A Little Stoic Perspective

That infinitely divisible moment of time that rests between perception and action was for Stoics the epicentre of their emotional intelligence, from where they were able to direct their volition through the puppet strings of an ethical hand. Where they tamed anger, found courage and took the perspective of true cosmopolitanism, everything connected through space, time and life.

Each circumscribed moment recognised as moving everything forward universally, synchronously one instant at a time. Experience being nothing but a succession of delimited moments within a small corner of all there ever has been and as far as we know will be.

The flow of each moment occurs with or without presence or disassembly but our perception forms narratives that in each split otherwise don’t exist. Seeing each instant in itself provides two practical functions, the perseverance and endurance of hardship and the motivation, focus and awareness of the fragility of life in the face of death to achieve outcomes through moral means.

The ends always justifying those means when lived through a continuous state of focus, attention and considered ethical action. Facilitated through the process of seeing things and experiencing time for what they are and it is. Being able to see our insignificance in relation to every connected thing and experiencing the same moment, here and now, no matter where.

Keep reminding yourself of the way things are connected, of their relatedness. All things are implicated in one another and in sympathy with each other. This event is the consequence of some other one. Things push and pull on each other, and breathe together, and are one.

Meditations 3.38