It’s always funny to read people’s hot takes about stoicism because they seem to polarize into two mutually exclusive camps. In one camp, stoicism is a “hollow, dissociative, nihilist philosophy” for sociopathic emperors and in the other, it’s just cope for people without the power or agency to change anything in the world around them. If anything the bipolar nature of this criticism itself validates the broad applicability of Stoicism.
And actually it is an accident that Marcus Aurelius is the “premier famous stoic”, largely because, as you point out, his personal journal wasn’t actually burned as he requested. If you actually engage at even a marginally deeper level than social media slop—e.g. by taking an undergraduate survey course in ancient philosophy—you’ll learn that the premier Stoic was Epictetus, who was born into slavery.
It’s also a glib misreading of Marcus Aurelius to characterize his writings as “bitter rants”. Much of “Meditations” takes the form of an internal dialogue between the emperor’s base feelings (which are sometimes bitter and sometimes as simple as not being a morning person) and his intellect as it works to apply Stoic philosophy to his own life. If you’re not an emperor you might not relate to having to deal with surly and ungrateful supplicants or the need to remind yourself that you aren’t actually a living god, and if you’re also a morning person, Marcus Aurelius is probably completely wasted on you. But that’s not what Marcus Aurelius is for. If you want a practical Stoic handbook, read the Enchiridion.
And actually it is an accident that Marcus Aurelius is the “premier famous stoic”, largely because, as you point out, his personal journal wasn’t actually burned as he requested. If you actually engage at even a marginally deeper level than social media slop—e.g. by taking an undergraduate survey course in ancient philosophy—you’ll learn that the premier Stoic was Epictetus, who was born into slavery.
It’s also a glib misreading of Marcus Aurelius to characterize his writings as “bitter rants”. Much of “Meditations” takes the form of an internal dialogue between the emperor’s base feelings (which are sometimes bitter and sometimes as simple as not being a morning person) and his intellect as it works to apply Stoic philosophy to his own life. If you’re not an emperor you might not relate to having to deal with surly and ungrateful supplicants or the need to remind yourself that you aren’t actually a living god, and if you’re also a morning person, Marcus Aurelius is probably completely wasted on you. But that’s not what Marcus Aurelius is for. If you want a practical Stoic handbook, read the Enchiridion.