Michael McGill

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Articles

The Quality of Your Life Isn’t a Product of the Times You Happen to Live In

Nov 16, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

The quality of the times you live in are a product of how you live. Michael McGill·Follow3 min read·--“These are bad times we live in.”Such are the thoughts of anyone who makes the mistake of plugging into the 24-hour news cycle. Just turn on the TV or go online and you will be presented with plenty of examples of the sad state of current affairs. If you go looking, you can find several reasons why we live in “unprecedented” bad times.
Reflections from a Deathbed

Oct 23, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

How to live a life you can be proud of. Michael McGill·Follow2 min read·--You are on your deathbed. The final moments of your existence are slowly fading away. As all dying people do, you reflect upon your life. You look back and perform a final evaluation of your existence before you pass into the great unknown. How do you feel about the life you lived? Do you feel regret for the missed opportunities? Do you wish that you would have lived a more meaningful life, and done more good in this world?
Laugh it Off

Oct 1, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

The Stoic philosopher Seneca provides the solution to the problem of taking life too seriously. Michael McGill·Follow2 min read·--Are you taking life too damn seriously? Instead of finding the humor in things, do they seem serious to you? Instead of making light of your assorted first world problems, do you carry them around like a heavy burden? Instead of shrugging off minor setbacks, do you take them too personally? Maybe its time to start laughing things off a little bit?
Create Something Beautiful

Aug 30, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

Each morning when you awake, you are presented with a wonderful gift. The blank canvas of a new day. This canvas is the medium upon which you, as the artist, will create your day, as the Stoic philosopher Epictetus so eloquently said:“For as wood is the material of the carpenter, and marble that of the sculptor, so the subject matter of the art of life is the life of the self.”What are you going to do with this fresh, white canvas? There are so many possibilities.
Let First Principles Guide You Through the Stormy Seas of Life

Aug 26, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

Let First Principles Guide You Through the Stormy Seas of LifeIn the swirling chaos of our modern lives, it’s easy to get off track. We become like the captain of a ship whose navigation system has gone offline. How do we navigate ourselves through the storm-tossed sea? How do we steer our ship in the correct direction towards our desired destination? Well, a good captain would still be able to navigate his vessel by first principles.
Make Yourself at Home

Aug 22, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

You go somewhere that you’ve never been to before, and you feel “out of place.”You find yourself in a situation you have never been in before and you’re “out of your element.”You’re away from your home for too long and you get “homesick.”But the truth of the matter is that you’re at home anywhere you go.
The Power of Stoic Acceptance

Aug 12, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

The biggest misperception about Stoicism is that it’s a philosophy of passivity. I believe this misunderstanding is mostly due to the Stoics speaking so much about acceptance.“Don’t hope that events will turn out the way you want, welcome events in whichever way they happen: this is the path to peace.”The fatal flaw that people make in their misunderstanding of Stoicism is believing that this Stoic mindset of acceptance is overtly passive.
How to Break Free from the Matrix

Aug 2, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

Most people sadly live only a small fraction of their lives. They glide along the surface, taking things at face value. Never examining what is going on behind the thin plane of what their eyes observe. Never questioning. Never wondering "why"? Never seeking the truth. They are NPCs. The Matrix has them. But there are others. Those who experience the full breadth of life because they choose to go deep and examine what lies below the surface. They are the observers, not the observed.
The Ancient Remedy for Your Case of "the Mondays"

Jul 15, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

Who out there has a bad case of the Mondays? If it's any consolation, you're certainly not alone. A lot of us are out here, coffee in hand, slogging our way into the work week. We trudge our way through the first couple days of the week and see the light at the end of the tunnel on Wednesday (hump day). We get excited when its finally Friday (TGIF!). We live it up on Saturday. Then we start dreading the upcoming week on Sunday. Rinse and repeat. Over and over. Week after week. Ugh.
This Has All Happened Before

Jul 14, 2024 | medium.com | Michael McGill

We think we live in "unprecedented times."We don't. We think people behave worse than they have behaved in the past. They don't. We think it's unique because we've never seen or experienced it before. It's not. We're surprised when the ugly side of human nature exposes itself. But it always does. Always has. Always will. The same kinds of people, doing the same kinds of things, for the same kinds of reasons. Any student of history knows that it's all cyclical.