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founding
Oct 25, 2023Liked by Massimo Pigliucci

This is a beautiful essay, Massimo. You touch upon so many core concepts of living. Your differing experiences of your parents’ passing, hopefully, hold blessed gifts that have enriched you by gaining wisdom. Naturally, my condolences to you and praise that being Stoic with your mother passing still seems to convey feeling from your heart as you write about it. In other words, your feeling of loss (that is, your emotion and heartfelt feelings) were not forfeited when you acted stoically.

As for the rest of the essay, I recall as a teenager how I wanted to “own” moments with my first love. There was us and the universe--only two entities--and we were the greater as the universe served us. I knew I couldn’t stop time or keep repeating the moment. Not only was that an absurd desire in terms of physics, but if it were possible to capture, or repeat, the moment itself would alter in its essence. When I was fourteen I told my friends (who still quote me today 😊), “You never can recapture magic moments.” All I was saying was to be cognizant of the moments as they happen. The hard part, though, is to feel heightened joy through appreciation of the moments then to be anxious, and melancholy, that they will be end. I had this problem throughout life. Never fully appreciating great moments. Talk about being tightly wound. 🙄

Humans struggle with loss, but Stoic practice and use of our intelligence may be the best method to steer our way and to contentedly cope.

An aside: I had dinner at my friend’s Mom’s house on Long Island last September and she gave me perfectly ripened figs from her backyard tree in Valley Stream. They were so delicious and I wasn’t even aware of their timing. Sometimes we gain wisdom in reverse; and that isn’t a problem as long as we are gaining. 😊

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Dec 3, 2022Liked by Massimo Pigliucci

It's better late than never: As I get older (64) I find myself thinking more and more of my own and my loved ones mortality. In my younger years such things would never cross my mind. I try my best to reflect on the words of Epictetus as often as I can as I know that it is so easy to be complacent and forget my own mortality. I like Seneca's comments about the foolish forgetfulness of mortality. So true..... thankyou

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You mentioned Robin Waterfield's translation of the Discourses as the one you prefer. Unless I was mistaken, didn't you recommend Robin Hard's translation elsewhere? Either way, is there an advantage of one over the other for you?

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Hi Massimo. Thank you for this new newsletter. The fig example is perhaps linked to the biblical episode of the cursing of the fig tree? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cursing_of_the_fig_tree

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