Transcript of Why Getting Married is the DUMBEST Thing You Can Do – Marcus Aurelius

Who is the most powerful man in the world? The ruler of the greatest empire in history. The one who sits alone in his tent on a battlefield. What about Marcus Aurelius? The man whose armies rest, but he writes by candlelight. Not battle plans, but reflections on the human condition. You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realize this and you will find strength. In those candlelight hours, he understood that your inner fortress is more important than any relationship you have with others. Your emotional discipline matters more than romantic validation. Your duty to yourself comes before your desire for someone else. But our marriage obsessed world calls us crazy. We're told that not marrying means something's wrong with you. that emotional chaos is just passion and dependency is just love. Marcus Aurelius would call this the dumbest thing and he'd be right. Stay with me and you'll learn why getting married is the enemy of inner peace. And inner peace, the Stoics taught, is the only thing worth pursuing. Welcome to modern romance. Endless swiping, emotional roller coasters, constant anxiety about whether they'll text back, ghosting, breadcrumbming, situationships that go nowhere. Your mind, the one thing you actually control, becomes a battlefield of someone else's moods, decisions, and whims. Marcus Aurelius faced literal battlefields and called them easier to navigate than the human heart left undisiplined. Watch how people behave in relationships today. They check their phones obsessively. They analyze every word for hidden meaning. They construct elaborate theories about why someone took 3 hours to respond instead of two. And at the end of the day, they call it love. But is it really love? Have you ever asked yourself? Because this isn't love. It's mental slavery. Your thoughts become consumed by another person's behavior. Your peace depends on their mood. Your day is ruined by their distance or made by their attention. Marcus wrote, "How much trouble he avoids who does not look to see what his neighbor says or does, but only to what he does himself." Yet in relationships, we do the opposite. We become investigators of someone else's emotional state while neglecting the governance of our own mind. We lose the very thing that makes us powerful. Our inner authority. The emperor who conquered the known world understood something most people never learn. The only territory worth conquering is your own consciousness. The only victory that matters is the one over your own unruly emotions. The only kingdom that truly belongs to you is the space between your ears. But modern relationships, marriage, dating, it turns you into a refugee from your own mind. Here's what separates the stoic from the ordinary person. The stoic masters emotions. The ordinary person is mastered by them. People think that stoicism is about suppressing feelings or becoming cold. It's not. It's about emotional discipline, feeling fully while choosing your response consciously. And relationships are the ultimate test of this discipline. When you're single, your emotions are your own. You feel anger, you examine it, understand it, and choose how to respond. You feel sadness, you sit with it, learn from it, and move through it with dignity. But in relationships, your emotions become entangled with someone else's emotional state. Their bad day becomes your anxiety. Their distance becomes your insecurity. Their moods become your master. Marcus Aurelius spent his life learning to be unmoved by external circumstances. You are an actor in a play, he wrote. If it's short, then it's short. If it's long, then it's long. If he wants you to play a poor man, play even that role skillfully. And similarly, if a or a public official or a private citizen. But most people in relationships become terrible actors. They forget their choosing their role. They let someone else direct their emotional performance. They give away their script and wonder why the play feels out of control. The single person practicing stoicism has a massive advantage. They can observe their emotions without the complication of someone else's emotional drama. They can build emotional resilience without being constantly triggered by a partner's unresolved issues. This is why Marcus called solitude the philosophers's laboratory. In solitude, you learn to distinguish between what you can control and what you cannot. You discover that your happiness doesn't depend on anyone else's behavior. You build what the Stoics called the inner citadel, an unshakable core of peace that no external circumstance can disturb. But there's something even more powerful about emotional discipline. When you master your own emotions, you become immune to manipulation. You can't be guilt tripped, lovebombed, or emotionally controlled. You become what Marcus called a citizen of the world, free, sovereign, and self-governing. And this brings us to something most people get completely wrong about purpose. A man's worth is no greater than the worth of his ambitions. Marcus Aurelius understood that life's meaning comes from duty, virtue, and contribution, not from fleeting pleasures or romantic highs. But modern culture and the marriage system have flipped this completely upside down. We're told to prioritize how we feel over what we do, to chase happiness instead of meaning, to seek pleasure over purpose. And marriages become the ultimate distraction from what actually matters. becoming the person you're capable of being. Watch people sacrifice their dreams for relationships. They abandon their fitness routine because their partner doesn't like it. They give up career opportunities to avoid long distance. They compromise their values to keep the peace. They lose themselves trying to keep someone else. Marcus faced this temptation constantly. As emperor, he could have indulged in any pleasure, pursued any romantic fantasy, surrounded himself with yesmen and distractions. Instead, he chose duty. He spent his life serving something greater than his immediate desires. He built roads, established laws, protected the empire, not because it felt good, but because it was right. This is what the Stoics called the discipline of desire. Wanting what is right over what feels good. Choosing what serves your character over what serves your cravings. Building a life of substance over a life of sensation. Being single forces this discipline. You can't use romantic excitement as a drug to avoid the hard work of self-development. You can't distract yourself with relationship drama when you should be building your career, your body, your mind. You have to face the question that terrifies most people. Who am I when no one is watching? This is where greatness begins. Not in the validation of another person, but in the daily choice to become worthy of your own respect. Marcus wrote, "Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one. But you can't become good while constantly seeking approval from your marriage partner." And this brings us to the most important stoic practice of all. Nowhere you can go is more peaceful, more free of interruptions than your own soul. This might be the most radical statement in all of philosophy. In a world obsessed with external stimulation, Marcus Aurelius declared that your inner world is the most fascinating place you could ever visit. But most people are terrified of their own company. They need constant noise, constant interaction, constant validation. They'd rather scroll through their phone than sit with their thoughts. They'd rather be in a bad relationship than face the silence of self-reflection. Why? Because they don't actually know who they are. They've spent so much time defining themselves through others eyes, their parents approval, their friends opinions, their partner's desires that they've never met themselves. The Stoics believe self-nowledge was the foundation of all wisdom. Know thyself wasn't just ancient advice. It was the first step toward freedom, but you can't know yourself while constantly adapting to someone else. In relationships, you're always slightly performing, slightly adjusting, slightly becoming what you think the other person wants. This isn't dishonesty. It's natural human adaptation, but it clouds self-awareness. Marcus spent hours each day in solitude, examining his thoughts, questioning his motivations, refining his character. His meditations weren't written for an audience. They were conversations with himself. At dawn, when you have trouble getting out of bed, tell yourself, "I have to go to work as a human being." This is the voice of someone who knows exactly who he is and what he's here to do. Not because someone else told him, but because he's done the work of self-discovery. And this work can only happen in solitude. When you're alone, you hear your authentic voice beneath all the social conditioning. You discover your real values beneath all the borrowed opinions. You find your true desires beneath all the external expectations. You start asking the questions that matter. What do I actually believe? What would I do if no one was watching? What legacy do I want to leave? What kind of person do I want to become? These questions have no easy answers, but they have true answers. And you can only find them when you stop seeking validation from others and start seeking truth from yourself. Marcus called this the view from above, the ability to see your life with clarity without the distortion of immediate emotions or social pressures. Now let's move to something most people misunderstand about stoicism and love. The Stoics weren't against love. They were against unregulated attachment. There's a massive difference. Love in its pure form wants the best for another person. Attachment wants another person to make you feel better about yourself. And most of what we call love is actually attachment in disguise. Watch how people behave when they're in love. They think about the other person constantly. Their mood depends on the other person's attention. They make decisions based on what will keep the other person happy rather than what serves their own growth. Marcus would call this slavery to externals, allowing your inner state to be controlled by forces outside your authority. You have power over your mind, not outside events. But in attachment-based relationships, you give that power away. You make someone else's behavior the master of your emotional state. The emperor understood something most lovers never learn. Your inner fortress, your peace, your purpose, your sense of self is too valuable to place under someone else's control. The moment you need someone else to feel complete, you've compromised your sovereignty. This doesn't mean becoming cold or unfeilling. It means loving from a place of strength rather than weakness, choice rather than compulsion, abundance rather than scarcity. And here's the paradox about love. When you don't need someone, you can actually love them freely. When your happiness doesn't depend on their behavior, you can appreciate them without trying to control them. When you're complete in yourself, you can offer yourself without losing yourself. Marcus loved his wife Fainina despite knowing she was unfaithful. Not because he was weak, but because he was strong. He chose love over attachment, virtue over victimhood, dignity over drama. But this level of love is impossible when you're emotionally dependent. Dependency creates fear. Fear creates control. Control creates conflict. Conflict destroys love. The single person practicing stoicism has the opportunity to break the cycle. They can learn to love without attachment by first learning to be complete without anyone else. They can practice unconditional appreciation for friends, family, even strangers without the complication of romantic need. This is what the Stoics called preferred indifference. You can prefer to have love in your life while remaining indifferent to whether you actually get it. You can appreciate relationships while not being attached to their outcomes. You can enjoy companionship while not depending on it for your wellbeing. The best thing about being single is it's a disciplined training camp for the most important skill you'll ever develop. Self-mastery. Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one. But most people spend their single time arguing with themselves about why they don't have someone. They analyze what's wrong with them. They strategize about how to become more attractive. They wait for their real life to begin when they find their person. Marcus would call this a catastrophic waste of time and attention. Your single years aren't preparation for real life. They are real life. Every day you wake up is an opportunity to practice virtue. Every challenge you face is a chance to build character. Every moment of solitude is a gift to develop the most important relationship you'll ever have, the one with yourself. The Stoics believed in what they called the discipline of action, aligning your daily behavior with your highest values regardless of external circumstances. This is much easier when you're not constantly distracted by relationship dynamics. You can build morning routines without negotiating with someone else's schedule. You can pursue challenging goals without worrying about how they affect your partner. You can make difficult decisions based on what's right rather than what keeps the peace. Think of it as building your philosophical muscles. Every day you choose discipline over impulse. You get stronger. Every time you find contentment in your own company, you become more self-sufficient. Every moment you spend improving yourself rather than seeking validation. you become more valuable not to others but to yourself. Marcus spent years on military campaigns often alone with his thoughts and his duties. He used this solitude to become the most powerful person in the world. Not just politically but psychologically. He built the inner citadel, an unshakable core of peace, purpose, and perspective that no external circumstance could disturb. Not defeat in battle, not criticism from senators, not even betrayal by those he loved. This inner citadel is what makes someone truly attractive. Not their need for validation, but their lack of it. Not their dependency, but their self-sufficiency. Not their emotional reactivity, but their emotional stability. And here's what happens when you build this inner strength. You become what the Stoics called the sage. Someone so centered in themselves that they become a source of stability for others. People are drawn to your peace, your purpose, your unshakable sense of self. But this attraction is different from the desperate magnetism of neediness. It's the attraction of someone who has something to offer rather than something to get. Which brings us to the ultimate stoic truth about relationships. Here's what Marcus Aurelius knew about love, relationships, and happiness. Very little is needed to make a happy life. It is all within yourself in your way of thinking. Listen to that again. Very little is needed to make a happy life. Not a soulmate, not romantic completion, not someone else's love or validation or presence, just your way of thinking. This isn't positive thinking or self-help nonsense. This is the hardest, most practical wisdom ever discovered. Your inner state is entirely within your control. And your inner state determines the quality of your entire existence. But here's what this really means for relationships. When you're happy alone, you can be happy with someone else. When you're complete by yourself, you can compliment another person. When you don't need love, you can give love freely. The person who has built their inner citadel doesn't enter relationships from desperation. They enter from abundance. They don't seek completion. They offer enhancement. They don't need rescue. They provide strength. This is what Marcus called the view from above. The ability to see your life with perfect clarity beyond the immediate emotions and social pressures. From this perspective, you realize that the relationship you've been desperately seeking with someone else is actually the relationship you need to have with yourself. And when you have that relationship, when you become your own best friend, your own source of wisdom, your own provider of peace, something extraordinary happens. You realize that you never needed anyone else to complete you because completion was never the goal. Growth was the goal. Character was the goal. Virtue was the goal. When you stop seeking happiness in relationships and start creating happiness within yourself, you become the kind of person who attracts authentic love. Not because you're trying to be attractive, but because you're genuinely fulfilled. The best thing you can do isn't finding someone to complete you. It's building yourself into someone who needs no completion. It's becoming so centered in your own virtue, so clear about your own purpose, so at peace with your own company that any relationship you choose becomes an addition to an already fulfilling life, not a solution to an incomplete one. Marcus Aurelius ruled the world, but found his greatest victory in ruling himself. So, it's time for you to rule yourself by avoiding the dumbest mistake of getting married. [Music]