“For every individual, the whole complex business of living, this whole fascinating, agonizing, thrilling, boring, reassuring and frightening business, with all its moments of simple peace and complex turmoil, will someday, inescapably, end.”
— Ernest Becker
Recommended reading: Ernest Becker’s Unflinching Examination of How the Fear of Death is Secretly Controlling Your Life
***A memento mori is a reminder of death. It is a key practice of Stoicism but is not unique to it. It can be a simple visual reminder or quote or a more serious mediation on death. Stoics use it to remind themselves of how short and fragile life is and therefor how much we have to be grateful for, to live virtuous lives and not to waste our time.
In this series, each Monday, I will post a memento mori from various sources, either from the primary Stoic texts themselves or other sources.
