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About this quote

What does it mean?
Regularly contemplating death and other feared things keeps you from craving excess and thinking small.
In plain terms
Think about death often to stay modest and content.
What can you take from it?
Use mortality as a reminder to avoid greed.

Where it applies

  • making financial decisions
  • pursuing status

Putting it to work

  • meditate on impermanence
  • set modest goals

Questions to consider

  • What does death teach you about priorities?
  • How can you balance awareness with enjoyment?

Another view

Constant focus on death can cause anxiety for some.

More from Epictetus

  1. If thou wouldst make progress, be content to seem foolish and void of understanding with respect to outward things. Care not to be thought to know anything. If…

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  2. Piety towards the Gods, be sure, consists chiefly in thinking rightly concerning them-that they are, and that they govern the Universe with goodness and justic…

    Permalink to quote #51
  3. If you seek Truth, you will not seek to gain a victory by every possible means; and when you have found Truth, you need not fear being defeated. (149)

    Permalink to quote #48

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