A practice paired with the memory of death: the refusal of every "sometime later." If the memory of death provides the background ("I am mortal, time is short"), "no more delay" draws the practical conclusion: philosophical work, then, begins this minute, and not "when things settle down." In Marcus the exercise takes the form of a regular self-reproach: I have already received so many extensions of term (προθεσμίαι) from the gods, and have used none of them. The aim is to convert the recognition of mortality into present action, so that the distance between "I know" and "I do" does not exceed the current moment.

(1) At the moment consciousness formulates "I will take up philosophy later," notice this formula as resistance and refute it by your previous postponements: "how many times have I said this already?" (2) Reduce the practice-goal to what is doable now: a single short meditation, a single review of an impression, a single refusal-of-action. (3) Do not bargain with yourself for "the right conditions" (quiet, time, mood) — Stoic practice is possible in any conditions; otherwise it does not work in principle. (4) Combine with keeping the teachings ready to hand: the exercise of immediacy is impossible without ready formulae, because procrastination is often simply the lack of a ready answer.