This is a great technique, usually referred to as negative visualisation. Epictetus put it like this:
Hold death and exile and all that seems dreadful before your eyes every day, but most of all death: and you will never think of anything bad or desire anything too much.
Quite the opposite. It lets you forget the unimportant things and the constant realization that your time on this earth is finite will drive you to live life to the fullest.
I don’t do it on purpose but I find myself comparing my problems to death fairly regularly and death doesn’t always seem much worse. The fact that my time is limited and I have to spend so much of it just making the money I need to survive doesn’t help.
I don’t have all the answers, and if budget allows it maybe you should talk to someone about that. That said there were times where waking up disappointed me and the following has changed me. There is another stoic attitude that says something like suppose you have died and you find yourself at the pearly gates. Peter decides you’re not done yet and he’s sent you back. That’s you today. The rest of your days are just gravy.
This is a great technique, usually referred to as negative visualisation. Epictetus put it like this:
Hold death and exile and all that seems dreadful before your eyes every day, but most of all death: and you will never think of anything bad or desire anything too much.
Memento mori.
Sounds like a good way to develop a suicidal ideation problem.
Quite the opposite. It lets you forget the unimportant things and the constant realization that your time on this earth is finite will drive you to live life to the fullest.
I don’t do it on purpose but I find myself comparing my problems to death fairly regularly and death doesn’t always seem much worse. The fact that my time is limited and I have to spend so much of it just making the money I need to survive doesn’t help.
I don’t have all the answers, and if budget allows it maybe you should talk to someone about that. That said there were times where waking up disappointed me and the following has changed me. There is another stoic attitude that says something like suppose you have died and you find yourself at the pearly gates. Peter decides you’re not done yet and he’s sent you back. That’s you today. The rest of your days are just gravy.