Nothing will ever kill the interest in the Roman Empire. The popularity for it ebbs and flows, but there'll always be enough people fascinated by the Europe of that time to make books, television shows and movies do well. [b:Meditations|1168191|Meditations|Marcus Aurelius|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1383681793l/1168191.SY75.jpg|31010] by Marcus Aurelius (C.E. 121–180) is an excellent example of why. The version I got was translated by [a:Gregory Hays|446105|Gregory Hays|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] after reading reviews of translations by others. (A general rule I heard years ago is to always go with the most recent translation, but remember: that's a general rule, meaning it's meant to be broken often.)
At times it reads almost like a modern self-help book, but with an oldish use of language. From Book Three:

12. If you do the job in a principled way, with diligence, energy and patience, if you keep yourself free of distractions, and keep the spirit inside you undamaged, as if you might have to give it back at any moment—
If you can embrace this without fear or expectation—can find fulfillment in what you're doing now, as Nature intended, and in superhuman truthfulness (every word, every utterance)—then your life will be happy.
No one can prevent that.
13. Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too—ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring the earth.
14. Stop drifting. You're not going to re-read your Brief Comments, your Deeds of the Ancient Greeks and Romans,the commonplace books you saved for your old age. Sprint for the finish. Write off your hopes, and if your well-being matters to you, be your own savior while you still can.

At other times, it reads like the title implies, of things to think through on your own. From Book Three:

40. The world as a living being—one nature, one soul, keep that in mind. And how everything feeds into that single experience, moves with a single motion. And how everything helps produce everything else. Spun and woven together.
41. A little wisp of soul carrying a corpse."—Epictetus
42. There is nothing bad in undergoing change—or good in emerging from it.
43. Time is a river, a violent current of events, glimpsed once and already carried past us, and another follows and is gone.

The Introduction is longish at lvii pages, but most of it is essential reading, though readers who know more about philosophy than I do or are smarter than I will get more out of it than I did.
Meditations is the kind of book that after reading it through you'll want to keep at hand. You can open it to any page, re-read it, and get something out of it.