Time and Desire, Mortality, & Time’s Nature
Wednesday Wisdoms for February 26, 2025
Mind Candy is a newsletter on practical philosophy and human flourishment—aka how to live “the good life.” Each month we tackle a new theme.
This month we’re exploring the theme of Time.
Welcome to Wednesday Wisdom, our 3x3 Newsletter where I distill worldly advice for better living with 3 quotes, 3 observations, and 3 questions.
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Time and Desire
🤨 Quote
“It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements if it were all well invested.”
Seneca
Source: On the Shortness of Life
Observation 🧐
How much time do each of us have? How do we choose what to do with that time?
We tend to be pulled toward the shiny objects of life.
Money
Status
Success
These are the sparkles that shine and try to pull our attention, try and hook us in. And they do a great job at it, we spend most of our life in pursuits of these things.
But what if those things were never real for us? What if they weren’t what we wanted? What we intrinsically needed?
What if instead we wanted was:
Health
Companionship
Understanding
And it doesn’t stop with those. We could want:
Freedom
Laughter
Relaxation
And many many more.
If our internal desires don’t match what the external world is presenting to us, why not focus on our internal desires to begin with and make the time we have worth it?
🤔 Question
How do you block out the noise of what the world tells you you should want?
Mortality
🤨 Quote
“Keep in mind how fast things pass by and are gone - those that are now, and those to come. Existence flows past us like a river: the "what" is in constant flux, the "why" has a thousand variations. Nothing is stable, not even what's right here. The infinity of past and future gapes before us - a chasm whose depths we cannot see.”
Marcus Aurelius
Source: Meditations 5.23
Observation 🧐
In Book IV of the Meditations, Marcus Aurelius poses a question to himself:
Considering the endless abyss of time in either direction, what is the difference between three days or three generations?
The point he’s trying to remind himself is two fold.
On one hand, time is infinite and when we look at our life on the timeline of the cosmos, it is insignificant. In the grand scheme of it, what does my life amount to compared to the vastness of time?
But the second part of this is that we spend so much time worrying about death when it is something we all must experience. And not just that we experience, but that everything experiences.
Death is one of the greatest fears for all and we waste a lot of time thinking about it.
But no one escapes it. They never have, no matter how old, fit, or rich.
One day, one way, death finds us all.
So rather than worry about the end, focus on the present which is ever flowing.
Enjoy this time.
Right here.
Right now.
🤔 Question
What is one thing you can do today to help limit your fear of your own mortality?
Beneath the paywall this week we explore the wisdom of Cicero. Click below to support and get access.