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Contributing Writer Classical Philosophy & the Long View

Dominic Aurelius

Dominic Aurelius is a writer and classicist whose lifelong conversation with ancient philosophy — the Stoics above all — has given him an unusual lens for contemporary experience. He has contributed to Light & Composition since 2018. For Dominic, every photograph confirms something Marcus Aurelius already said, which is less about the ancients being right and more about how little the essential human situation has changed in twenty centuries.

206 Published Reflections

Reflections by Dominic Aurelius

Showing 12 of 206 essays
The Weight of the Daily Photo of the Day
November 2, 2018

The Weight of the Daily

Seneca once reminded his friend Lucilius that we are often more concerned with the acquisition of things than with the nature of the things themselves. We treat the objects of our daily survival as mere background noise, failing to see the dignity inherent in the labor that brings them to our table. To the ancient […]
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The Virtue of Constraint Photo of the Day
October 18, 2018

The Virtue of Constraint

Epictetus taught that the essence of freedom lies not in having every option at our disposal, but in mastering the few that are truly ours. We often mistake abundance for power, believing that if we could only reach further or possess more, our vision would finally become clear. Yet, the opposite is frequently true. When […]
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The Weight of Small Repairs Photo of the Day
October 17, 2018

The Weight of Small Repairs

Epictetus famously reminded his students that we are not disturbed by things themselves, but by the views we take of them. When a tool fails or a plan falters, the immediate impulse is to view the disruption as a tragedy, a fracture in the expected order of the day. Yet, the philosopher suggests that these […]
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The Weight of the Thread Photo of the Day
October 8, 2018

The Weight of the Thread

Seneca once remarked that it is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, who is poor. We often mistake the value of a life for the noise it makes or the scale of its ambition, forgetting that the most profound human dignity is found in the quiet repetition of […]
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The Unscripted Joy Photo of the Day
September 22, 2018

The Unscripted Joy

Epictetus reminded his students that we are all actors in a play written by another. We do not choose our roles, nor do we choose the stage upon which we stand; we are merely tasked with playing our part well, whatever the circumstances. Often, we grow rigid in our roles, performing with a heavy sense […]
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The Sustenance of Place Photo of the Day
September 20, 2018

The Sustenance of Place

Seneca once reminded his friend Lucilius that the wise man does not seek to be fed by the exotic, but rather finds contentment in the simple sustenance that the earth provides in its own season. We often mistake the act of eating for a mere biological necessity, a chore to be dispatched between the more […]
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The Weight of Unburdened Motion Photo of the Day
September 19, 2018

The Weight of Unburdened Motion

Seneca once remarked that we are often more frightened than hurt, and we suffer more in imagination than in reality. We carry the heavy baggage of our anxieties, our social stations, and our perceived obligations, forgetting that the soul is most agile when it travels light. To be a child is to exist in a […]
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The Play of Shadows Photo of the Day
September 2, 2018

The Play of Shadows

Seneca once observed that we are often frightened by the appearance of things rather than the things themselves. We see a gesture and immediately assign it a history of malice, or we witness a sudden movement and assume it is the precursor to a collapse. Our minds are restless architects, constantly building narratives out of […]
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The Wisdom of the Small Photo of the Day
August 25, 2018

The Wisdom of the Small

Epictetus once remarked that we should not seek to have events happen as we want them to, but instead want them to happen as they do happen. It is a profound shift in perspective, moving the center of our gravity from the demanding ego to the reality of the world as it exists. We are […]
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The Quietude of Being Photo of the Day
August 6, 2018

The Quietude of Being

Seneca once observed that we are often more concerned with the duration of our lives than with their quality, forgetting that the span of a single day, if lived with full attention, contains the entire architecture of existence. We spend our hours looking toward the horizon, waiting for some grand event to justify our presence, […]
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The Unrepeatable Light Photo of the Day
August 6, 2018

The Unrepeatable Light

Seneca once remarked that time is the only thing we can truly call our own, yet we treat it as if it were an infinite resource, squandering the present while waiting for a more significant moment to arrive. We often look at the turning of the day as a routine occurrence, a predictable cycle that […]
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The Integrity of Earth Photo of the Day
August 5, 2018

The Integrity of Earth

Seneca once observed that we are like the stones of a building; if one is removed, the whole structure feels the shift, yet the individual stone remains defined by its place and its burden. We often look at the world as a series of fleeting impressions, forgetting that the most enduring things are those that […]
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