Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast, designed to help bring those four key Stoic virtues,

courage, discipline, justice, and wisdom into the real world.

It should be the easiest book in the world to read. It's only depending on the translation

a couple hundred pages, which are made up of short passages, making it easy to read. It's only depending on the translation a couple hundred pages, which are made up of

short passages, making it easy to read in small increments. It's written in a straightforward and

accessible style without any complex philosophical jargon. Unlike most books, there's no pretense,

no performance, no intent to impress an audience. It's filled with

topics that are universal and relevant, dealing with tough times, being nice to people, waking

up and getting to work even when you'd rather stay under the warm blankets. And yet, so many people

struggle with and get frustrated by Marcus Aurelius' meditations. And they have ever since it

was first discovered after the emperor's death nearly 2,000 years ago. Just as we can imagine the

first reader of meditations trying to make sense of the private thoughts of this great man,

today people have questions about where to start and what to take from it. What translation should I get?

Should I read it cover to cover? Is it better to approach it in bite-sized pieces? Do you read it

once or multiple times? Where did Marcus write it? Why did he write it? Did Marcus mean to come off so

dark or dower? Is it important to know about Marcus's circumstances? Who he was writing for? What he meant? Do you need to

know the core principles of stoicism to fully appreciate meditations? We've been working hard here at

Daily Stone for the last decade to try to make Marcus really successful and practical for people.

We even publish our own edition of Meditations. But we've also spent

hundreds and thousands of hours, not just with his writings, but also with the best experts and

translators and students of Stoicism to help make sense of what he meant and what he can do for us.

Getting to the bottom of meditations is the work of a lifetime. And as Marcus would say,

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