Perennial Meditations

In his classic On Becoming a Person, the psychologist Carl Rogers wrote, “The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.” Why are we so prone to see self-improvement as the path instead of self-acceptance? [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchwisdompodInstagram: instagram.com/searchwisdompodSign-up for The PATH, our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

To the question, what's the most important decision we make? Kierkegaard explained, "The thing is to understand myself: the thing is to find a truth which is true for me, to find the idea for which I can live and die. That is what I now recognize as the most important thing."Similarly, in Letters from a Stoic, Seneca urged Lucilius, “Adopt once and for all a single rule to live by, and make your whole life conform to it.” The wise person does not always take the same steps, but they walk a single road. [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchwisdompodInstagram: instagram.com/searchwisdompodSign-up for The PATH, our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

Are you truly thinking for yourself? According to the philosopher Montaigne, “Each man is a good education to himself, provided he can spy on himself from close up.” [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchofwisdomInstagram: instagram.com/searchofwisdompodcastSign-up for The PATH, our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

What if finding happiness is more accessible than we realize? What if the path to a happy life isn’t a path at all? According to Leo Tolstoy, “The most important advice I could give, that which I considered to be the most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say: in the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.” [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchofwisdomInstagram: instagram.com/searchofwisdompodcastSign-up for The PATH, our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

What comes to mind when you hear the word virtue? For some, it can feel outdated or old-fashioned. Virtue (or arete) translates to excellence or moral virtue. The notion of excellence connects with living up to one’s full potential or the highest good (summum bonum).Plato identified the four cardinal virtues with the character of a good city as described in The Republic. According to Plato, “Clearly, then, it will be wise, brave, temperate, and just.”  [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchofwisdomInstagram: instagram.com/searchofwisdompodcastSign-up for The PATH, our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

How does the realization of the speed of change (or impermanence) influence our daily lives? In Meditations, Marcus Aurelius wrote, “Reflect often on the speed with which all things in being, or coming into being, are carried past and swept away.” The fundamental truth of impermanence exists in nearly every wisdom tradition.In Fragments, the pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus wrote, "The meaning of the river flowing is not that all things are changing so that we cannot encounter them twice but that some things stay the same only by changing." [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchofwisdomInstagram: instagram.com/searchofwisdompodcastSign-up for The PATH, our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

Where is your path of self-improvement leading you? Are you confident you're heading towards the highest good? In a letter to Lucilius, known today as Our mind’s godlike potential, Seneca wrote, “There is but one good, and that is both the cause and the mainstay of happiness: trust in oneself.”According to Seneca, "Complete virtue consists of the evenness and steadiness of a life in harmony with itself through all events, which cannot come about unless one has the knowledge and skill of discerning things human and divine. This is the highest good." [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchofwisdomInstagram: instagram.com/searchofwisdompodcastSign-up for The PATH, our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

Where do you go to find inner peace? The Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius suggested people often seek retreat in the country, by sea, and in the hills, and even he is prone to this yearning. What if we don’t need to go anywhere to find peace?In Book IV of Meditations, Marcus wrote, "But all this is quite unphilosophic, when it is open to you, at any time you want, to retreat into yourself. No retreat offers someone more quiet and relaxation than that into his own mind. So constantly give yourself this retreat, and renew yourself." [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchofwisdomInstagram: instagram.com/searchofwisdompodcastSign-up for The PATH our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I share a short reflection on How to Be Free - According to EpictetusWhat does it mean to be free? According to the slave-turned Stoic philosopher Epictetus, if you make peace with all things that are beyond your power, refusing to fight them, you will be invincible. [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchofwisdomInstagram: instagram.com/searchofwisdompodcastSign-up for The PATH our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, I share a short reflection on The Wisdom of Solitude.How might your life change if you adopted the practice of solitude? According to the Trappist monk, Thomas Merton, learning to be alone is a path to peace and connection (one of life's many paradoxes). Merton wrote, "The person who fears to be alone will never be anything but lonely." [...]If you're interested in a deeper dive, you can read articles on ancient lessons for modern life at the PERENNIAL publication on Medium or check out our YouTube Channel.Follow Perennial Leader Project:Twitter: twitter.com/searchofwisdomInstagram: instagram.com/searchofwisdompodcastSign-up for The PATH our free newsletter (short reflections on wisdom). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit perennial.substack.com/subscribe