Marcus Aurelius Wrote A Letter To Himself Every Day. He Never Showed Anyone.

Added: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]The most powerful man in the Roman world kept a private journal.

[00:00:04]He never showed it to anyone.

[00:00:06]He never meant for it to be read.

[00:00:09]You're reading it right now.

[00:00:12]His name was Marcus Aurelius.

[00:00:16]Emperor of Rome from 161 [music] to 180 AD.

[00:00:23]He commanded the largest army in the world.

[00:00:27]He ruled 50 million people.

[00:00:31]And every morning in a military [music] tent on the Danube frontier, often before dawn, he wrote a letter to himself. [music] Not a diary, not memoirs, orders.

[00:00:45]Begin the morning by saying to yourself, "I shall meet with the busybody, the ungrateful, the arrogant, the deceitful."

[00:00:55]Then he went out [music] and met them.

[00:00:58]He titled his private notes to myself.

[00:01:04]12 books survived.

[00:01:06]2,000 years later we call them Meditations. [music] But that was never the title.

[00:01:13]It was always instructions from a man to himself on how to face the [music] day.

[00:01:21]Subscribe. Forge the mind.