsettled you.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: Stand at the crossroad.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: One path represents your initial response.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: The response of vice.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: The other is a calmer, stoic approach.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: What is it?
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: And what do you choose?
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: Like a sand castle, all is temporary.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: Build it, tend to it, enjoy it, and when the time comes let it go.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: Jack Cornfield.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: You may have noticed that everything has its season.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: Now imagine holding a delicate sand sculpture.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: Open your hand.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: Notice how the wind scatters the grains.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Use this as a metaphor to examine what in your life are you gripping too tightly.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: Let it go and feel the relief as you let the grains gently drift with the wind.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: True happiness is to enjoy the present without anxious dependence upon the future.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: Now is the only true realm of existence.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: The past is a memory right now, and a future is a thought or an imagination right now.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: So feel the world around you right now, the steady earth, the space between objects.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: Let the future worries and past regrets fade.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: What are the textures, sounds, sense, feelings, thoughts that are coming all on their own and fading away all on their own?
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: Obstacles are not opposing you, but merely and gently re rooting you Epictetus.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: When it comes to difficulties, are they really obstacles or are they guides?
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: Picture a mountainous path with an unexpected blockade.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: Instead of an end, it's actually a detour to a more scenic route.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: What in your life right now?
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: What challenge can be seen as a detour a redirect to something better?
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: Don't set your mind on things you don't possess, but count the blessings you actually possess and think how much you would desire them if they weren't already yours.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Marcus Aurelius In everything that happens there's a silver lining, something that highlights a possibility of something great, of something better.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_00: Think of the radiant sun breaking through the cloud cover.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Its rays illuminate three blessings in your life.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: Recognize them.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: What are these three blessings that the sun shines on?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: Now as the day unfolds, how will you act in line with virtue?
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: Take a deep breath in, and as you release it, imagine a cloak of stoic wisdom settling on your shoulders.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: Open your eyes, armoured against life's storms, but always open to its beauty, the miracle of existence and the privilege of what it means to be here now.