Marcus Aurelius Meditations
Marcus Aurelius: To wipe away fancy, to use…
To wipe away fancy, to use deliberation, to quench concupiscence, to keep the mind free to herself.
The passage follows a public-domain translation of Meditations. The reading beside it is ours.
The mind is constantly offered junk food: imagined insults, impulsive cravings, anxious forecasts, and arguments that play on repeat. You do not have to eat every thought that arrives. Marcus’s short list is a daily mental hygiene routine. Remove the fantasy. Pause before deciding. Let the craving cool. Keep some part of yourself unoccupied by the noise. This matters when you reach for your phone without thinking, when anger drafts an email for you, or when a purchase promises to fix a feeling it cannot touch. The goal is not to become numb or rigid. It is to keep your judgment available when desire and fear are trying to take the wheel. Before your next reaction, create one small gap. Name the impression, wait a moment, and decide what you actually want to do.
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