Stoic Practices: Contemplation of Nature

This entry is part 44 of 47 in the series Journey Through Stoicism

Stoicism teaches that nature is both teacher and law. In a time of rising seas and stronger storms, the lesson feels urgent: to live according to nature now means to remember that we are not outside it.

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Rehearsing Virtue in Small Daily Acts

This entry is part 43 of 47 in the series Journey Through Stoicism

At The Portico café in downtown Tampa, I paused my work to sit with a man who had just been released from prison. He was unsure what to do next. I offered coffee, listened, and waited until the manager returned to connect him with help. It wasn’t a big deal, but later, I realized how much peace there can be in simply giving someone attention for a few minutes.

In the past, I invited my widowed neighbor to join my husband and me for our usual Taco Tuesday after she told me her daughter had been declared cancer-free. She later said how much the evening meant to her. Those simple moments, one with a stranger, one with a friend, reminded me that compassion is a practice. The Stoics taught that virtue is built not in theory but in repetition, through the small choices that make us steady and kind.

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Living the Last Best Moment – A Stoic Practice

This entry is part 38 of 47 in the series Journey Through Stoicism

Greta Gerwig once said, “You don’t know when the last time of something happening is. You don’t know what the last great day you’ll spend with your best friend is. You’ll just know when you’ve never had that day again.” That line has echoed in me ever since I first heard it. It captures both the sweetness and fragility of the present moment.
The Stoics knew this well. Marcus Aurelius warned against drifting into tomorrow, reminding himself that life is lived only in the day at hand. Seneca told us that we waste time as if it were endless. For them, attention to the present was not a poetic thought. It was survival. It was also the way to live a life worth remembering.
I think of an afternoon long ago with my friend Jim, shooting pool at his parents’ house. Or a fall day on a golf course with my friend Mike, pausing to look over Moss Lake together. Neither seemed extraordinary at the time. Yet they have stayed with me as “last great days.” The lesson is clear: if I want to live fully, I must live here, in this moment, as if it could be the last best one.

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The View from Above

This entry is part 31 of 47 in the series Journey Through Stoicism

I walked the hospital garden and followed the path of grace. At the end a bronze plaque carried lines from Psalms nine and ten. Refuge for the oppressed. God hears the afflicted. The metal was warm under my hand. Nothing was fixed. Yet something in me settled enough to breathe.

The Stoics call it the View from Above. Rise in your mind. See the room, the floor, the building, the town, the small blue world. The pain stays real, but it finds its size. From there the next right act appears. Ask a clear question. Hold a hand. Eat. Pray. Sleep if you can. The practice pairs with the dichotomy of control and with evening reflection. It opens the frame, then helps you learn from the day.

Tomorrow I head to Boone while my sister and a caregiver sit with Mom. Those mountains have taught me to climb, look, and return. The Wesleyan way names that rhythm as grace. Action without contemplation is unrooted. Contemplation without action is inconsequential. In a brittle season for our republic, this practice steadies my voice and keeps my heart useful.

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A Flicker Toward Life

This entry is part 28 of 47 in the series Journey Through Stoicism

It was one of those days that left me both drained and restless. The kind of day that yanks you in every direction and leaves you replaying every moment in your head. By the time I sat down to journal, the day already felt like a blur—frustration, hard choices, and a fragile spark of hope all tangled together. Writing helped me find its shape. The Stoics would call it evening reflection. Wesleyans might call it examen or discernment. Either way, it’s how I pulled a heavy, scattered day into some kind of order.
That night, I saw a flicker of determination in my mom’s words. She had been saying for weeks, “I’m tired, I’m ready to go.” But this time she spoke of rehab, of getting better. It wasn’t conviction, but it mattered. Seneca once said, “Sometimes even when the body is weak, the mind can still rally.” I saw that rally in her, small though it was.
And along the way, there was gratitude—even humor. A friend had kept me talking for nearly ninety minutes on the road, filling the time with what he called his “landscaping philosophy.” Later, when I thanked him for knowing I needed company, he laughed. “You’re giving me too much credit. I just found someone willing to listen to me drone on about mulch and hedges.” That laughter mattered. Gratitude mattered. In days like this, even the smallest things carry weight.

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Embracing the Unforeseen

This entry is part 26 of 47 in the series Journey Through Stoicism

So I’ll drive north. I’ll carry with me a fortune cookie scrap of paper that turned out wiser than I expected. And I’ll try to remember that philosophy is not about lofty words on a page. It’s about how you hold yourself when the phone rings at 3 a.m., how you respond when plans dissolve, how you see both the bitter and the sweet.

Marcus and Seneca remind us: surprises are not intruders. They are part of the order of things. To embrace them is to live in step with nature itself.

And maybe that is the real fortune. Not that life will protect us from pain, but that it will give us endless chances to practice courage, patience, and love.

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The Graduation Gift

This entry is part 23 of 47 in the series Journey Through Stoicism

A framed silhouette of my niece, standing before the mountains at sunset, carries a message for her high school graduation: “Behind you, all your memories. Before you, all your dreams. Around you, all who love you. Within you, all you need.” It is a blessing, but also a challenge — to live with gratitude for the past, purpose in the present, and trust in the strength we already carry. In its quiet way, it’s pure Stoic wisdom.

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Boone, Facebook, and Marcus Aurelius…Oh My

This entry is part 18 of 47 in the series Journey Through Stoicism

I came across a meme that read, “There are two places you need to go often: The place that heals you. The place that inspires you.” It struck me deeply, because for me, one of those places is Boone, North Carolina, where I went to college. But as I reflected on that idea through the lens of Stoic philosophy, I realized the Stoics might offer a very different kind of guidance: to go inward. This essay explores the contrast, and surprising harmony, between modern healing and ancient inner retreat.

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My Take on Tampa’s No Kings Day Protest

On June?14, 2025, Tampa’s “No Kings Day” protest unfolded under blue skies outside City Hall. Between 2,000 and 3,000 people participated, joined by coordinated protests across Tampa Bay—ranging from Largo to St.?Petersburg—where similar crowds gathered. And here is my take. I saw proof: when people stand together, young and old, across every background, authoritarian theatrics shrink. It gave me hope. Tampa spoke with its numbers and its unity. And for me, that was worth the energy, bearing the heat, being there with them. In short, I think we had a lot more energy than the Birthday Parade in D.C.

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No Kings Day: A Stand Against Power and Injustice

This Saturday, people will rise across 2,000 U.S. cities, including Tampa, united in one unflinching message: “No Kings.” This is not a protest born of idle dissent. It is a fierce rebuke of President Donald Trump and a social order built on abuse of power. Flag Day plus Trump’s 79th birthday equals a military parade costing taxpayers $25–45?million. The implicit message? A cult of personality masquerading as patriotism. For United Methodists grounded in Wesleyan conviction, this is intolerable. John and Charles Wesley stood against social evil, not in quiet tones but with prophetic boldness, calling out power when it crushes the least among us. That same courage calls us now to confront policies that tear at the fabric of our communities.

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First Snows

The Western North Carolina Mountains had their first snow day today. Watching the webcams from time to time during the day brought back many great memories. There’s a magic to the first snow that roots itself deep in memory, stretching across years and places. In Kings Mountain, NC, where the winters were mild and snow was a gift rather than a certainty, the first flakes meant the world was about to change. As a kid, waking up to a white-coated street was like waking up on Christmas morning. School would call it a day, and we’d pile out of the house, sleds in hand, to the steep street just beyond our driveway.

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