Jianfa Tsai’s Input
What’s the most honest piece of advice you’ve ever gotten from a book, the kind that didn’t feel good to read? Jianfa Tsai: Memento mori.
Explaining Like I’m 5 (ELI5)
Imagine you have a giant, magical box of your absolute favorite chocolates, but you know it is the only box you will ever get and when it is empty, it is gone forever. At first, realizing the chocolates will run out might make you feel sad or a little scared. However, because you know they are limited, you will not just throw them around or eat them without tasting them; instead, you will slow down, enjoy every single bite, and share them with the people you love. “Memento mori” is just a grown-up way of saying “remember the chocolates will run out,” which stops us from wasting our precious days on things that do not actually matter.
The Psychological and Philosophical Depth of Mortality Salience
The ancient Latin maxim memento mori, translated directly as “remember that you must die,” serves as a cornerstone of Stoic philosophy designed to shock the practitioner out of cognitive complacency and autopilot behavioral patterns (Ahuja, 2026).memento mori While confronting the absolute certainty of one’s own demise initially induces existential friction, academic literature demonstrates that deliberate death reflection shifts an individual’s orientation away from superficial, extrinsic goals toward intrinsic values such as personal growth and deeper community connection (Cozzolino et al., 2004). Within psychological frameworks like Terror Management Theory, a controlled framework of mortality awareness—often called death salience—acts as a powerful psychological clarifier, shrinking daily anxieties by forcing a radical reassessment of personal priorities (Shumate, 2025). Rather than promoting nihilism, historical text analysis of Roman Stoicism reveals that keeping the finite nature of time at the forefront of consciousness is an active strategy to eliminate regret and build genuine perfection of character (UCR Magazine, 2021).
Action Steps for Personal, Academic, and Professional Growth
- Establish a Perspective Pause Protocol: When encountering stressful impediments or relationship tensions in your daily routine, intentionally apply a “last-day lens” to the scenario to immediately deflate cognitive friction and reduce the psychological weight of minor setbacks (Shumate, 2025).
- Implement Structured Mortality Journaling: Dedicate 5 to 10 minutes every week to answer specific existential prompts, such as identifying deferred goals or recognizing behavioral patterns you would regret continuing if your time were suddenly shortened (Life Note, 2026).
- Audit Commitments via Via Negativa: Systematically review your academic, personal, and professional tasks; eliminate lower-value activities that consume finite cognitive energy, ensuring your limited time is explicitly channeled into high-impact projects that reflect your deepest values (Life Note, 2026; UCR Magazine, 2021).
Date
Monday, June 1, 2026, 8:09 PM AEST
Authors
Jianfa Tsai (https://orcid.org/0009-0006-1809-1686) in collaboration with Gemini AI Pro.
References
Ahuja, R. (2026, March 2).Ahuja, R. (2026, March 2). Memento mori: Contemplating death can lead to a fulfilling life. Medium. https://medium.com/@Ritika.Ahuja/memento-mori-b4aecceb2242
Cozzolino, P. J., Staples, A. D., Meyers, L. S., & Samboceti, J. (2004). Greed or gratitude? Death awareness and the resolution of unmitigated self-interest. Psychological Science, 15(1), 57–61. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0963-7214.2004.01501009.x
Life Note. (2026, April 27). Memento mori journaling: Daily method, 35 prompts & mortality researchMemento mori journaling: Daily method, 35 prompts & mortality research. https://blog.mylifenote.ai/memento-mori-journaling/
Shumate, M. (2025, December 8).Shumate, M. (2025, December 8). Memento mori and mental health: Why remembering death can help us live. Aim Wellbeing. https://aimwellbeing.com/memento-mori-and-mental-health-why-remembering-death-can-help-us-live/
UCR Magazine. (2021). Memento mori. University of California, Riverside. https://news.ucr.edu/ucr-magazine/fall-2021/memento-mori