Remember how long you have been putting off things, and how often you have received an opportunity from the gods, and yet not use it. You must now at last perceive that you are part of the universe, and that the universe’s existence is an efflux, and that a limit of time is fixed for you, which if you do not use for clearing away the clouds from your mind, it will go and you will go, and it will never return. Every moment you should think steadily as a Roman and as a man to do what he must in hand with perfect and simple dignity, and a feeling of affection, and freedom, and justice; and to give yourself relief from all other thoughts. And you will give yourself relief, if you live your every act in life as if it were the last, laying aside all carelessness and passionate aversion from the commands of reason , and all hypocrisy, and self-love , and discontent with the portion which has been given to you. You see how few the things are, of which if a man has hold of, he is able to live a life which flows in quiet, and is like the existence of the gods; for the gods on their part will require nothing more from him who observes these things. Do wrong to yourself, do wrong to yourself, your soul; but you will no longer have the opportunity of honoring yourself. Every man’s life is sufficient. But yours is nearly finished, and although your soul should revere itself it also places its happiness in the souls of others.

Aurelius, Marcus. Meditations: Adapted for the Contemporary Reader (Harris Classics) (pp. 20-21). Kindle Edition.