Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 7.8

Let not future things disturb you, for you will come to them, if it shall be necessary, having with you the same reason which now you use for present things.

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 7 (tr Long)

Back in middle school, I was told that another student in my class disliked me intensely. I had no idea why, because I always kept to myself, but bullies don’t need a reason beyond their own issues. I was told, in all the glory and grandeur of gossip, that he was going to beat me senseless. He apparently insisted that bones would be broken.

Yes, I was afraid.

I was informed that the great beating event would happen after school. For a few days, I made excuses to stay at school late. Then I started taking circuitous routes from the building.

Then I finally had enough. If it will happen, I thought, it will happen. I know I’ve done no wrong to this fellow. I will keep thinking that way, and I will stick with it. Let him do what he needs to do. I will do what I need to do.

One day, he and his three friends saw me leaving school, right out in the open, as I walked home. They glared at me, and I glared right back. Wonder of wonders, they walked away. It could easily have ended very differently.

This was the experience of a child growing into a man. I am well advised to keep that experience in mind, at all times, now that I am a man.

Whatever may happen, or especially whatever inevitably will happen, is not within my power to determine. Nor do I know exactly what I may or may not do, or how I may or may not think in the future. Those are choices I am still going to make.

But why should I be so troubled? I can make a commitment right now, and everything I possess right now will be more than enough to manage what may come. I only need to maintain that commitment. I do not need to provide anything more for the future than what I already have at this very point in time.

There are no additional requirements. There are no special tricks. If I can be a good man now, I can also be a good man tomorrow. No situation needs to change that. So I can be decent at this moment, just for this moment, and I can push it forward one moment at a time. The rest will manage itself.

Somehow, I survived my wedding day with absolute confidence. That didn’t come from any arrogance or assumption. It came from an awareness that who I was, at the very moment I spoke my vows, could last for the rest of my life, if only I chose to make it so. Nothing needed to be added. It was all there, and I had to renew those vows, every day, even every hour, even at every moment.

It is all there for me now. Tomorrow can be a continuing of the now.

Written in 9/2007