Premeditation of evil

Premeditatio malorum is a Stoic exercise that consists in calmly anticipating possible misfortunes in order to prepare oneself inwardly. It is neither pessimism nor anxious rumination, but a training of the mind to face what may happen without being caught off guard or destabilized.

From a Stoic perspective, much of our suffering comes less from events themselves than from surprise, frustrated expectations, or the illusion that certain things “should not” happen. Premeditatio malorum aims to dissolve these illusions. By imagining loss, failure, illness, exile, or ingratitude in advance, one strips such events of their power to shock.

This exercise serves several purposes. First, it clarifies the distinction between what depends on us and what does not. The feared events almost always belong to the latter category; what depends on us, by contrast, is how we respond to them. Second, it weakens future passions: what has been thought through, accepted, and integrated beforehand strikes less violently when it occurs. Finally, it strengthens present gratitude: what you possess today appears more fragile, and therefore more precious.

Premeditatio malorum does not invite us to live in fear, but in preparedness. It transforms fear into lucidity, and lucidity into stability. In this sense, it is an exercise in freedom: being ready to lose what one loves without ceasing to love it, and being ready to face adversity without identifying with it.

For the Stoics, anticipating misfortune has only one aim: to make the soul steadier, more flexible, and less dependent on chance. It is not about imagining the worst in order to suffer in advance, but in order to suffer less—or not at all—when adversity arrives.