What has helped me deal with this is keeping perspective. A great quote for this is one by ancient Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius from almost two thousand years ago.

“When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: The people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous, and unfriendly. They are like this because they can’t tell good from evil.” –Marcus Aurelius

Keeping this mind doesn’t solve the problem. What it does is let you think about your every day struggles with others differently. It won’t make the pain go completely away, but it can lessen it.

Several years ago, I wrote some articles on Marcus Aurelius and his wisdom. One of these is below:
The Wisdom Of Marcus Aurelius: How To Gather The Strength To Survive In Adversity

It’s about having a routine, and not getting in the habit of excuses. Once you start skipping writing, it’s very easy to quit. And I don’t want to quit. It’s true, I have been very unmotivated the past year. There are personal circumstances which get me often depressed, however writing usually served me as an outlet for this.

In the past year, writing hasn’t been able to fulfil this function. I started writing on Medium a few years ago, and what kept me going is some of the success I was starting to see. People were finally reading my stuff. And I was even making a bit of money for that.

This year, this totally collapsed. Very few people read my articles now. And I literally earn only a few cents a month. It’s gotten that bad. Writing has never been about the money. I was always driven by the intrinsic motivation of learning and being creative. This has driven me to write all those years, when I wasn’t earning anything.

However, deep down, we all know extrinsic motivation also plays a role. It can’t be the main factor, but it also has its place. When it’s not there, it can kill any type of project. And especially as you get older, and things don’t seem to be going your way, intrinsic motivation starts losing its power. This is what I have discovered.

Anyways, this is just a short reflection I have had this month. This little piece also allows me to keep my monthly writing routine. And hopefully, if any rare soul does come across this, it can also help them put a little perspective on how the world works, and what drives people in their life.

Throughout all the years writing on my blog, I have posted different articles sharing the thoughts of these greats. Most of them are lost to the internet, and no one really reads them unfortunately. That’s a bit of a shame, as it took me a lot of work to put them together. So here I share them again.

Boethius – The consolation of philosophy and how a man about to die found happiness.

Epictetus – The wisdom of a Stoic master and the secrets to living a good life revealed.

Diogenes of Oinoanda – The secret to happiness and living a life of pleasure.

Marcus Aurelius – How to gather the strength to survive in adversity.

Plutarch – Tips on how to keep a tranquil mind in a turbulent world.

Galen – How to correct the errors of your mind.

Also check out the articles in my Marcus Aurelius mini-series:
The Introduction
The Discipline of Desire
The Discipline of Action
The Discipline of Assent

If you want to learn how to be funny, there is no better guide than the Ancient Romans. Here are some tips from them:

Tips on humor from the ancient Romans.

And if you want to improve your fitness, then maybe apply some techniques from the way the ancient gladiators used to do it.

Train like a gladiator: The real ancient Roman gladiator workout.

And if you want to read something analyzing where the current world is heading, read my classic on the fall of the Roman Republic. It is now even more relevant than when I wrote it.

11 Lessons from the fall of the Roman Republic: It is disturbing how relevant they are for today.

If you want to read even more stuff like this, then check out my ancient wisdom section.

Rather than sit idly by, I decided to go online and share some fitness tips I had learnt in the previous years. After all, I would quite often get approached by friends, but even random guys, asking me to share my secrets on how to get big and strong. At the time, there was not much of this type of material online.

Even worse, most of the stuff that you could find dealt with losing weight. I had the opposite problem. I was always a skinny guy, and needed to GAIN weight instead. So I decided to write about that. Little did I know that at the time, the big explosion in blogging was on the way.

Millions of people were starting their own blogs. Thousands were starting their YouTube channels. My content got lost in this flood.

So after a while blogging, I decided to shift the topic of my blog. I thought long and deep. What is my competitive advantage? The ability to learn things quickly, combine disparate domains, and excel in different areas. Thus, Renaissance Man Journal was born.

On the way, I wrote about ancient philosophy and the lessons for today, psychology, goal setting, project management, and a vast variety of other things. Some of my favorite topics were ones on problem solving, such as first principles thinking, thinking by analogy, and similar things.

For a while, my articles on first principles thinking, Renaissance Man, gladiator workouts, and even the fall of the Roman Republic, ranked on the first page of Google. Usually, pretty high up. Over time, they inspired other people’s writings. Some of these were acknowledged, but more often they were not.

For some reason, at some point most of these articles ended up buried in the rankings, usually falling off Google altogether. This despite the fact that articles that borrowed heavily from my thinking still ranked among the top pages for those keywords. Unfortunately, my traffic declined. Never big to begin with, it slowed down to a trickle.

At some point I discovered a platform called Medium. Actually I discovered it twice. First time I tried putting on some articles, got no reads, and left. Years later, I rediscovered it again. This time I stuck around.

I had never made a dime off my blog. Rather, I spent thousands of USD maintaining the blog, and buying materials to inspire my articles. On Medium, for the first time I was getting paid. It was never big amounts, but at least at my peak earnings, they covered the costs.

I thought I was getting somewhere. On Medium, I attracted readers, and was starting to make some OK cash. Nothing to write home about, but it gave me more motivation. My best year was probably 2021, with the beginning of 2022 also being good. All of 2022, I got a steady, predictable income every month. One month it was a bit bigger, another a bit smaller, but at least it was there.

Then 2023 came. My readership on Medium tanked. So did my earnings. They went into the dumpster. Just to give perspective, in the past few months, I barely got out of single digits in USD per month for ALL my articles. That doesn’t even cover the cost of a single book. While back in the day, most of my articles would at least cover the cost of the material used in producing them (although maybe not the time), now I was once again losing heavily.

Such has been the arc of my career as a writer. It feels like I am back at square 1. Oh well. Coupled with personal problems, work problems, and other problems, these past years have not been very good to me. I am also getting older, starting off the years of a slow decline. I am not the young buck anymore, working hard to gain weight and muscle.

It used to be striving to get better. Now, it’s about keeping what I have, if not trying to prevent from losing it too fast. This has reflected also in my writing. It used to be all about self-improvement. Now, I spend most of my time musing about metaphysical subjects. Thus is the arc of a person.

At its core, EQ involves five key components: self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, and social skills. A self-aware person recognizes their emotional triggers. A self-regulated one doesn’t let those triggers control them. Empathy allows us to feel with others, not just for them, while social skills help us translate emotional insight into meaningful interaction.

In today’s fast-paced, interconnected world, emotional intelligence isn’t just a “nice to have”. It’s essential. Teams thrive under emotionally intelligent leadership, and personal relationships deepen when empathy and understanding lead the way. In essence, EQ is the essential glue that drives interpersonal relationships and one of the main make-or-break factors for success.

“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existence. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery each day.”

Published after his death, this quote epitomized the principles he lived his life by. It’s what made him a genius.

For him, the most important thing was never to stop questioning. Curiosity is a powerful driver in this world. Cultivating it was for Einstein the most powerful piece of advice he could pass onto the next generations.

Yet, in today’s world it seems as if many people have lost this sense of wonder, this need to know and understand. It’s as if curiosity is not something valued by today’s youth, or even the older generations.

The genuine will to try to understand how the world works has instead found a substitute. The need to gawk at people’s Instagram pictures, or watch reality shows on TV.

Stupid curiosity has replaced smart curiosity as the driver of people’s actions. And that’s a shame. In the process, people are losing an important element that gives meaning to life.

The result? Depression, feelings of meaninglessness, and stupidity.

The power of observational curiosity

Yet curiosity is in itself a superpower. The mundane can be a great source of inspiration.

Imagine a world where you notice the subtle details that often elude people’s attention, the way light filters through a window, the expressions on strangers’ faces, the patterns of behavior in a bustling city.

Observational curiosity encourages you to slow down, look beyond the surface, and uncover hidden narratives. From Sherlock Holmes to the keen-eyed scientist, those who harness this form of curiosity possess a distinct advantage, uncovering insights that escape the notice of the casual observer.

In today’s age, being curious is a tremendous advantage. It can give you a sense of meaning, in a world that often seems to lack it.

Just like for Einstein, following my curiosity has also been the secret to a better life. Keeping my mind busy, and trying to learn about how things work has helped me deal with the absurdity of the world.

Loneliness, depression, melancholy. Been there. Often, still there. What helps me beat it? Curiosity.

Why is a fundamental question

The most profound questions often begin with a simple “why.” From childhood wonder to scientific inquiry, the courage to ask why unlocks new avenues of understanding.

Curiosity thrives on the refusal to accept the status quo, and on the relentless pursuit of deeper truths. Through the stories of great innovators and revolutionaries, you can see how the persistent quest for answers has led to groundbreaking discoveries, paradigm shifts, and societal transformations.

True curiosity necessitates a degree of vulnerability, a willingness to abandon preconceived notions and venture into uncharted territory. It is in the realm of uncertainty that we challenge the boundaries of what is known. This is where true growth and innovation thrive.

By embracing the unknown, you open yourself to the possibility of failure, but also to the potential for greatness. The rewards of curiosity usually far outweigh the risks.

Curiosity is a timeless human characteristic. It is not bound by the constraints of time or place. It has propelled us from the caves of our ancestors to the outer reaches of space. It’s the fundamental building block of human progress.

In our quest for knowledge, we must remember that curiosity is not a destination. It is an endless journey, an ever-evolving force that propels us forward. As we nurture our curiosity, we embrace the boundless possibilities that lie before us, and unleash the hidden power that resides within each of us.

So, let your curiosity go. Read. Wonder. Explore. For in curiosity lies the seeds of a better future. And a better state of mind.

An earlier version of this article was originally published on “Medium” here.

1) Set Clear Goals and Priorities:
The first step in effective time management is to set clear goals and priorities. Take some time to define your short-term and long-term objectives, both in your personal and professional life. Once you have a clear vision of what you want to achieve, prioritize your tasks based on their importance and urgency. This will help you focus your time and energy on the most essential activities.

2) Plan and Organize:
A well-structured plan is the backbone of efficient time management. Start each day or week by creating a to-do list, outlining the tasks you need to accomplish. Break down bigger tasks into smaller, more manageable sub-tasks, making them less overwhelming. Use calendars, planners, or digital tools to schedule your activities and allocate specific time slots for each task. This will provide structure to your day and prevent time wastage.

3) Eliminate Time Wasters:
Identify and eliminate activities that consume your time without adding value. This includes excessive social media use, aimless web browsing, or spending excessive time on unproductive tasks. Be mindful of the time you spend on these activities and consider setting specific time limits or implementing self-imposed restrictions to avoid falling into the trap of time-wasting habits.

4) Learn to Delegate:
Recognize that you can’t do everything on your own. Delegating tasks to others not only frees up your time but also allows you to focus on high-priority responsibilities. Evaluate your workload and identify tasks that can be effectively delegated to capable individuals. Delegation not only reduces your burden but also helps develop the skills and abilities of others, fostering a more efficient and collaborative work environment.

5) Prioritize Self-Care:
Maintaining a healthy work-life balance is essential for long-term success and well-being. It is crucial to prioritize self-care activities such as exercise, proper sleep, and relaxation. Taking care of your physical and mental health ensures that you have the energy and focus needed to manage your time effectively. Remember that downtime and self-care activities are investments in your overall productivity and happiness.

6) Practice the 80/20 Rule:
The Pareto Principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, states that 80% of your results come from 20% of your efforts. Identify the tasks or activities that yield the most significant results and focus your time and energy on them. By prioritizing and dedicating more resources to high-impact tasks, you can optimize your productivity and achieve more with less effort.

7) Embrace Time Blocking:
Time blocking is a technique that involves setting aside specific blocks of time for different tasks or activities. It helps create a sense of structure and discipline in your schedule, ensuring that you allocate sufficient time for each task. Dedicate uninterrupted periods for focused work, allowing you to enter a state of flow and accomplish tasks more efficiently.

Conclusion:
Mastering time management is a lifelong skill that can significantly enhance your productivity and overall quality of life. By setting clear goals, planning effectively, eliminating time-wasting activities, delegating tasks, prioritizing self-care, and embracing strategies like the 80/20 rule and time blocking, you can take control of your time and make the most of every day. Remember, time is a finite resource, and how you manage it ultimately determines your success and fulfillment in both personal and professional endeavors.

Picture a Mediterranean evening. You enter a room.

In front of you stands a woman. A thought pops up — “how strange”. Looking to the side, you notice a table. On it, the woman had placed 72 different objects, including a rose, feather, grapes, scissors, a scalpel, but also a gun and a bullet.

You come closer and find a paper with instructions:

“There are 72 objects on the table that one can use on me as desired.
Performance.
I am the object.
During this period I take full responsibility.

Duration: 6 hours (8 pm — 2 am).”

Close your eyes and put yourself there. What would you have done?

It started innocently enough

Marina Abramovic is a performance artist. This is the type of art where the artist, their body, and their actions are the exhibit. What happened on that day in Italy was Marina’s most daring and shocking performance.

That day, she became an object.

There was nothing separating her from the audience. No barrier, no stage, no notice.

Anyone surrounding her could do whatever they wanted to her. Using any of the objects on the table.

At the beginning, no one did much. Maybe a light touch, here or there.

However, as the hours passed, the disinhibition started manifesting itself. Within a few hours, all her clothes were ripped off. She was there.

Naked.

Then things turned bloody. Someone slashed at her throat. Blood began to pour. The person sucked it up.

It got bad…

How far can the public go?

For Marina, in that piece she turned art up on its head. The audience were part of the show. In a video, she explained what she was aiming for:

“I said okay. I am going to make the piece to see how far the public can go.”

What are people in the audience capable of, if the artist doesn’t do anything?

There was even a pistol and a bullet. If a person wanted to, they could take them and kill her.

Marina wanted to know. It was bugging her mind. What will the public do in this type of a situation?

She got her answer.

People cut her up. They tore her clothes. They drank her blood. One person even put a bullet into the pistol and stuck it at her neck.

That’s how far it went.

Marina has been quoted as saying:

“The experience I drew from this work was that in your own performances you can go very far, but if you leave decisions to the public, you can be killed.”

People just ran away

When the performance was over, there was a sudden change in the audience. As the clock stuck 2 am in the morning, she moved.

She started taking steps towards the people. In that instance, everyone ran away.

As she said:

“People could not actually confront with myself, with me.”

It’s as if people realized she was not an object anymore. Fear overtook them. Maybe they reflected. Their actions could have consequences. Or, maybe they felt shame.

The performance piece had reached its culmination. It had revealed its point. It looked deep into who people really are, and how they can behave in certain circumstances.

The lessons were not all negative. While there were people in the audience who were tempted to (and did) abuse their power, another group of people rose up to stop them.

Yet, the darkness had shown its face.

How would a person act if they had the power to do whatever they wanted, without consequences?

In his work “The Republic”, ancient Greek philosopher Plato tells the story of the Ring of Gages. This ring gives the person who wears it complete invisibility.

They can do whatever they want. Without consequences. And they do. The people when given the ring turn to despicable deeds.

The story is told by Glaucon, Plato’s brother. It starts off with a premise. What would you do if you had this ring?

Glaucon comes to a spectacular conclusion:

“And this we may truly affirm to be a great proof that a man is just, not willingly or because he thinks that justice is any good to him individually, but of necessity, for wherever any one thinks that he can safely be unjust, there he is unjust.”–Plato in “The Republic”

Most people are just, because there would be punishment if they weren’t. If this threat is taken away, they will resort to committing all kinds of evil.

Marina Abramovic’s experiment proved exactly this point. When people were faced with what they deemed an object, one that wouldn’t fight back, their temptations got the better of them.

With no consequences to their actions, they gave in to their urges.

The banality of evil

We have seen similar types of actions happen on a larger scale all throughout history. We are seeing them take place at this very moment in Ukraine.

Nazi Germany. Rwanda. Congo. Those, and other places, have also experienced this in the last one hundred years.

Ordinary people turned evil.

It’s quite troubling how quickly a person can dehumanize the other. In their eyes, they are no longer a person. They are an object.

Sometimes even worse. They become a non-person, someone who deserves their fate.

Many psychology experiments have shown how this can degenerate. Philip Zimbardo, the researcher behind the notorious Stanford Prison Experiment, described it in the introduction to his book, “The Lucifer Effect”:

“I summarize more than 30 years of research on factors that can create a “perfect storm” which leads good people to engage in evil actions. This transformation of human character is what I call the “Lucifer Effect,” named after God’s favorite angel, Lucifer, who fell from grace and ultimately became Satan.”

Marina Abramovic’s performance that night in Naples showed us how a perfectly ordinary person can turn bad.

The most powerful art is the one that can turn a mirror on ourselves. This one did just that.

Is there any silver lining?

Of course, there are different interpretations that can be given to this piece of performance art. While it may have revealed the dark inner shadows of the people attending the piece, it could have also actually pushed people to behave this way.

Maybe, the people were testing the artist. How committed was she to her piece? What would push her over the edge?

It could have also been simple curiosity on the audience’s part. A macabre one, but curiosity nevertheless.

Humans are complicated creatures. We have already discussed the psychological experiments that showed how far they are capable of going.

However, all is not settled. There are challenges to the conclusions of the psychologists that ran these experiments.

Even the famous Robbers Cave Experiment run by psychologist Muzafer Sherif has been called into question. Critics have described it as being based on a “subterfuge”, as the researchers had manipulated the groups of boys that were the unwitting subjects of their study.

And there might also be a silver lining to the Ring of Gages story. Cicero, when centuries later recounting Plato’s tale in his own work, came to the conclusion that there indeed are just people. Very few, but they do exist.

And they won’t abuse the power, if given to them.

“Now, suppose a wise man had just such a ring, he would not imagine that he was free to do wrong any more than if he did not have it; for good men aim to secure not secrecy but the right.”–Cicero

Maybe, just maybe, not everyone is prone to unleashing the beast within.

An earlier version of this article was originally published on “Medium” here.
Credit: 1; Photo by Mulyadi in Unsplash

“I don’t care for the great centuries. All I care about is life, struggle, intensity.” — Emile Zola

Emile Zola was a 19th-century French author, renowned for writing in a “naturalistic” style. His novels depicted the nitty-gritty details of everyday life, warts and all.

He rejected the Romantic themes of authors like Alexandre Dumas or Victor Hugo, and rather focused on the mundane parts of existence. No lofty ideas. No larger than life characters. No sublime beauty.

Instead, he described struggles. His works examined normal people facing existential problems. There was no sugar-coating. He wanted to portray reality as it really was.

Dark. Raw. Real.

Naturalists looked at how circumstances, emotions, and forces of nature shape human lives. For them, these outside constraints are what drives a person’s destiny.

“Man is not alone. He lives in society, in a social condition; and consequently, for us novelists, this social condition unceasingly modifies the phenomena. Indeed our great study is just there, in the reciprocal effect of society on the individual and the individual on society.” — Emile Zola

While many elements of the thinking of writers like Zola are similar to existentialism, there is one huge difference. Whereas philosophers like Sartre or Camus believed people are free to choose (despite their circumstances), naturalists saw life as pretty much fixed.

There is no free will. Only determinism. Can’t do much about it.

Showing life how it really is

Naturalism wasn’t only reflected in literature. In the 19th century, it pervaded different aspects of society. Philosophy. Theater. And of course, painting.

One aim of naturalist painters was depicting people in their natural and social environments. As noted by Rebecca Seiferle, naturalism was about incorporating the subject into the context.

“Naturalism is often equated with Realism, but it was only defined some decades later — experiencing its heyday during the 1870–80s — and was more concerned than the older movement with a hyperreal visual compositional precision; and with integrating the human figure into an enveloping landscape or scenario.”–Rebecca Seiferle

Naturalist painters depicted normal people in their everyday activities. Often, they focused on the lower, working classes. Their aim was to capture the scene in a hyper-realistic manner, with all the imperfections in tow.

In this way, these painters put on canvas the same types of ideas writers like Zola put on paper with their pens.

Coming across a painting that reflects the pain of everyday reality

Art is meant to invoke emotions. Whoever is looking at a painting should feel something. This feeling is deeply personal, and can be quite different from the painter’s original aim.

My most powerful encounter with naturalism dates from a while back. As I was exploring the Fin de Siecle (end of the 19th century) exhibit at the Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Brussels, I came across a painting.

The way it was set up harkened back to the Middle Ages. It was a triptych, a panel painting divided up into three sections which can be folded into each other.

On the painting, you could see three scenes. One taking place in the morning, one at lunch time, and one in the evening.

It was the story of a working class family. On the left, they were walking to work. In the middle, they were having lunch, their only break in the day. On the right, they were depicted on their walk back home.

For me, the most striking part was how well the painting conveyed the feelings of pain and resignation. The somber colors. The slumping postures. The dejected faces.

Look at the faces of the family walking in the morning on their way to work. The precariousness jumps at you straight away. These were chalk sellers, and made a living by walking around all day. It was hard work for very little money.

Their only break was at mid-day, when the entire family gathered for lunch.

The scene reminded me of the story of Sisyphus, with one crucial difference. Whereas Albert Camus made him smile despite his predicament, Frederic’s characters stay somber and dejected. There is no bright spot in their fate.

Art that speaks to you across the ages

Leon Frederic was a Belgian artist who was born in 1856 and died in 1940. Throughout his lifetime, he saw enormous changes take place.

Belgium was a country that rapidly industrialized. Fueled by the coal mines in the country’s south, a string of factories rose up all around. Whether gathering the coal, creating widgets, or struggling to make a living in other ways, life was tough for the vast majority of the population.

The average worker worked long hours for very little pay. Kids as little as 5 years old would often spend as much as 14 hours a day in incredibly dangerous positions.

There was no safety net. You got injured? That meant losing your job.

Frederic tried capturing this societal turmoil in his paintings. Moving through realist, naturalist, and symbolist stages, and combining it with inspiration from Old Flemish Masters, his artwork reflected the struggle of his day and age.

Unless you are a fanatic of 19th century French and Belgian art, you probably never heard of Leon Frederic before, or seen any of his work. That’s a shame. I find his early paintings incredibly powerful.

His “Chalk Sellers” is a masterpiece of emotion. It brilliantly captures the human condition.

The family depicted in the painting lived in harsh everyday conditions. It never changed. Day in and day out, it was always the same. What’s worse, these people were born and probably died in the same conditions.

While Frederic’s artwork depicts a scene from the 19th century, the lessons are universal. We are lucky that most of us don’t have to live through these types of horrible conditions, where even the smallest kids had to work from dusk ‘til dawn.

However, this eternal circularity of pain is ever-present in our age as well. It might be a different type of pain, but it is there nevertheless. For most people, it is impossible to escape.

Looking at this painting, you are reminded of the human condition. Life is hard, and full of suffering. Outside circumstances give it shape, and you can’t escape their influence.

An earlier version of this article was originally published on “Medium” here.
Credit: 1; Photo found in Wikimedia Commons