AN

INTRODUCTION
TO STOICISM
Da y 4: Me m e n to Mori: The
T i m el ess Sto i c Exe rcis e

D A I L Y S T O I C . C O M
 et us prepare our minds as if we’d come to the
“L very end of life. Let us postpone nothing. Let us
balance life’s books each day. … The one who puts the finishing
touches on their life each day is never short of time.” Seneca
At a Roman triumph, the majority of the public
would have their eyes glued to the victorious general
at the front—one of the most coveted spots during
Roman times. Only a few would notice the aide in the
back, right behind the commander, whispering into his
ear, “Remember, thou art mortal.” What a reminder to
hear at the peak of glory and victory!
It is reminders like this one that we desperately
need in our own lives—a thought or an idea that we’d

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rather ignore, do everything to avoid and pretend is
not true. Most often, our ego runs away from anything
that reminds us of the reality that sits at odds with the
comfortable narrative we have build for ourselves. Or,
we are simply petrified to look at life’s facts as they are.
And there is one simple fact that most of us are utterly
scared to meditate, reflect on and face head on: We are
going to die. Everyone around us is going to die.
Such reminders and exercises take part of Memento
Mori—the ancient practice of reflection on mortality
that goes back to Socrates, who said that the proper
practice of philosophy is “about nothing else but dying
and being dead.” In early Buddhist texts, a prominent
term is maranasati, which translates as ‘remember death.’
Some Sufis have been called the “people of the graves,”
because of their practice of frequenting graveyards to
ponder on death and one’s mortality.
Throughout history, Memento Mori reminders have
come in many forms. Some, like the aide behind the
general, were there to humble. Others were invented to
inspire zest for life. The essayist Michel de Montaigne,
for instance, was fond of an ancient Egyptian custom
where during times of festivities, a skeleton would be
brought out with people cheering “Drink and be merry
for when you’re dead you will look like this.”
To us moderns this sounds like an awful idea. Who
wants to think about death? But what if instead of being

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scared and unwilling to embrace this truth we did the
opposite? What if reflecting and meditating on that
fact was a simple key to living life to the fullest? Or that
it was the key to our freedom—as Montaigne put it, “To
practice death is to practice freedom. A man who has
learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave.”
In his Meditations—essentially his own private
journal—Marcus Aurelius wrote that “You could leave
life right now. Let that determine what you do and say
and think.” That was a personal reminder to continue
living a life of virtue NOW, and not wait. The French
painter Philippe de Champaigne expressed a similar
sentiment in his painting Still Life with a Skull, which
showed the three essentials of existence — the tulip
(life), the skull (death), and the hourglass (time). The
original painting is part of a genre referred to as Vanitas,
a form of 17th century artwork featuring symbols of
mortality which encourage reflection on the meaning
and fleetingness of life.
Meditating on your mortality is only depressing if
you miss the point. It is in fact a tool to create priority
and meaning. It’s a tool that generations have used to
create real perspective and urgency. To treat our time
as a gift and not waste it on the trivial and vain. Death
doesn’t make life pointless but rather purposeful. And
fortunately, we don’t have to nearly die to tap into this.
A simple reminder can bring us closer to living the life

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we want. It doesn’t matter who you are or how many
things you have left to be done, a car can hit you in an
intersection and drive your teeth back into your skull.
That’s it. It could all be over. Today, tomorrow, someday
soon.
The Stoic finds this thought invigorating and
humbling. It is not surprising that one of Seneca’s
biographies is titled Dying Every Day. After all, it is
Seneca who urged us to tell ourselves “You may not
wake up tomorrow,” when going to bed and “You may
not sleep again,” when waking up as reminders of our
mortality. Or as another Stoic, Epictetus, urged his
students: “Keep death and exile before your eyes each
day, along with everything that seems terrible— by doing
so, you’ll never have a base thought nor will you have
excessive desire.” Use those reminders and meditate on
them daily—let them be the building blocks of living
your life to the fullest and not wasting a second.
P.S. Check out our popular memento mori medallion,
print and pendant from the Daily Stoic Store!

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