Meditations
A series of personal writings by Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius, recording his private notes to himself on Stoic philosophy.
What else do they all swear by?
Joe Rogan, Ryan Holiday and Tobi Lütke use or recommend Meditations. See what else they have in common.
See what they all swear by Or pick your own peopleWhat creators think
Recently discussed in
How Meditations compares
2 creators weighed in
C
Christianity
Different focus
World's largest religion
Tom says Meditations changed his inner self-talk in a way that differed from how Christianity approaches death.
T
1 creator
T
1 creator
Tom says Meditations changed his inner self-talk in a way that differed from how Christianity approaches death.
"I was really knocked out by it on a couple of different levels. Reading Marcus Aurelius over the last week has given me sort of a new kind of self-talk. It's given me a language in which to address these things. I'm not bullshitting you ..."
Compared favorably to Aristotle, the New Testament, and other ancient philosophers; contrasted with Christianity's view on death
The Daily Stoic
Different focus
daily Stoic readings book
Ryan calls Meditations the best book ever and urges the Hays translation; The Daily Stoic is a separate modern guide with its own translations.
1 creator
1 creator
Ryan calls Meditations the best book ever and urges the Hays translation; The Daily Stoic is a separate modern guide with its own translations.
"What I think is the best book ever written, Marcus Aurelius's Meditations. I strongly recommend the Gregory Hays translation. It's the most lyrical, the most accessible, and it's just an incredible document... If you haven't read Meditat..."
Preferred over free internet translations; he notes the Daily Stoic also has good translations
What creators say
"Marcus Aurelius talks about the idea of the common good something like 80 times in Meditations, right? 80 times is a lot... It's not until the middle of the pandemic that I'm reading Marcus Aurelius and all these allusions, and in some cases direc..."
More from Ryan Holiday →+73 more mentions from Ryan
"While it's true that someone can impede our actions, Marcus Aurelius famously says in Meditations, they can't impede our intentions or our attitudes."
"In Meditations, Marcus Aurelius says, 'Ambition is tying your success to what other people do or say.' He says, 'Sanity is tying it to your own act..."
"I am a Meditations fan. I know stoicism is falling out of favor a little bit right now but it's been a lifelong thing for me, and I have a copy of Meditations in most rooms I spend time in. So I just do some random reading and it's like magical ho..."
More from Tobi Lütke →"I was really knocked out by it on a couple of different levels. Reading Marcus Aurelius over the last week has given me sort of a new kind of self-talk. It's given me a language in which to address these things. I'm not bullshitting you on that."
More from Tom Junod →"Marcus Aurelius's Meditations is so informative on so many levels. I mean here you have somebody who was literally an emperor and he's writing this journal in a tent in a battlefield. The soul becomes dyed the color of its thoughts and I think abo..."
More from Ivanka Trump →
"You could read Meditations by Marcus Aurelius and literally learn how to live a better life."
More from Joe Rogan →+1 more mention from Joe
"I'm most certain that that flavored some of his writings, particularly Meditations, because there's a lot of the stuff in there that seems very psy..."
"I ended up — it was super cliche but — ended up reading Meditations by Marcus Aurelius and I was like, wow, this is incredible."
More from Jett Franzen →
"Reading Meditations is also just an insight into the mind of a man who's to himself, 'cause Meditations is not supposed to be work that's published. It's just a diary."
More from Lex Fridman →Creators also endorse
Keep exploring
Topics
About this data
- ✓44,000+ mentions extracted from real podcast transcripts
- ✓Every quote links to the source episode
- ✓Sponsored mentions are always labeled
- ✓Critical takes are shown, never filtered out